Creating Transparency from Whites

Turning white areas into transparent areas is very essential for drawing anime on the computer...having a lineart with whites will force you to makes layers above the lineart...and that can become messy...

The first thing to do is to duplicate your lineart (background) so it has its own layer, delete the old background, and then create a new background. Select your lineart layer, then select the channels tab...


Click on the little thing that looks like a dotted circle that the arrow points to. Once all the white areas are selected...


Press the Delete key (yes, Delete...not Backspace...DELETE!). All your whites have now become transparent ^_^...but you may not be done.


In some cases...doing that makes the lineart look faded. If this is your case, just simply check the preserve transparency box on your lineart layer, then select a pure black color and a big brush and just trace over all of your lines. (Note: On Photoshop 6.0 and higher, preserve transparency is the same as "Lock.") Nothing that isn't a line will be colored because everything else is transparent...and you have it preserving that ^_^. This should darken your lines back up in no time.
Hope that helps ^_^