How do I edit an image on photoshop to have only four colours?

Question

It's a birthday invitation, there's a patterened background thats black and white, several coloured squares and some greyscale photos, all writing is in white. I need to get it down to four colours for printing.

Answer 1

I will assume that black is a color and white is not.

I would change the writing to red.

Keep the pattered background black and white.

Keep the photos gray scale.

Change the squares to blue and yellow.

That adds up to: black, blue, yellow and red.

To change the colors I would take the paint bucket tool which is hidden under the gradient tool on the left. (Right click on the gradient tool to get the paint bucket tool.) Take the paint bucket and choose the color you want and fill in the words and the squares.

(I have the same version!)

Answer 2

I'm not sure why you need to reduce colours if you are printing 4 colour. 4 colour printing (CMYK) is sufficient to reproduce a full colour image.

However, to do what you want use the Posterize command.

Answer 3

In the Photoshop "Menu":

IMAGE > MODE > CMYK COLOR

That's it.

Make sure the image is 300 dpi at the size you want it printed. Anything less than 150 dpi is going to look blurry / digital.

Print a version of it at home on your inkjet at the size you want it to come out. Fix any problems before giving it to the printer.

Answer 4

Do you mean you want to change the color to CMYK mode for printing?

Image/Mode/CMYK