Problem painting on black layer masks

OS 10.5.8, Photoshop CS3. I am unable to paint with white on a black layer mask. When inverting and painting with black on a revealed underlaying layer it works fine. Is there a know bug which I have missed? This worked some time ago, but when trying again now (after the last OS update) it no longer works.

Hi ccyphoto07, welcome to the forum.
From what you've written, I assume you're sure you have the mask targeted in the Layers panel when painting on it...
Any chance your brush is set to something like Color instead of Normal blending?
Could you consider taking some screen grabs showing the problem (i.e. where you've painted on the mask, and it's showing black blotches in the Layers icon, but your image isn't transparent)?
Thanks.
-Noel
Edit: R_Kelly is too quick for me!

Similar Messages

What do you do when painting on a layer mask with the correct color dosen't work?

I have been trying to do some compositing but when i paint with white on a black layer mask or black on a white layer mask, NOTHING HAPPENS. What should I be looking for? Is there an adjustment that needs to be set a certain way? I would also like to know how you open multiple images in one document with each image on it's own layer. Thanks...

Everything is set correctly... still nothing.
I want to use a texture and an image. I have them both in the same document, but the only way to get the texture to allow the image to show through is to reduce the opacity. That's not the look I want. I tried clipping the two different images together, but then I could only see the photo itself and no texture. I just don't understand why when I set things correctly they don't work.
One other question if I may? Everything, all of a sudden is opening in Preview instead of with PS as it has always been in the past. I don't recall changing any settings. What should I look for to make PS my default...
Oh and one more thing. When I click on Safari photoshop goes missing and Safari shows. If I click on photoshop then Safari goes missing. This is INCREDIBLY annoying and I don't know why it's doing that. Both these things started at the same time. I'm on a Mac.

Eraser tool doesn't work for black layer mask

I am trying to set a black layer mask and use the eraser tool to edit it. Unfortunately the eraser tool is not responsive. I'm not knowingly doing anything differently than I've done in the past. I recently did a round of software updates for CS6. Wondering if anyone else is experienceing this and if there's a solution?

Check that foreground color in the toolbox is set to black. (opposite from when using the brush tool)
Press D and then the X key.
And that opacity and flow are 100%.
Most people use the brush tool on layer masks and you might find that works better.

No "Paint" Visible on Layer Mask (CS6 Photoshop)

So, when you're editing a picture using the layer mask, you have the black paint on the paint brush to select it. You paint it, and you see in the side-panel: the right side which is the layer, and the left side which is the white box with black paint on it. You'd think the black paint would also be where you can see it while you're editing the damn picture. But I am not proper enough to know how to make this "paint"... appear! Where the hell is my "paint," and why wouldn't it be on the main picture? Damn it, I just want to make a basic mask. Thanks for your help.

Hey, thank you! One other problem, though: now it's just a white screen with black paint. I need to see what I'm painting around. Thanks Again!

Painting on Shape layer mask not working correctly

I created a Gradient layer and assigned a vector mask. I then added a mask channel. When I activate the mask channel the forground/background color switch to black and white, but if I attempt to swap the colors, either by clicking the "Swap colors" icon or "Shift-X" the LAYER color changes to black. I am unable to simply paint with black or white on the mask channel. Am I doing something wrong or is there a bug in PSCC 14.2?
This process works as expected n PSCS6.

Am I doing something wrong or is there a bug in PSCC 14.2?
Is the question meant seriously?
Is the Layer Mask actually selected in the Layers Panel?
Could you please post a screenshot with the pertinent Panels visible?

Painting with a Layer Mask Advice

I created a layer mask that includes a person's face and a mask of a computer chip, so I can selectively paint parts of the chip onto his face, with the goal of making it seem as if the person is a robot. I am able to successfully create the mask and paint back from the mask, however, it does not look at all convincing. It just seems like the effect is sticking on the face.
1. Can anyone give me some advice for next steps to make it look more believable?
2. I'm playing with layer blending modes. Should I be selecting the image or its mask when applying the blending mode.
Thanks for any advice/suggestions!

