How to Create Color Swatches using Photoshop

Anna_Marie_grisaille_Apr11.jpg

Last time I talked about how to posterize an image in Photoshop. After I converted my reference photo to black and white, I used the posterized image to quickly place the corresponding values on the face. Since everything got simplified down to 4 values, the grizaille came together much faster than usual.

What we think we see and what is actually there are two different things and I thought it might be fun to take a look at the color swatches for this reference photo.

Create Color Swatches on Photoshop

Create Color Swatches on Photoshop

Let's say you have a photo and like to create a color swatch table for all the colors present in the image (see custom made swatches on the upper - right):

Open photo

Click on Image>Mode>Index Color

keep Preserve Colors on to get the exact colors of your image> click >OK

click on Image>Mode>Color Table -- This pulls up all the color swatches of your image

click SAVE> name.act >OK

(I like to save the color swatches where I also keep my reference photos, just make sure you save it as an .ACT file)

Go back to Image

Click on Image>Mode>RGB to change back to previous file

Now go to SWATCH Palette

Click> Replace Swatches

Opened Color Table - Locate your saved swatch file

Source:

Adobe Photoshop Video

Update: Below is the finished painting so you can see how the painting is build layer by layer. 

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