Adobe Photoshop CS5 One-on-One

2. Zoom in on the saw blade. This is a good
   chance to use a new zoom technique in
   CS5. Press Ctrl-spacebar (�-spacebar),
   place your cursor near the tip of the
   blade, and drag to the right, zooming in
   on the blade area until you reach a value
   of around 200 percent, as in Figure 3-30.


3. Select the quick selection tool. As you’ll
   recall from the last exercise, the quick se-
   lection tool is paired in the toolbox with
   the magic wand tool. Select it from the
   flyout menu, or press W (Shift+W if you
   skipped the Preface) to toggle from the
   magic wand to the quick selection tool.


4. Turn on the auto-enhance feature. In
   the options bar, be sure to turn on the Figure 3-30.
   Auto-Enhance check box. Auto-Enhance seems to smooth out
   the otherwise crummy job that the quick selection tool does
   when making a selection outline.

Auto-Enhance occasionally makes the quick selection tool behave erratically.
But in my opinion, the tool is plenty erratic on its own and adding a little
more erratic behavior in the interest of smoother edges is worth it.

5. Adjust the brush settings. Move the cursor into the image
   window; you’ll notice that the cursor turns into a round brush,
   anticipating your ability to paint a selection. Click the arrow
   next to the number 30 with the dot over it in the options bar
   to set some important brush options:
   
   
   • Where this image is concerned, the default brush is too
     large. To make it smaller, lower the Diameter value in the
     ensuing pop-up panel to 15 pixels, as in Figure 3-31.
   
   
   • Make sure the Hardness value is set to 100 percent, which
     will help keep the selection from leaking out beyond the
     edges of the saw blade.
     Leave the other items set to their default and click the arrow
     again to close the options.
   
   
   
   

If you ever need to return to the default settings for any tool, click the

arrow to the right of the tool icon on the far left of the options bar

to open the tool presets and then click the arrow at the upper-right

corner of the pop-up menu and choose Reset Tool.

Figure 3-31.

Quick Selection and the Quick Mask Mode 81