Look for a Photoshop tutorial on Displacement Map. If you want to have the circuited board contoured to his face. Place a dupe of the face image on top of the contoured board. Mask the face to show parts of the board, Add a layer style to the face layer like a drop shadow to add some depth.

Layer mask brush/gradient tool not working in black.

I have cannot paint in black to conceal on a layer mask. I have "NORMAL" mode set and the foreground color is set to black. When I paint or use the gradient tool in "normal" mode with black it paints to transparent.   Before the uprade it was normal.   I have this problem on both CS6 apps pc-and-laptop. I am lost here. Can I get someone to help a brother out...
Thanks,
Kenny

Same issue, please see below:
Given:
     Photoshop 12.1 x64 on OS X 10.7
Problem:
     Painting with black and using the 'gradation tool' inside a 'white' (everything exposed) layer mask is NOT WORKING:
The facts:
     1) Using a black-to-white gradation in a white layer mask is not working.
     2) Using a black-to-transparent gradation in a white layer mask is not working.
     3) But, a using a white-to-black gradation in a black layer mask is working.
     4) or, using a white-to-transparent gradation in a black layer mask is working.
This used-to work. Shall we keep an eye out for a fix or is Adobe going to back-out this bug from the update that broke this?

Layer Mask Issue, please help.

Hi,
My layer mask is not working, not sure what's happening. I'm using CS 4 . i want to use blending effect so i place the photos on a white background. I click layer mask on each photo, select brush tool brush on the photo but is not working, is either appear black or white color when i use the brush paint on it. If not wrong, the foreground color should be grey & white in layer mask function but it appear black & white instead. Please see the screenshot below. Please help, thank you

Hi, I will try explain your problem.
In your posted example we can see see that you have three layers in the layers panel.
On each one of layers, we can see, on the left side, that there is the Layer Thumbnail, that is a showing the actual image of your layer and then a Layer Mask Thumbnail (the white rectangle, on the right side).
A layer mask works as follows: you tell Photoshop to display or hide actual parts (pixels) of the layer with greyscale values. A white pixel on the layer masks tells Photoshop to show the image area at full opacity (non-transparent), while a black pixel on the layer mask tells Photoshop to hide the layer totally (0% of opacity.) Gray values will therefore show the image data partially.
But you are painting on the document, and you need to indicate Photoshop whether you want to paint on the image (what you did in your example, and you do not desire) or if you want to paint on the layer mask (what you want to do). This indication is called Targeting. It is done simply by clicking either on the Layer thumbnail, or on the Layer mask thumbnail of your layer. (Clicking different areas of a layer in the layer palette are different orders you give to the program). For instance, if you want to switch the layer you are hiding to another one, in order to paint on its mask, make sure to click on the layer mask thumbnail of the other layer in the Layers Panel.
In Photoshop CS5.5 and earlier, you will see that a layer or its mask is targeted because there will be three outlines around it: a black, a white and a black one again, like the actual layer data in the highlighted layer 0928 of your image. You should see those three outlines around the layer mask in order to paint on it.
In CS6, the target indicator is different, look in my image, we can see that the layer mask is targeted thanks to the white corners: I was then able to mask part of the black layer by targeting the Layer Mask in the layer panel, and then painting on the image where I want to hide the layer.
If you want to modify the actual layer (the photos, in your case), simply click on its thumbnail, and you are good to go!
Hope this helps.
See these help documents: Layes Basics: http://help.adobe.com/en_US/photoshop/cs/using/WSfd1234e1c4b69f30ea53e41001031ab64-78e3a.h tml
Layer masks: http://helpx.adobe.com/photoshop/using/masking-layers.html
Some search results for "Layer Masks Basics" in Photoshop help: http://community.adobe.com/help/search.html?q=layer+mask+basics&x=0&y=0&lbl=photoshop_prod uct_adobelr&hl=en_US&lr=en_US&self=0&area=0
(It is one of the best ways to search for tutorials or help files)
Pierre

