Working with selections

topics.jpg (1056 octets)

Selecting part of an image is the first step in most of the editing tasks. Once you define a selection you can move it, copy its contents, delete its contents, modify its colors, apply a filter to it (and constraint it to the selected area), and more. In most cases selections are used to constraint the application of another tool or special effect to a defined zone within the current object. If you select a zone, all the editing tasks you do afterwards (painting, application of special effects ...) will be applied to and only to the selected parts of the object. The unselected parts are considered non-active and are preserved.

 

Doing selections

Whithin Photonyx all selections are made through Selection Masks. A Selection mask is a simple color overlay that highlights the selected parts of the image.

You do selections within Photonyx using the selection tools. The power of all these selection tools reside in the fact that you can combine them together to achieve precise selections.

Here is the normal workflow to achieve precise selections :

  • Make a Selection Mask with a selection tool
  • Add another zone to the first selection : Press Shift Key and one or more times any of the selection tools.
  • Substract from the current selection : Press Control Key and apply one or more times any of the selection tools.

The next step for refining you selection is editing it directly using the painting tools :

  • Use the Navigator, the Zoom drawer or right click with your mouse to quickly zoom-in and navigate the image.
  • Select a small brush size and edit the selection selection by :
  • Painting in white to add zones to the selection;
  • Painting with black to substract zones from the selection;
  • Paint with gray levels to add translucent zones to the current selection.

Other useful commands/shorcuts :

  • Select the content of the active object : Select >  All : Ctrl + A
  • Remove a selection from the active object : Select >  None : Ctrl + D
  • To swap an objects's selected and non-selected areas : Select > Inverse Ctrl + Shift + I

I strongly advise you to use different selection tools to achieve precise to the pixel selections. Get confident with all the tools and when defining selections take advantage of the particularities of each one of them.

 

Feathering selection masks

To soften a selection mask border and make it more or less fuzzy you should use the Feather command from the Select menu.

  • To display the feather dialog box : Select > Feather (Alt + Ctrl + Shift + F)
  • you then can enter a value for the stretch over the one Photonyx will fade the selection maks hard borders

 

Moving selections                                                                            

You can use Move Tool to move a selection or the current object. How Photonyx processes the image depends on whether you selected the move object or move selection option for the Move Tool. You may want to :

tb_move_s.jpg (1096 octets)Moving one or more objects with the move object tool.

 

tb_move-s_s.jpg (1026 octets)Moving the selection mask with the move selection tool.

 

To select either the move object or the move selection tool, press V key or select it in the toolbar (Alt-click to select the hidden one).

note.jpeg (8965 octets)To move either the current object or the Selection mask; click on the project window and drag to another position. When done release the button.

 

Copying, cutting and pasting selections

Use the following commands to manipulate the content of selections :

  • Edit > Copy to copy the content of the selection in the clipboard : Ctrl + C
  • Edit > cut removes the content of the selection and copies it in the clipboard : Ctrl + C
  • Edit > Paste ... to paste the content of  the clipboard in the current object : Ctrl + V
  • Edit > Clear removes the content of the selection but doesn't copy it in the clipboard : Ctrl + C

 

Creating an object from the selection

You can easily create an object directly from the current selection using :

  • Object > Create > Object via Copy : Ctrl + J
  • Object > Create > Object via Cut : Ctrl + Shift + J

note.jpeg (8965 octets)The small difference between the two methods is that when using "Object via Cut" the selection is removed from the source object and pasted in the new object.