In Quick Mask Mode: how to get a solid mask with the brush or pencil tool?

[anjat01]

In Quick Mask Mode: when using the brush tool or pencil tool to mask certain areas, the tools do not provide 100% opacity, even if the opacity and flow are set to 100%. The masks are always somewhat transparent. That is a problem, because any adjustments I make to the rest of the image (e.g. brightness, blur, filters) are also applied to the masked areas to a lesser extent. My purpose of masking those areas is to isolate them. For that you need the mask to be solid.

To work around this issue, I mask the areas first with the brush tool, then switch from quick mask mode to normal mode, select inverse, switch back to quick mask mode, and clean up the original masked areas with the eraser tool. But that’s way too time consuming.

How can I get a solid mask with the brush or pencil tool?

Thanks in advance for any insights!!!

[K´mo]

Is your tool's blending mode set to normal?

[anjat01]

Yes. The mode (toolbar at the top) is set to normal. That's the blending mode, right? I have also tried resetting all tools, which did not solve the problem.

[davescm]

As well as the other suggestions - are you using a pen with pressure sensitivity or a mouse?

Dave

[anjat01]

Thanks for the suggestion, Dave. I think the problem was that I didn't have full black or white selected.

[Bettina Di Virgilio · Accepted solution]

Check if the color is full black or full white. Maybe you're using a grey.

[anjat01]

Oh my gosh - I guess I had missed some basics of masking! Since the masking color is always red, I never paid any attention, which colors I had selected. I didn't think that the two had anything to do with each other. Thanks to your response, Bettina, I realize now that they do. That actually might solve the problem! Ok - will do a proper masking tutorial. Though until recently my method had been working great for the most part, I wonder what else I might have missed. Thank you!!!

[Bettina Di Virgilio]

The grayscale is used to define how much the area is selected, in fact you can have also a faded selection. With full white and full black the area you're painting will be completely selected or non selected. Probably untill now your foreground and background color were full white and black.