PS CC (since JAN 2014 update) Layer-mask editing causes hangs/crashes

ONLY since JAN 2014 update, PS CC has been hanging/crashing when I paint/edit a layer mask. All may be well at first (or not), but suddenly the display of the mask (or mask overlay on the layer itself, as shown when hitting backslash key) is not shown in full but renders in s-l-o-w-l-y in rectilinear pieces <snapshot below was taken before video card upgraded but is still typical of what I mean>. When I view Windows' Task Manager for PS, I see my CPUs are each working at their upper limits (up to 80+-90+%), varying only by a few points, over a VERY long time... which could be MANY minutes. OR the System has decided PS is Not Responding.
In any case, whenever this happens, it means in all practicality PS CC is not working, so I either kill it or it's crashed.
Now, here's the thing: that VERY file, can immediately be opened in PS CS6 (which I have fortunately kept installed on my computer), and the mask will be as I thought it should be, and I can edit it as I always could, just fine! So it's obviously a PS CC thing, and I do NOT recall this happening prior to the JAN update. It is still a problem after the two subsequent updates.
I have not been able to determine the specific instances when this happens, as it seems to happen whenever I am editing a mask, no matter what size/softness/color brush, what magnification, what view mode, many or few layers, big or small file, etc.
I did upgrade my NVIDIA card (from GeForce GTX 260 [with current driver] to GTX660), just in case it was a factor (maybe kept it from crashing as fast? hard to tell... but it's still an unworkable problem). You can see from my Sys Info shown here from the PS CC Help menu that it should be more than sufficient for any PS CC task, and it's running the latest driver:
Adobe Photoshop Version: 14.2.1 (14.2.1 20140207.r.570 2014/02/07:23:00:00) x64
Operating System: Windows 7 64-bit
Version: 6.1 Service Pack 1
System architecture: Intel CPU Family:6, Model:14, Stepping:5 with MMX, SSE Integer, SSE FP, SSE2, SSE3, SSE4.1, SSE4.2
Physical processor count: 4
Processor speed: 2664 MHz
Built-in memory: 16379 MB
Free memory: 12453 MB
Memory available to Photoshop: 14697 MB
Memory used by Photoshop: 60 %
Image tile size: 1024K
Image cache levels: 4
Font Preview: Medium
TextComposer: Latin
Display: 1
Display Bounds: top=0, left=0, bottom=1200, right=1920
OpenGL Drawing: Enabled.
OpenGL Allow Old GPUs: Not Detected.
OpenGL Drawing Mode: Advanced
OpenGL Allow Normal Mode: True.
OpenGL Allow Advanced Mode: True.
AIFCoreInitialized=1
AIFOGLInitialized=1
OGLContextCreated=1
NumGPUs=1
gpu[0].OGLVersion="3.0"
gpu[0].MemoryMB=2048
gpu[0].RectTextureSize=16384
gpu[0].Renderer="GeForce GTX 660/PCIe/SSE2"
gpu[0].RendererID=4544
gpu[0].Vendor="NVIDIA Corporation"
gpu[0].VendorID=4318
gpu[0].HasNPOTSupport=1
gpu[0].DriverVersion="9.18.13.3221"
gpu[0].Driver="nvd3dumx.dll,nvwgf2umx.dll,nvwgf2umx.dll,nvd3dum,nvwgf2um,nvwgf2um"
gpu[0].DriverDate="20131219000000.000000-000"
gpu[0].CompileProgramGLSL=1
gpu[0].TestFrameBuffer=1
gpu[0].OCLPresent=1
gpu[0].OCLVersion="1.1"
gpu[0].CUDASupported=1
gpu[0].CUDAVersion="6.0.1"
gpu[0].OCLBandwidth=1.16816e+011
gpu[0].glGetString[GL_SHADING_LANGUAGE_VERSION]="4.40 NVIDIA via Cg compiler"
gpu[0].glGetProgramivARB[GL_FRAGMENT_PROGRAM_ARB][GL_MAX_PROGRAM_INSTRUCTIONS_ARB]=[16384]
gpu[0].glGetIntegerv[GL_MAX_TEXTURE_UNITS]=[4]
gpu[0].glGetIntegerv[GL_MAX_COMBINED_TEXTURE_IMAGE_UNITS]=[192]
gpu[0].glGetIntegerv[GL_MAX_VERTEX_TEXTURE_IMAGE_UNITS]=[32]
gpu[0].glGetIntegerv[GL_MAX_TEXTURE_IMAGE_UNITS]=[32]
gpu[0].glGetIntegerv[GL_MAX_DRAW_BUFFERS]=[8]
gpu[0].glGetIntegerv[GL_MAX_VERTEX_UNIFORM_COMPONENTS]=[4096]
gpu[0].glGetIntegerv[GL_MAX_FRAGMENT_UNIFORM_COMPONENTS]=[2048]
gpu[0].glGetIntegerv[GL_MAX_VARYING_FLOATS]=[124]
gpu[0].glGetIntegerv[GL_MAX_VERTEX_ATTRIBS]=[16]
gpu[0].extension[AIF::OGL::GL_ARB_VERTEX_PROGRAM]=1
gpu[0].extension[AIF::OGL::GL_ARB_FRAGMENT_PROGRAM]=1
gpu[0].extension[AIF::OGL::GL_ARB_VERTEX_SHADER]=1
gpu[0].extension[AIF::OGL::GL_ARB_FRAGMENT_SHADER]=1
gpu[0].extension[AIF::OGL::GL_EXT_FRAMEBUFFER_OBJECT]=1
gpu[0].extension[AIF::OGL::GL_ARB_TEXTURE_RECTANGLE]=1
gpu[0].extension[AIF::OGL::GL_ARB_TEXTURE_FLOAT]
I work on digital-photography files, and use a layer mask in almost every file, so this relatively-recent bug is a big PITA, having to switch back and forth between CS6 and CC!
Until there's a fix... is there a way to roll-back my PS CC version to BEFORE the JAN 15, 2014 update?

