Image>Adjustments Greyed out (Inactive) - Why?

[june_6376]

Hi folks, as I've started my learning in Photoshop I've been posting at quite a pace here and I'm strating to see the trend of the problems in the Software - it's very often restrictive in its features.

I was following a tutorial to select a particular area of a photograph and black-and-white just that bit.
The instruction was, rectangular Marquee Tool-> Select the part you want to keep the colour, Ctrl+Shift+I to select the inverted remainder, and then go to Image>Adjustments>Black and White.

However, as with most problems I keep facing with Photoshop, it doesn't want to do it.

Black and White option is greyed out and cannot be applied.

And no, it's not made clear why.

The layer is not locked, the layer is not a smart object and aside from that I don't know what more conditions it needs to satisfy for the "adjustment" options to function.

Below is the screenshot of where I'm stuck.

 I'm concerning myself with the4 currently selected IMAGE_8544 layer and that's the one Photoshop somehow doesn't want to apply the black and white effect under the adjustment menu.

Any clue at all as to why? Thanks in advance

[D Fosse · Accepted solution]

You're in quick mask mode. Press Q.

[june_6376]

Oh that solved it....though I cannot think of a reason why it should refuse while in the mask mode. I'll store it in my head as another strange perk of Photoshop....thanks much

[jane-e]

@june_6376 

Hi June

It sounds like you are new to Quick Mask. It is used to select/deselect by painting and is most often used with pure black and pure white. "Q" is the shortcut to enter/exit this mode. There are several ways to tell when you are in Quick Mask:

• The layer in the Layers panel is red
• It says Quick Mask in the tab with the file name
• It's indicated in the Channels panel
• There is a red overlay showing what is selected/deselected

Details here:

https://helpx.adobe.com/photoshop/using/create-temporary-quick-mask.html

Jane