Hue Saturation Lightness (HSL)
(24 bit colour)
The values for each of the HSL parameters can be varied between 0 and 255.
Paint Shop Pro 7 Colour Dialog Box
Hue can be changed by moving the small selector ring at the foot of the green arrow around the colour circle either by the mouse - or by changing the value in the Hue field. Increasing values causing the ring to progress anti-clockwise.
The inner square gives all of the shades for the currently selected Hue and movement in the direction of the yellow arrow varies the Saturation and the blue varies the Lightness.
All of the Colour Dialog controls interact and changes to one result in appropriate changes in others.
A typical application where HSL colour selection has a distinct advantage - which in the days before colour photography was known as "tinting". A method of hand painting over areas of black an white photographs with a transparent colouring. The tools for doing this in PSP7 are Colorize in the Color menu - and Color to Target on the Retouch tool - although with the former it affects the whole layer if an area hasn't been pre selected. Also you cannot use the Color Picker tool from within the Colorize box.
The images below illustrates how close the end result can be to the original - and the technique could also
be used to colour pictures of your ancestors.
The easiest way I have found to determine skin tone settings is to load a colour image as a reference that has an area of similar colouring to that you wish to reproduce.
YOU HAVE BEEN WARNED
Press the 'h' key to display the Histogram Window and set the Display channel to Hue. Note the Median value then repeat with the Display channel set to Saturation.
Now click Foreground at the top of the Color Palette to bring up the Color box as per the top of this page and enter the noted values in the Hue and Sat boxes - click OK - and you are ready for a "copy" of the target image which must be converted to 24 bit colour via the Colors menu.
If after testing a Hue - the effect is not right - try adjusting the hue value each way and try again. If either the reference or target images has used cosmetics - all bets are off!
This technique can be repeated for the eyes and other areas of a picture. Be warned -
eyes are particularly difficult as they contain many hues - and the
Red-eye Removal...
tool will probably
give more acceptable results - and can be accessed via
Effects>Enhance Photo.
You may also need to colour hair separately.
The left picture is the original and the right converted to Gray Scale then coloured in with a Colour to Target Retouch Brush with HSL settings of 11,66,200 for skin and HSL settings of 169,5,200 for eye taking many attempts to get the eye colour looking right.
When the Retouch tool is used in the Colour to Target mode the Lightness value is taken from the individual pixels of the target image - ignoring the palette setting.
It is possible to switch PSP7 so that the Color Dropper tool displays HSL values. This is done from the Dialogs and Palettes box which is reached via File>Preferences>General Program Preferences. where Display colors in HSL format must be selected. At the same time ensure Display all color dropper tooltips is also selected.