- Enter the Quick Mask mode. The
“marching ants” outline prevents us
from seeing the edges of the selection di-
rectly. To test for accuracy and smooth-
ness, we’ll use a Photoshop feature that
allows us to view the selection in a
less distracting environment. Start by
clicking the icon at the very bottom of
the toolbox, as shown in Figure 3-37,
which allows us to enter the Quick Mask
mode. (Alternatively, you can press the
Q key.) In this view, Photoshop creates
a facsimile of an old-school rubylith
mask that covers the deselected areas
of your image with transparent red and
leaves the selected area in regular view. - Examine the mask directly. Pretty in
pink it may be, but the effect is still not
the best view for judging the edges of the
selection. Click the tab for the Channels
panel, and you’ll see a quick mask cre-
ated for this view at the bottom of the
entries. (It’s an alpha channel, which
we’ll learn more about in Lesson 10.) To
see the mask by itself, independently of
the image, click the next to the RGB
entry at the top of the Channels panel
to turn off the visibility of the image.
What remains is the mask.
As you can see in Figure 3-38, Photo-
shop now reveals the selected area in
white and conceals the deselected area
with black. What is revealed is that the
quick selection tool did a fairly hideous
job (especially when you compare it to
the relatively smooth edges created by
the supposedly inferior magic wand
tool on the body of the saw.) Press the
Q key to exit the Quick Mask mode,
and let’s see if we can improve this se-
lection with another tool.
Figure 3-37.Figure 3-38.Quick Selection and the Quick Mask Mode 85