Just wanting a transparent background behind the image

I've spent most of the day trying to follow this guide I found, but I just can't keep the main image from becoming semi-transparent itself.

SGA gate image

I want to make the background transparent, just leaving the gate.
I've tried adding just a red alpha channel, just a blue alpha, just a green and even tried using all 3.
No matter what I do, I can get the background to go transparent but the gate ends up being semi-transparent. :(

Any help would be so appreciated...

hi,
take a look on the layer pallette and make sure opacity and fil is at 100% if it something less the main object can look transparent..

uniquelyam said:

I've spent most of the day trying to follow this guide I found, but I just can't keep the main image from becoming semi-transparent itself.

SGA gate image

I want to make the background transparent, just leaving the gate.
I've tried adding just a red alpha channel, just a blue alpha, just a green and even tried using all 3.
No matter what I do, I can get the background to go transparent but the gate ends up being semi-transparent. :(

Any help would be so appreciated...

Thank you for the help, jerrylb.

I tried again and both the opacity and fill are at 100%. Still ends up semi-transparent.

I tried another guide with the same results.
I ended up trying one other guide after that, that suggested using "Blending Options - Blend if: Gray". Well just moving the slider over one notch showed a lot of empty areas in the image. Seems there's a lot more black than I thought in the image. I'm wondering if that's half the problem.

Though I'm still not ruling out user error :o

Though I'd still love to know if I was doing something wrong or missing something - the image and I ended up.. compromising..
I did something slightly different than what I was wanting with the image but in the end it gave me quite satisfying results.

Amb ~

I was just about to tell you to use the blending options,

Instead of using the black slider use the white slider, and use the option/ or alt while you drag and you can split the triangle into 2 triangles,

This will erase the gate and leave you with the black background, from here you should be able to select the background and delete it from a duplecate layer with out the "blend if" settings.

Uniquelyam,

The reason the tutorial worked so well for its author was because the alpha channels in the fireworks image showed either black or white areas. In an alpha channel, shades of gray create partial selections. Your gate image has shades of gray in it, and I bet your individual color channels portray gray areas as well as black and white areas.

You're on the right track. Choose the color channel that has the greatest amount of contrast between the gate and its background. Duplicate that channel. Then (and this is where the tutorial left off) go to Image > Adjustment > Levels. Move the black and white sliders (top sliders, not the Output sliders) toward each other (black toward the right, white toward the left) until the majority of your duplicated channel is either black or white. If you need to, go in with your Brush tool and paint with either black or white until the entire alpha channel contains black and white only. Your goal is to have the background area one color (either black or white) and the gate the opposite color.

Be sure to become active on your RGB composite color channel again before proceeding.

Now load your newly created alpha channel. It should select only what you want. Depending on how your alpha channels are set up, you may need to go to the Select menu and choose Inverse to make the gate selected. Once you have the gate selected, go to the Layer menu and choose New > Layer via copy. You have copied the gate onto a new layer.

Next, select your Background layer so it is active. Double-click on the words "Background layer" and rename th e layer Layer 0. That makes it possible to throw away the background layer. When you drag your Layer 0 to the trash can within the Layers palette, you'll be left with your transparent layer with the gate on it.

I hope this helps!