How would I remove the gray area around the snow globe?

[firstdefence]

I reckon with a combination we could have a decent background removal macro, mine seems to preserve the colours on the trees but loses the white because of the Erase white paper filter, back to the drawing board.

[Pšenda]

29 minutes ago, firstdefence said:

Congratulations you now have an Affinity Photo created transparent image and you can do it in one click with the Macro...

How will this macro solve the OP request?

 

On 12/9/2021 at 11:24 PM, Pšenda said:

If I understand question correctly (the gray area around the snow globe), then globe area must be masked. 

 

[firstdefence]

Seems to defeat the object of making the background transparent if the area within the globe is ignored, shouldn't the area within the globe also be transparent, that would make sense wouldn't.

But, regardless the area within the globe could be masked off prior so that the inner part is ignored by any processes. It just makes for a singular macro. The other view is that once the background is removed you can do whatever you want within the globe area so removing the background gives you many more options to wield the creative wand of amazingness. and produce the Christmas Card of the recipients dreams. 😁 🎄 

[Lisbon]

1 hour ago, firstdefence said:

1. Open the image
2. Duplicate the image layer
3. With the duplicate layer selected, go to Filters > Blur > Average
4. Change the duplicate layers blend mode to divide

Really nice.

Duplicate > Invert > Divide, also seems to work.

[firstdefence]

Hi Lisbon see my other macro re inverting...

BG to Trans Inverted.afmacro

 

This is a revised Macro to include the white area's my previous attempt blatantly missed, thanks to @prophet for pointing out...

BG Trans v2.afmacro

The process is taking too much of the white and to much pencil out so I think I'll try a v3 lol!

[prophet]

Teamwork makes the dream work.

[filoplume]

1 hour ago, Lisbon said:

Really nice.

Duplicate > Invert > Divide, also seems to work.

Interesting, but makes all the gray white, even inside the circle

[Lisbon]

2 hours ago, filoplume said:

Interesting, but makes all the gray white, even inside the circle

Exactly.
The steps that I have mentioned where just a suggestion for an alternative way of replacing steps 1 to 4 from @firstdefence.
His solution is better than mine.

This would be my workflow:

1) Make a copy of the background ("Original copy") and turn the visibility off.
2) Follow @firstdefence instructions
3) Set "Original copy" to screen and add a levels adjustment layer.
By adjusting the Black a white levels you can recover the white portions.

[Pšenda]

4 hours ago, firstdefence said:

shouldn't the area within the globe also be transparent, that would make sense wouldn't.

In my opinion, by comparing the drawings inside the globe, it is obvious why try to keep them and remove the background only outside.

 

But OP should think about how to distribute his drawing. If he really will print it on colored paper so that he can send it as a Christmas card, then there will be a problem with printing white and gray paper inside the globe. He will probably have no choice but to remove the background completely.
But if he wanted to create a picture of a Christmas card for sending by email, I would leave the inside of the ball, because this way the drawing is nicer in it.

[firstdefence]

Agreed, the loss of detail in the globe is probably a bit too much, although it keeps the essence of the image the loss of detail would suggest editing inside the globe should be avoided. I was trying to get a macro that could give options, I probably went a bit overboard and the limitations and feral nature of Erase white paper filter didn't help, but without experimentation and pushing the boundaries one cannot find solutions for the OP and other forum members and visitors that want to do a similar thing and if the macros help someone in the future that's a good thing.

 

[filoplume]

18 hours ago, Pšenda said:

In my opinion, by comparing the drawings inside the globe, it is obvious why try to keep them and remove the background only outside.

 

But OP should think about how to distribute his drawing. If he really will print it on colored paper so that he can send it as a Christmas card, then there will be a problem with printing white and gray paper inside the globe. He will probably have no choice but to remove the background completely.
But if he wanted to create a picture of a Christmas card for sending by email, I would leave the inside of the ball, because this way the drawing is nicer in it.

Hi,

I decided to have the printer use white linen for the card.  Too late to use all of your suggestions as I had to send it off to get them printed in time to send them out.

Thanks for all of the lessons! I learned a lot and I am sure everything will come in handy the next time I use toned gray paper and need to scan or copy it for something!

I am going to print out this thread and keep it for reference.

[filoplume]

Hello again,

For future reference, the scan of the image didn't turn out as gray as it looks on the toned gray paper.  It ended up looking a little yellow.

Any ideas how I could have made the snow globe look more gray like it does on the paper?  I only used a 4B pencil and white acrylic stick (except for the little colored pencil lights).

 

[firstdefence]

To me the background looks more of a green tinted grey, so it's not a neutral grey.

You could use a HSL adjustment filter to desaturate the greeny grey background, the left is the original colour the right is the desaturated effect.

To do this...

1. Select the HSL adjustment filter
   
2. Select a single colour, it doesn't matter which one, it's just to gain access to the Picker
   
3. Click on the Picker button and then click on an area of the background, I chose this area
   
4. Now move the saturation shift slider all the way to the left so it reads -100%
   
5. Your background should now be a more neutral grey.

[filoplume]

22 hours ago, firstdefence said:

To me the background looks more of a green tinted grey, so it's not a neutral grey.

You could use a HSL adjustment filter to desaturate the greeny grey background, the left is the original colour the right is the desaturated effect.

 

You are right!  More green, than yellow.

The globe turned out good from the printer but now I know for the next time I want to enhance anything like that.

Thanks FD!

[Paul Martin]

This any help?

Crystal ball.afdesign

[Paul Martin]

Or this?

[filoplume]

1 hour ago, Paul Martin said:

This any help?

Crystal ball.afdesign 616.73 kB · 0 downloads

That's it!!  How you do dat?

[Paul Martin]

2 hours ago, filoplume said:

That's it!!  How you do dat?

I think I found the original somewhere and have made several variants. It doesn't really answer your original query. My thorught would be to put you drawing onto a completely transparent layer )i.e. no pencil-shading and layer that over the crystal ball.

[filoplume]

By the way -Pixlr.com removed the background image very nicely!  One click.  Probably better than or as good as using the Selection Brush Tool in APhoto.  Certainly quicker! 🙂