Creating and Working with Selections in Paint Shop Pro 7 Learn How to Use Paint Shop Pro's Selection Tools pp. 62-68 Paint Shop Pro 7 offers 3 basic tools for creating various selections: Selection Tool (6th button on the Toolbox) Freehand Tool (7th button on the Toolbox - looks like a rope) Magic Wand Tool (8th button on the Toolbox) Selection Tool Hands-On Exercise p. 62 Open a new file in Paint Shop Pro Select the Selection Tool in the Toolbox Set the shape of the selection to Rectangle using the Tool Options palette Select a rectangular portion of the canvas Unselect by one of two ways: Click Selections/Select None Click outside of the selected area with the cursor still in the Select Mode

Freehand Tool Hands-On Exercise pp. 62-66

The Freehand Tool offers three selection types:

1. Freehand
2. Point to Point
3. Smart Edge

Create an image as shown below for practice:

When the Freehand Tool is set to the Freehand Type, you can easily draw any irregular shaped selection area that you wish. Give it a try.

When the Freehand Tool is set to the Point to Point Type, you click at each vertex (corner) of the desired selection area. Double-click when you are finished. Give it a try.

When the Freehand Tool is set to the Smart Edge Type, you can click near an object on the canvas and the selection marquee will conform to the edge of the shape. Give it a try!

Magic Wand Tool Hands-On Exercise pp. 66-68

The Magic Wand Tool permits you to select various colored areas.

• Select the Magic Wand tool (and set its tolerance to 10)
• Click an area of an image
• You should see a marquee appear along the edge of the shape

Note: The Sample Merged checkbox permits a magic wand selection across various layers. When the same color appears on various layers it will still get selected if the checkbox is checked.

Selections Menu pp. 67-68

The Selections Menu offers:

• Select All (Ctrl + A)
• Select None (Ctrl +D)
• From Mask (Shift + Ctrl + S) [Chapter 11]
• Invert (Shift + Ctrl + I)
• Float - Creates a duplicate that can be moved
• See page 68 for 10 more options

Editing Your Selections in Paint Shop Pro pp. 69-73

Hands-On Exercise for Adding to a Selection pp. 69-70

To add to a selection that has already been made, all that one must do is press the Shift key as another selection gets created with the mouse. Try this on the canvas in Paint Shop Pro.

Hands-On Exercise for Subtracting from a Selection pp. 70-71

To subtract from a selection that has already been made, all that one must do is press the Ctrl key as another selection gets created with the mouse.. Try this on the canvas in Paint Shop Pro.

Hands-On Exercise for Expanding and Contracting a Selection pp. 71-72

Sometimes one might want to expand or contract a selection by a cretain number of pixels. To do this use Paint Shop Pro's menu:

• Click Selections/Modify/Expand & Set the Number of Pixels.
• Click Selections/Modify/Contract & Set the Number of Pixels.

Hands-On Exercise for Growing a Selection p.72

Often one may want to select more areas that have pixels that are colored similarly to those already chosen. Rather than resetting the Magic Wand's tolerance, one may want to:

• Click Selections/Modify/Grow Selection

Hands-On Exercise for Selecting Similar Areas p. 72

Also, sometimes you may want to select noncongruent (noncontiguous) areas of the same color. If so, then:

• Click Selections/Modify/Select Similar

Hands-On Exercise for Saving & Loading Selections pp. 72-73

The selections (marquees) that you make can be saved and reloaded into another file.

• Click Selections/Save to Disk
• Click Selections/Save to Alpha Channel
• Click Selections/Load from Disk
• Click Selections/Load from Alpha Channel

Note: An alpha channel is a storage area for items that your image is not currently using such as:

• Selection Shapes
• Masks

Copyright © 2001, RGPatterson, all rights reserved; last revised: 9/5/01