Problem opening tga’s with alpha channel

[Milkman]

It would also help if someone could explain to me why my ps 7 doesn’t work anymore. I start it up, you know, it’s searching for its components and all of the sudden, photoshop disappears like it never was there. I tried to reinstall it, but it’s the same scenario. Any help would be appreciated…

[Darby Edelen]

[Milkman] “When I open a tga or any image with a transparent background, I get the drawing with a white background”

If the .tga is using an alpha channel I believe you’ll have to set this alpha as a layer mask to see the transparency. Photoshop doesn’t take alpha channels into account when determining transparency. I’m guessing this is because Photoshop documents can have 1, 2, 5, 10 or more alpha channels, which are often used for filters (Lighting Effects, Lens Blur come to mind) instead of defining transparencies.

To set an alpha to a layer mask you can cmd-click (ctrl-click) that alpha channel in your channels tab of the layer palette, then choose the layer you want to mask and Layer > Layer Mask > Reveal Selection.

This Layer Mask will give you a preview of how your .tga file will look in other programs that use the alpha channel as transparency.

[Milkman]

Thx, but with my ps7, I didn’t need all that stuff, it looks like a lot of unnecessary work. I really can’t figure out how it comes that it doesn’t want to start anymore. I tried unstalling and reinstalling, but all that doesn’t help.

[Ekim Wahs]

Regarding the problems with Photoshop 7 Have you tried clearing the Preferences on Launch?

For the Targa behavior. In Photoshop 7.0 the Targa plug-in saved Transparency information. This created a lot of complaints from users who were used to the way the plug-in worked previously. So much so that the plug-in had to be re-released with its old behavior. You can replace the CS2 targa plug-in with the 7.0 plug-in and have it work the way you are used to.

Mike Shaw
Photoshop QE

[Milkman]

Wow, that worked! I can’t believe that worked!!! Man, I could kiss you, I’ve been stuck with this problem for a week now. Thanks a thousand times!!!

[Milkman]

Oh, wait. I tried the plug-in in ps 6.0. I can open pictures now with a transparent background, so that’s good. But than I draw something on a transparent bg and save it, and when I want to open it again, I get the ‘new image’ window. So I click ok, and of course I get this white window. So it seems I’m unable to save something as a tga and re-open it again. :s

[Ekim Wahs]

Did you remove the other targa plug-in when you put the 7.0 version in? What happens if you try it in CS2 instead of Photoshop 6? It works as expected for me on Save and reopen in CS2.(transparency is saved) Note it will not change the behavior of files previously saved with the other plug-in. They have already been written without transparency, and included Alpha if present and selected in the save options.

Mike Shaw
Photoshop QE

[Milkman]

It finally works for me with the CS2. I first tried it with 6.0 because I lost my cs2 but I retrieved it today, so everything’s cool now. Thank you very much. I could kiss you.