I am not qualified to comment on technical issues; I'm just a user whose son in IT is my 'technical support department.' (But he's not much of a PS user.)
I'm pretty sure, however, that all my Prefs were set to the same things BEFORE the Jan 16, 2014 PS CC update as after (unless the update itself changed something I was unaware of... the settings APPEARED to be the same but I can't easily locate my notes of what my Prefs were from long ago).
And they were the same as the PS CS6 I have had installed on this same system for a very long time, with older video card with older driver, with newer driver; newer video card with newest driver, etc. Yet after that CC update, CC has not (until this workaround) worked re 'the masking bug' for me, yet CS6 has always worked just the same.
So I conclude that the only variable (other than the video card upgrade I did in an attempt to solve this and of course those Windows auto-updates) in this scenario IS something to do with PS *CC*, and after Jan 16, 2014.
As for restarting the machine vs. restarting PS, well, PS is the major player of my system, so when I shut that (and LR) down, I might as well 'clean things up' by Restarting. BTW, I am in the habit of closing and reopening PS (CC or CS6) whenever I finish with a file and load another, in order to get back some of that memory which PS never seems to want to let go. (This is not new to the latest versions, I think. My son says it's a 'memory hog'? ;-) ) I track its memory use in Windows' Task Manager and find that seems to let it 'refresh' itself. (See, I told you I'm not a technical person. ;-) ) But I do not think this has anything to do with the bug. Just a quirk of PS. Like when a tool goes all wonky (for example, its little icon becomes just a 'plus' sign even though the tool is still performing correctly, it's telling me, I think, that it would like to be restarted. And that makes it feel all better... I mean, tool icon reappears.)
Anyway... it's up to Adobe to figure out IF and what may be wrong with PS CC -- it still doesn't work for me as I had it configured at first, and I think it should, right? -- and to fix that... PLEASE. SOON.

