Changing Colors

[PegM_4]

We are getting ready to get new siding for our house. Since we can no longer change the color every few years, I want to be sure I like what we get. I would like to take a photo of our house and scan the colors we are looking at, then sort of paint the colors onto our house image so I can see what it will look like. Is this possible?

The programs I have to work with are Photoshop Elements v.2, Paint Shop Pro v. 7, or GIMP.

Can anyone tell me how to use one of these programs to do what I want.

Thanks for any help
Peg

[TimeTraveler]

I'm not familiar with Elements, but PSP and GIMP can do what you need for this. Does Elements have layers?

The easiest way off the top of my head would be:

- Use the lasso to select the part of the house that you want to change color.
- Copy and past that to a new layer.
- Desaturate the new layer so the house is B&W.
- Scan the color swatches, open them, use the eyedropper to select a color.
- Hold down the control button (it's either control or alt) and left click on the B&W layer (on the thumbnail in the layers palette) to make it a selection.
- Use the paint bucket to fill the selection, and set the layer blend mode to color.

You can make a new layer for each color, and turn them on and off, instead of making a new document. Just duplicate the B&W layer for as many colors as you need, adding a new color to each layer. Turn off all of the duplicate layers except for the color that you want to view.

Also, if you don't want doors, windows, shutters, etc. to change color too, you will have to mask them out on the B&W layer.