A (98)

QUICK SELECTION

John Paul Zampetti

If you want to select an area that is similar in tone or

colour to its background – a wedding dress against a

light backdrop, for example – first create a

temporary solar curve (a Curves adjustment layer

with a handful of anchors pulled in the opposite

direction from each other), which shows separations

in tone more clearly and often creates stronger edge

contrast. Use the Quick Selection/Magic Wand while

this curve is selected.

Jesse Peraza

You can use the Quick Selection tool to make a

selection around a subject. If you miss certain areas

of the subject or selected part of the background, you

can go to Window>Paths to bring out the Paths

palette. Click the arrow/delta on the top-right of the

palette to bring down the options. Click on Make

Work Path. This will create a vector path of your

ARTISTS FROM THE PHOTOSHOP COMMUNITY

SHARE THEIR TOP TIPS FOR THE USE OF

SELECTIONS IN THEIR WORK

TOP SELECTION TIPS selection. You can now refine your selection using

the Pen tool and convert it back to a path when you

are done by holding down Cmd/Ctrl and clicking on

the path thumbnail.

Stephen Vosloo

When painting a selection onto your subject, it can

sometimes seem like it freaks out and selects the

whole image. Don’t just go back to the start – it’s an

intelligent tool, and it needs to be trained. Hold

down the Opt/Alt key to set the brush to ‘-’ and

paint on areas in the image you don’t want

selected. Continue to do this and you’ll see your

selection snap to the original subject. This

combined with Refine Edge makes for powerful

and quick selections of objects.

QUICK MASK

Jose Gonçalves

After you make a selection, click on Q to see that

selection in Quick Mask mode. Now if you want to

apply feather to the selection, use Gaussian Blur to

see in real-time the amount of feather you are

applying. If you want to contract or expand the

selection while in Quick Mask mode, use one of the

Maximum or Minimum filters. To mimic the

command, apply the filter Find Edges (Filter>Stylize>

Find Edges) to create a border effect. To expand or

contract that border, use Maximum or Minimum.

Valentin Gheorghe

After you make your selection, enter Quick Mask

mode and then use the Blur filter to feather the

selection. This way you see exactly how much to

feather instead of having to guess.

PEN TOOL

Christiano Normano

When using the Pen tool, turn on Rubber Band in the

Options bar. When using this, the Pen tool will show

the next bend in the segment. This will both speed up

and add more accuracy to your selection.

REFINE EDGE

Julia Kuzmenko McKim

I always have the Remember Settings option on, so

that my adjustment numbers are saved and already

there after I make every selection and get into the

Refine Edge. Considering I do similar type selections

across most of my images – like most artists – this

saves me a lot of time in the long run.

I often change the background colour in the View

Mode. I would choose black if the selection I am

making is bright, and I would choose white if the

selection I am making is dark, to help my eyes better

see the quality and hardness of the selection edge

and refine it more accurately.

Depending on what my selection is for, I

sometimes change the Output to Selection, Layer

Mask or New Layer and use the Decontaminate

Colors to prevent adjacent colour pixels bleeding into

my selection from the outside of it.

LASSO TOOL

Jose Gonçalves

You might find you are working with the Lasso tool,

but you want to change to the Polygonal tool without

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PRO GUIDE TO SELECTIONS