Photoshop Elements 9 Layer Mask Difficulties

Hi,
I am trying to use the Photoshop Elements 9 layer mask tool but every time I brush over my image to hide sections of it, the image merely becomes faded-out, as if I were using a brush with a low opacity. However, my brush opacity is at 100%, as is the opacity for the layer mask itself. I have made sure that I am using a black brush, that my brush mode is set on normal, that the layer mask mode is set on normal, that the image's color mode is RGB, and that the layer mask is selected when I am painting on it. I have reset all the tools to their default settings, and have gotten rid of all other layers except for the image in question and the background layer so that nothing is obstructing my view. Whenever I paint on the layer mask, the thumbnail shows the black areas in which I painted, as it should; however, the image is still apparent. Meanwhile, when I use the eraser tool, areas I erase disappear just fine. What am I doing that is causing the layer mask tool to behave in this way?
Thanks!

Could you post a screenshot?
If you press the D key then the X key, does that make any difference when you paint on the layer mask?

Layer mask misery

I have reformatted my computer and re installed Photoshop CS6 64bit. I duplicated the layer and applied a Gaussian blur. I created a layer mask and when I brush over the layer it does not reveal the mask - how do I correct this?

Are you brushing white on black to reveal the pixels on the layer?
Show a screen grab, right at the point where you're trying to paint on the layer mask. Include everything please.
-Noel

When i paint either black or white on layer mask it erases picture pixels also path selection tool does not work

when I paint either in black or white on layer mask it erases picture pixels also path tool does not work

I would try resetting your preference file first: http://www.lightroomforums.net/showthread.php?14226-Resetting-(or-Trashing-)-the-Lightroom -Preferences-file
Also, install the latest version 4.4.1 would probably be a good idea.

Layer mask - difficult to see the area as I paint black

When I work with layer masks, it is difficult to see the area as I paint black, covered all over.
How do I show one layer mask without making the picture appear?

Chris Cox wrote:
Option/Alt click the layer mask.
Nice one Chris. One of these days I'll go through the full list of shortcuts again.
[edit] Just having a look see, and Shift Alt (Shift opt) clicking the mask shows the mask overlaying the image in Quickmask mode.

Can't paint at full opacity in layer mask in CS6 64 bit windows 7

A problem has developed in my photoshop CS 6 64 bit on windows 7. I can't paint at full opacity in a layer mask. It is like an 75 % opacity brush. I have gone back to the default brushes soit is not the particular bursh. My brush settings are all at 100%, mask density is 100% , the blend mode is normal,-can't think of where else to look for the solution.The brush works just fine when I am not in a layer mask.
I updated the graphic card driver and also the wacom intuos driver. It has to be somewhere in photoshop CS6 as when I go into my older version photoshop, cs5, the mask opacity works works at 100 % opacity
Any ideas of what to do next.

I am having a similar problem that I need help with. I just loaded CS6 for the first time ever last week and have been tinkering around with photo editing. I am trying to use an action I downloaded to whiten the whites of the eyes and teeth. When I run the action I cannot paint with the soft white brush. I hit backslash and it shows no work completed, just a red background. I have everything selected at 100% opacity (brush and action layer).
A couple days ago I was able to use the brush tool to darken the background by loading an action and paiting on. Now I can't do that anymore.
I can use my brush for other tasks. I am so confused. I would greatly appreciate any insight.

Problem using Brush tool with layer mask in Photoshop CC.

Using Photoshop CC, working on a layer mask. Using the Brush tool to paint white to show the effect works like normal. Painting black has no effect. Just started doing this in the last two days.

Check you Brush blending mode setting in the tools option bar.

Problem painting on black layer masks

Similar Messages

Maybe you are looking for