6.0 Selections

page two
The number three item is multicolored, and so, not a good candidate for the magic wand. First I'll select it with the rectangular marquee tool.
     With that tool selected in the toolbox, and the New Selection button chosen, you would place the cursor precisely on the upper left corner of the multicolored rectangle and drag to the lower right corner. Then release the mouse button. The illustration shows the cursor on the red rectangle.

If you have difficulty placing the cursor on precisely the point of the corner, you can try magnifying your view by using the zoom tool, the Navigator palette, or by typing in a magnification value on the status bar and pressing Enter. You can also switch to the precise cursor by pressing the Caps Lock key. Just don't forget to press it again to unlock Caps Lock.
     While in the process of dragging a selection, you can reposition it by pressing the spacebar. When you have the spacebar down (still holding the left mouse button down, as well), the selection outline can be moved without being reshaped.
     If, in spite of all this, you end up with a selection that is not quite lined up with the rectangle's edges, try using the Select > Transform Selection command. Your selection will become a transform outline with handles that can be dragged to resize the selection. Hover your cursor over the edge to see the arrow, shown below, to drag to change the width.

The arrow at the corner, shown below, is where you drag for scaling.

Or the double headed, curvy arrow for rotating (not shown). Do this with the selection greatly magnified so you can see the edges, clearly. Click the big check box in the transform options bar, or press Enter to accept you changes.
     Another choice for selecting this rectangle, is the polygon lasso. Choose it in the toolbox, check its settings in its options bar, and then click once on a corner of the rectangle, and click again on each of the other corners around the object. To complete the selection, click on the starting point. Your cursor will show a little hollow circle when it is positioned precisely over the starting point.
     Again, if you have trouble seeing where the cursor is clicking, try switching to the precise cursor by pressing the Caps Lock key. This will turn the polygon lasso tool icon shown below, left, to the precise brush cursor, shown at right unless you have chosen precise in Preferences. You can choose to always use the precise cursor if you like, by going to Edit > Preferences > Dispaly & Cursors.

Magnify your image using the zoom tool, or Navigator palette before you select.
     When your finished with this one, press Ctrl plus D to deselect all.
        

Copyright © 2000 by Jay Arraich.
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All photographs copyright ©2000 by Jay Arraich
jay@arraich.com