ptg 154 Chapter 9 Using the Magic Wand tool With the Magic Wand tool, you simply click a color in the image and the tool selects all adjacent pixels of the same (or a similar) shade or color. Like the Color Range command, which is discussed on pages 156–157, the Magic Wand lets you control the range of pixels the tool selects, but unlike Color Range, this tool lets you add nonsimilar colors to the selection. To select color areas with the Magic Wand tool: 1. Click a layer or the Background. 2. Choose the Magic Wand tool (W or Shift-W). 3. On the Options bar: Choose a Tolerance value (use the scrubby slider) to control the range of colors the tool selects (for a starting value, try between 30 and 40). Check Anti-alias to allow the tool to add semi- transparent pixels along the edges of the color areas it detects. is will produce smoother edge transitions for your image edits. Check Contiguous to limit the selection to areas that are connected to the rst pixel you click, or uncheck this option to allow the tool to select similarly colored, noncontiguous (unconnected) areas throughout the image with the same click. To select possible occurrences of a similar color on all visible layers, check Sample All Layers, or uncheck this option to select colors on just the current layer. 4. Click a color in the image. 5. Unless your image contains nothing but totally at color areas (which is unlikely), you’ll have to do some extra work to rene the selection. Do any of the following: To add to the selection, Shift-click any unselected areas. A To subtract any areas from the selection, hold down Alt/Option and click them. Or choose the Quick Selection tool, then with the Alt/Option key held down, drag short strokes across the areas to be subtracted. B To select additional, noncontiguous areas of a similar color or shade based on the current Tolerance value, right-click in the document and choose Similar. (is command works the same whether the Contiguous option is checked or not.) A To select the sky in this image layer, we clicked on the right side with the Magic Wand tool (Tolerance 38; Contiguous checked), then Shift-clicked more sky areas to add them to the selection (as shown above). B Some areas of the keys became selected, so we are using the Quick Selection tool with Alt/Option held down to remove them from the selection. ptg Selections & Masks 155 A Finally, we pressed Backspace/Delete to get rid of the selected pixels (in this document, the Background is hidden). 6. Optional: If you have selected a background area that you want to remove and you clicked a layer in step 1, press Backspace/Delete; A or if you clicked the Background in step 1, press Ctrl-Backspace/Cmd-Delete. ★ Deselect (Ctrl-D/ Cmd-D). ➤ You can change the Tolerance value for the Magic Wand tool between clicks. For example, for more control when adding unselected shades or colors along the edges of a selection, lower the Tolerance value incrementally: Click with a Tolerance of 30–40 rst, lower the value to 15–20 and click again, then nally lower it to 5–10 and click once more. To select just one color or shade, use a Tolerance of 0 or 1. ➤ To undo the results of the last click made with the Magic Wand tool or to undo the last use of the Similar command, press Ctrl-Z/Cmd-Z. To expand a selection using a command: With any selection tool chosen, choose Select> Grow or Similar. B–C ese commands use the current Tolerance setting of the Magic Wand tool. You can repeat either command to further expand the selection. ➤ When the Magic Wand tool is selected, you can access the Grow and Similar commands via the context menu. TO ANTI-ALIAS OR NOT? Before using a selection tool, check Anti-alias (if available) on the Options bar to fade the edge of the selection to transparency, or uncheck this option to produce a crisp, hard-edged selection. The effect of anti-aliasing won’t be visible until you edit the selected pixels. e A n t i - a l i a s o p t i o n w a s o n when this selection was created. e A n t i - a l i a s o p t i o n w a s o when this selection was created. B We clicked the blue sky area with the Magic Wand tool (Tolerance of 35), Shift-clicked once on the clouds… C …then chose Select > Similar. e Tolerance setting controlled which pixel range was added to the selection. ptg 156 Chapter 9 Using the Color Range command To create a selection with the Color Range command, you click a color area in the document window or in the preview area of the dialog, and depending on the parameters you have chosen, all occurrences of just one color or a range of related colors become selected. e dialog also provides controls for widening or narrowing the range. After closing the dialog, you can further rene the selection with any selection tool. e more solid the color areas in an image, the more eectively this command works. To create a selection using the Color Range command: 1. Click a layer. e command will sample colors from all the currently visible layers, but of course only the current layer can be edited. 2. Optional: Create a selection to limit where the command can select colors. 3. Choose Select > Color Range, or if a selection tool is in hand, right-click in the document and choose Color Range. 4. In the Color Range dialog, choose from the Select menu to limit the selection to Sampled Colors (shades or colors you’ll click with the Color Range eyedropper); to a specic preset color range (e.g., Reds, Yellows); or to a luminos- ity range (Highlights, Midtones, or Shadows). 