It's been several weeks since I opened up this project and I forgot what the hexcode was. Pressing alt+b does not give me the same color as the rest of the color on the repaint. Am I screwed?

Edited March 20, 20206 yr by Hansaspeed

Nope you are not. Some things to try...

Zoom your image to greater than 600 percent size so you can see individual pixels with a grid, select the eyedropper tool (I) and then hit caps lock so you get the tool's precise cursor (crosshair), now click an individual pixels which appears the correct colour. This is because if you have been spraying details on your paint job with the airbrush, you will have variations on the base colour, but there will be no mistake on where you are clicking when you can see the pixel grid.

Make sure your layer is not locked or otherwise hidden, and that you have indeed got the correct layer highlighted in the layers palette when you click. It's an easy mistake to make to be clicking on the wrong layer!

When the colour appears in your tool bar's foreground color palette, either double click on that to call up the color picker palette and you should see the hex code, make sure that the 'only web colors' option is not ticked as this will limit the palette range. Alternatively, click the options in the Color panel and choose copy color's hex code

Go up to the image menu and choose mode. Check which colour mode you are in, some modes do not use or display hex colours.

Go up to the view menu and make sure the gamut warning option is not selected.

 

 

 

On 3/20/2020 at 2:50 AM, Chock said:

Nope you are not. Some things to try...

Zoom your image to greater than 600 percent size so you can see individual pixels with a grid, select the eyedropper tool (I) and then hit caps lock so you get the tool's precise cursor (crosshair), now click an individual pixels which appears the correct colour. This is because if you have been spraying details on your paint job with the airbrush, you will have variations on the base colour, but there will be no mistake on where you are clicking when you can see the pixel grid.

Make sure your layer is not locked or otherwise hidden, and that you have indeed got the correct layer highlighted in the layers palette when you click. It's an easy mistake to make to be clicking on the wrong layer!

When the colour appears in your tool bar's foreground color palette, either double click on that to call up the color picker palette and you should see the hex code, make sure that the 'only web colors' option is not ticked as this will limit the palette range. Alternatively, click the options in the Color panel and choose copy color's hex code

Go up to the image menu and choose mode. Check which colour mode you are in, some modes do not use or display hex colours.

Go up to the view menu and make sure the gamut warning option is not selected.

 

 

 

The color I get ends up being noticeably darker than the rest of the livery

Is it a paint kit you are using? Check the Layer Blend Mode.

On 3/26/2020 at 3:00 PM, Chock said:

Is it a paint kit you are using? Check the Layer Blend Mode.

Layer blend mode is normal, but the other layers have different modes. Should I switch them all to normal? I am using the PMDG 747 paintkit

Nope, leave them as is. The layer blend modes are probably correct for the layers as they are. However, the reason I noted it was worth checking the layer blend mode is that it can affect the appearance of stuff, so it could have been a reason why your colour looked different.

I'm trying to think of other things which might be causing your issue. I'll fire up PS and have a look and see if that jogs my brain into some other possible suggestions.

2 minutes ago, Chock said:

Nope, leave them as is. The layer blend modes are probably correct for the layers as they are. However, the reason I noted it was worth checking the layer blend mode is that it can affect the appearance of stuff, so it could have been a reason why your colour looked different.

I'm trying to think of other things which might be causing your issue. I'll fire up PS and have a look and see if that jogs my brain into some other possible suggestions.

I dragged my drawing layer to the top of the list, used the eyedropper, and sent it back into the proper folder. Thanks for the help!

Another way I do it is to copy the layer you know the color is on, then CTRL+N, create a new file and paste the layer on to the new file, set the layer style  to normal (if its not already), and pick the color off there...then for safe keeping ....add it to swatches.

Can't begin to tell you how many shades of Lufthansa gray and blue I played with and had swatches for before I dialed in the ones that looked best in flightsim (on my computer of course).