TRANSPARENCY / COLOR DISAPPEARS

[Lori21792350lumh]

When I remove the background to become transparent, the colors of the object all turn black and white.  What steps do I take to keep the color?  I tried to re-color it and if I click on it somewhere to chose an area to color it then turns everything the color I am trying to change a specific are to.  The file I am working with is attached (not in svg format but I can convert and remove background successfully).  I'm very new, any step by step instructions would be appreciated.  Thank you in advance.

[Ton Frederiks]

Did you try to use the Shape Builder tool (Shift M) with the Alt key depressed on the white background?

Turn on the View > Show Transparency Grid.

[Lori21792350lumh]

I have the transparency view on and can see the eagle is in a white box.  I can get the white box to disappear but then the colors turn to black and white.

[Monika Gause]

Please show us what's in the layers panel.

Also: before and after would be interesting.

[Lori21792350lumh]

[Monika Gause]

Please click on the little triangle to the left of the layer name.

And also upload a much larger and legible screenshot.

[Lori21792350lumh]

[Lori21792350lumh]

Thank you for helping me.

[Monika Gause]

This is not vector artwork, but a raster image.

It looks like the colorization might also be a raster image.

You cannot remove the background with Illustrator. Use Photoshop for that.

[Lori21792350lumh]

Oh, ok.  I will try doing that. Thank you!

[Lori21792350lumh]

GOT IT!  Can't thank you enough!  Have a wonderful weekend!