5. If you chose Sampled Colors in the preceding step, with the Eyedropper tool from the dialog, click in either the dialog preview or the document window to sample a color in the image. A–B 6. To add more colors or shades to the selection, Shift-click in the document or preview window; or to remove colors or shades from the selection, Alt-click/Option-click. To expand or reduce the range of selected colors and to control the number of partially selected pixels, adjust the Fuzziness value. C 7. Choose a Selection Preview option for viewing the selection in the document window: None for no preview, Grayscale to see a larger version of the dialog preview, Black Matte to view the selec- tion against a black background, or White Matte to view the selection against a white background. Choose one of the latter two options when you need to see if the edges are properly selected. B In the preview, the white areas represent fully selected pixels, the gray represent partially selected pixels, and the black areas represent unselected pixels. A We chose the Color Range command, then with the Eyedropper, clicked the blue sky at the top of the image. C To fully select the sky and background, we Shift- clicked a lower section of the sky in the preview and increased the Fuzziness value to 105. ptg Selections & Masks 157 8. Click OK. A Note: If you chose a preset color range and the image contains only minimal levels of that color, an alert dialog will inform you that the selection marquee will be active but invisible. ➤ Press Ctrl/Cmd to toggle between the Selection and Image previews in the dialog. A In the nal Color Range selection, the entire blue sky and distant background are selected, including the noncontiguous areas between the columns. USING THE LOCALIZED COLOR CLUSTERS OPTION IN THE COLOR RANGE DIALOG The Localized Color Clusters option in the Color Range dialog creates a more accurate selection of colors based on their proximity to the sampled color. Click a layer, open the Color Range dialog, choose Select: Sampled Colors, then with the Eyedropper tool, click in the document window to sample a color. B Check Localized Color Clusters, then use the Range slider to control the distance from the sampled color (or colors, if you Shift-clicked) within which similar colors may become selected. C You can Shift-drag in the preview or document to add more color areas to the selection, within the current range, D or Alt-drag/ Option-drag to remove color areas. E C We checked Localized Color Clusters and lowered the Range value to 15 to shrink the selection area. D Next, we Shift-dragged to select more grapefruit colors, within the current Range. E Finally, we dragged with Alt/ Option held down to remove some color areas from the selection. B We chose the Color Range command, then with the Eyedropper, clicked the grapefruit in the image. ptg 158 Chapter 9 Hiding and showing selection edges If your selection edges (those “marching ants”) become distracting or annoying, you can hide them from view. If you do so, remember that the selection remains in eect even when you can’t see it! To hide or show the edges of a selection: Press Ctrl-H/Cmd-H or choose View > Extras. If this command doesn’t work, make sure View > Show > Selection Edges has a check mark. A–B Note: e Ctrl-H/Cmd-H shortcut hides or shows all the options that are currently checked on the Show submenu. ➤ Mac OS users: e rst time you press Cmd-H after installing Photoshop and then opening or creating your rst document, an alert dialog will appear. ★ If you click Hide Photoshop, the Cmd-H shortcut will be assigned to the Photoshop > Hide Photoshop command; if you click Hide Extras (as we do and recommend), the shortcut will be assigned to the View > Extras command. e alert won’t reappear unless you reset all warning dialogs (see page 386). ➤ If an option is unchecked in the View > Show > Show Extras Options dialog, you can turn it on or o only via the Show submenu, not by using the Ctrl-H/Cmd-H shortcut. For this reason, we like to keep all the options checked in that dialog. ➤ To verify that there is an active selection in your document, click the Select menu. If most of the commands on the menu are available, you know that there is an active selection. ➤ You can hide or show selection edges via the shortcut while using the Adjustments panel and while any of the Image > Adjustments dialogs are open. Swapping the selected and unselected areas To swap the selected and unselected areas: Do either of the following: With any tool chosen, press Ctrl-Shift-I/Cmd- Shift-I (or choose Select > Inverse). C–D With any selection tool chosen, right-click in the document and choose Select Inverse. (Repeat either step above to switch back to the original selection.) B …then we hid the selection edges to gauge the results. A We applied the Texture > Grain lter (Grain Type: Speckle) to this selection… C i s i s t h e o r i g i n a l selection. D And this is the inverse of the same selection. ptg Selections & Masks 159 Creating a frame-shaped selection With the Rectangular Marquee or Elliptical Marquee tool, you can create a selection in the shape of a frame, either at the edge of the canvas area or oat- ing somewhere within it. You can then apply lters or adjustment settings to the frame-shaped selec- tion or turn it into an adjustment layer mask (don’t worry, you’ll learn those tricks later in this book). Your edits will aect only pixels within the frame- shaped border. To create a selection in the shape of a frame: Method 1 (at the edge of the canvas area) 1. Click a layer. 2. Choose the Rectangular Marquee (M or Shift-M). 3. In the document window, drag a marquee to dene the inner edge of the frame selection. 4. Optional: To soften the edges of the selection, click Rene Edge on the Options bar, choose On White (W) from the View menu, ★ zero out all the sliders, adjust the Feather value to achieve the desired degree of softness, then click OK. 5. Right-click in the document and choose Select Inverse. A–B Method 2 (within the image) 1. Click a layer. 2. Choose the Rectangular Marquee or Elliptical Marquee tool (M or Shift-M), then drag to dene the outer edge of the selection. 3. Alt-drag/Option-drag inside the rst selection to create the inner edge of the frame selection. C Reposition the inner selection, if needed. C Alt-drag/Option-drag to create one rectangular selection within another. B Finally, we added an editable type layer. e type is easy to read because we lightened the background. A We created an inner selection with the Rectangular Marquee tool on this 300 ppi image, applied a Feather value of 25 px via Rene Edge, then chose Select > Inverse. Next, we used a Levels adjustment layer to lighten the area within the frame selection (see pages 206–207). . installing Photoshop and then opening or creating your rst document, an alert dialog will appear. ★ If you click Hide Photoshop, the Cmd-H shortcut will be assigned to the Photoshop > Hide Photoshop. colors and to control the number of partially selected pixels, adjust the Fuzziness value. C 7. Choose a Selection Preview option for viewing the selection in the document window: None for no preview,. in either the dialog preview or the document window to sample a color in the image. A–B 6. To add more colors or shades to the selection, Shift-click in the document or preview window; or to