

Let's use our simple two-layer document once again, this time to see how the Overlay mode works. Each of these blend modes is designed to boost the contrast in an image, but the Overlay mode is by far the most popular and often used, and one you most definitely need to know.ĭownload this tutorial as a print-ready PDF! Next up in our look at the essential blend modes for photo editing in Photoshop is a blend mode that both multiplies dark areas and screens light areas at the same time, the Overlay mode.Īs we saw at the very beginning of our discussion, the Overlay mode is part of the Contrast group of blend modes, along with other blend modes such as Soft Light, Hard Light, Vivid Light, Linear Light, and so on. We've looked at the Screen blend mode which lightens images, perfect for brightening highlights and fixing underexposed photos. If you need IE6 support, use an IE png fix or filters (not w3c compliant afaik).We've looked at the Multiply blend mode which darkens images, great for restoring shadows and fixing overexposed photos. If you can't use rgba and don't know what your bottom color is, you could use a white transparent 10x10px png as a background. Also, I don't think you can achieve what you want using sass as you need to know your bottom color in order to give the top color a value. I dont' see how changing the lightness would be like faking a white transparent overlay. Here's a working jsFiddle using Chuck's answer: * works if $background is $808080, but not if it's a color */īackground-color:scale-color($background, $lightness:150%)

Here's a demo to better illustrate what I'm trying to do, or you can see the code pasted below. It seems like one of the SCSS color functions should be able to achieve this effect, but I've tried a few things, and I can't seem to get it to work. Also, since I'm using SCSS variables, I won't necessarily know what the bottom color is beforehand, so I'll need to calculate the result. I could easily do background-color:rgba(255,255,255.5) on the overlay, but I'd rather have a solution that doesn't require the browser to support rgba colors. I'm trying to use SCSS to fake a white transparent color overlaying another solid color.
