So far we have looked at ways of working on the whole image. Very often you will only want to work on part of the image and, for that, you need to make a selection.
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The selection tools are the second group down on the toolbar. The first enables you to select regular shapes - squares, circles, etc. The second allows you to trace around more complicated shapes in your picture. The third, 'the magic wand', allows you to select on the basis of colour. The last is a 'magic brush'. |
Select the 'rectangular marquee tool'. Click and drag it across part of your picture. You will see the selected area marked out with the 'marquee' (commonly known as 'marching ants').
Now take a broad paint brush and scribble over the picture. You will see that only the parts inside the selection are affected.
Try adjusting the colour or brightness and, again, you will see that you can restrict the effect to just the selected portion.
Now, on the menu click Select > Inverse. This has the effect of selecting the previously unselected part. Scribble with the paint brush again to see the effect.
Try the elliptical marquee tool, which works in just the same way.
If you press the shift key after you have started making the selection you can force the selection to be exactly square or circular.
Pressing the shift or alt keys before you start making the selection enables you to add to or subtract from an existing selection. You can also do this from the options bar.
Use the lasso tool. Click and drag around any shape you like.
Or the polygonal lasso tool. Click once to start and then for every corner - the tool fills in a straight line between corners. Click on the start point to finish.