我最近这样做是为了回答我的项目经理的问题。
将灰色转换为透明的功能是：

  private Image TransformGrayToTransparency(BufferedImage image)
  {
    ImageFilter filter = new RGBImageFilter()
    {
      public final int filterRGB(int x, int y, int rgb)
      {
        return (rgb << 8) & 0xFF000000;
      }
    };

    ImageProducer ip = new FilteredImageSource(image.getSource(), filter);
    return Toolkit.getDefaultToolkit().createImage(ip);
  }

实际上，它作用于灰度图像上，因此我只是将RGB分量（R一个）复制到alpha中，而丢弃了其他与我相同的分量。
你可以调整它以过滤特定的颜色，例如。平等或范围等的测试
。当然，数据的BufferedImage必须BufferedImage.TYPE_INT_ARGB类型。

我没有解决保存的问题，因为它很琐碎，但是我也可以添加此代码页。

[编辑]要将图像转换为BufferedImage：

BufferedImage dest = new BufferedImage(
    imageWidth, imageHeight,
    BufferedImage.TYPE_INT_ARGB);
Graphics2D g2 = dest.createGraphics();
g2.drawImage(image, 0, 0, null);
g2.dispose();

[编辑2]我是在Christoffer发布他的完整解决方案之后来的，但这是我的，我展示了如何使一系列颜色透明。可以改进，例如。而是使用HSB组件。

import java.awt.*;
import java.awt.image.BufferedImage;
import java.awt.image.FilteredImageSource;
import java.awt.image.ImageFilter;
import java.awt.image.ImageProducer;
import java.awt.image.RGBImageFilter;
import java.io.*;

import javax.imageio.ImageIO;

public class AddTransparency
{
  AddTransparency() throws IOException
  {
    String imagePath = "E:/Documents/images/";
    File inFile = new File(imagePath, "map.png");
    BufferedImage image = ImageIO.read(inFile);

    Image transpImg1 = TransformGrayToTransparency(image);
    BufferedImage resultImage1 = ImageToBufferedImage(transpImg1, image.getWidth(), image.getHeight());

    File outFile1 = new File(imagePath, "map_with_transparency1.png");
    ImageIO.write(resultImage1, "PNG", outFile1);

    Image transpImg2 = TransformColorToTransparency(image, new Color(0, 50, 77), new Color(200, 200, 255));
    BufferedImage resultImage2 = ImageToBufferedImage(transpImg2, image.getWidth(), image.getHeight());

    File outFile2 = new File(imagePath, "map_with_transparency2.png");
    ImageIO.write(resultImage2, "PNG", outFile2);
  }

  private Image TransformGrayToTransparency(BufferedImage image)
  {
    ImageFilter filter = new RGBImageFilter()
    {
      public final int filterRGB(int x, int y, int rgb)
      {
        return (rgb << 8) & 0xFF000000;
      }
    };

    ImageProducer ip = new FilteredImageSource(image.getSource(), filter);
      return Toolkit.getDefaultToolkit().createImage(ip);
  }

  private Image TransformColorToTransparency(BufferedImage image, Color c1, Color c2)
  {
    // Primitive test, just an example
    final int r1 = c1.getRed();
    final int g1 = c1.getGreen();
    final int b1 = c1.getBlue();
    final int r2 = c2.getRed();
    final int g2 = c2.getGreen();
    final int b2 = c2.getBlue();
    ImageFilter filter = new RGBImageFilter()
    {
      public final int filterRGB(int x, int y, int rgb)
      {
        int r = (rgb & 0xFF0000) >> 16;
        int g = (rgb & 0xFF00) >> 8;
        int b = rgb & 0xFF;
        if (r >= r1 && r <= r2 &&
            g >= g1 && g <= g2 &&
            b >= b1 && b <= b2)
        {
          // Set fully transparent but keep color
          return rgb & 0xFFFFFF;
        }
        return rgb;
      }
    };

    ImageProducer ip = new FilteredImageSource(image.getSource(), filter);
      return Toolkit.getDefaultToolkit().createImage(ip);
  }

  private BufferedImage ImageToBufferedImage(Image image, int width, int height)
  {
    BufferedImage dest = new BufferedImage(
        width, height, BufferedImage.TYPE_INT_ARGB);
    Graphics2D g2 = dest.createGraphics();
    g2.drawImage(image, 0, 0, null);
    g2.dispose();
    return dest;
  }

  public static void main(String[] args) throws IOException
  {
    AddTransparency at = new AddTransparency();
  }
}