Layer mask questions

[rxdan]

I am still working on the picture from my previous post. I now have 2 layers in my layers box, a background and a layer mask above it. The mask was created with a solid color fill after a selection. I chose red for the fill color because it would stand out against the blue sky. The mask icon to the right of the color fill icon has the sky/island as while and the foreground below as black. Any changes I make affect the foreground only. Can anyone tell if there is a simple way to reverse the mask so it blocks the foreground and not the background? I saved the selection before I made the mask, but it took me several hours to fine tune the mask after the selection was made because of all of the posts. Am I doomed to recall that selection, inverse it, create a new mask and spend another few hours fine tuning that one?

Thanks,

Dan

[rxdan]

Layer mask questions

I am using PSE2 with Hidden Power and I now have 2 layers in my layers box, the background and a layer mask above it. The mask was created with a solid color fill after a selection. I chose red for the fill color because it would stand out against the blue sky/island background. The mask icon to the right of the color fill icon has the sky/island as white and the foreground below as black. Any changes I make affect the foreground only.

Can anyone tell if there is a simple way to reverse the mask so it blocks the foreground and not the background? I saved the selection before I made the mask, but it took me awhile to fine tune the mask after the selection was made because of all of the details sticking up in to the sky from the foreground. I was hoping to avoid having to do all that fine tuning again.

Am I doomed to recall that selection, inverse it, create a new mask and spend more time fine tuning that one?

Should I have made the selection and then used the quick mask function in Hidden Power to created the mask and then modify that with the brush rather than just create a solid color mask and then fine tune that?

I just now thought about the quick mask and it probably would have been easier because it is transparent.

Any thoughts or words of wisdom would be greatly appreciated.

Thanks,

Dan

[Doug Nelson]

Maybe I'm not grasping the complexity of what you're trying to do, but couldn't you just invert the mask with Ctrl-I (the same thing as Image>Adjustments>Invert)? You'd want to make a copy of it first.

[Xaran]

If the mask is selected in the layers pallette then you should be able to just use the standard invert option from the image/adjustments menu.

Christine

[Kellilou]

inversing selection

In photoshop, while your mask is still active (meaning the lasso box is still highlighted), right click then "select inverse" This will quickly and easily invert your selection. I think that's the advice you want...

Kelly

[rxdan]

doh! I got it

The control-I was what I needed.

Thanks to all who helped!

Dan

p.s. I am sorry I posted my question twice. The first time my post reply started to go then went blank, so I thought it did not make it through.