Suggestions for selecting areas for working with Layers

[NeilMacG]

Hi,

I'm just trying to get to grips with working in Layers. Something in various photo editing tools that I have avoided for as long as possible. However it seems to me that to advance any further with my editing skills I need to make good use of layers.

One of the bits I'm struggling with is how best to select specific areas of a photo (for example to desaturate a background from a person). I realise there is the magic wand and lasso but once having selected part of what I want to work with I can't figure out how to complete the selection process. In PS Elements there is an Airbrush tool that helps with this, but as that's not available here I'm wondering how people complete the selection process in it's absence?

TIA

Neil

[NeilMacG]

Doh - Always seems to happen.

I searched before I posted and couldn't seem to find the answers I wanted.

Just had a quick rummage through the first couple of screens of postings and found this buried in a post:

http://www.getpaint.net/doc/latest/en/MagicWand.html

This helps a lot, but I do still wonder what happens if you can't get exactly what you want and need to be more precise.

Neil

[david.atwell]

With the Selection tools, if you'll look at the context toolbar, you'll see options for Selection Mode. If you switch it from "Normal" to "Add," it will add to the selection; this allows more precision.

I don't understand what this question has to do with Layers or Airbrush, though.

[Simon Brown]

To use the magic wand select it and click on the part of the image you want to select. If it selects too much of the image press Ctrl-Z, drag the tolerance until the number is a bit lower and try again. To select more than one part with MW hold down Ctrl while selecting. To move the selection to a new layer press Ctrl-X and then Ctrl-Shift-V.

[NeilMacG]

With the Selection tools, if you'll look at the context toolbar, you'll see options for Selection Mode. If you switch it from "Normal" to "Add," it will add to the selection; this allows more precision.

I don't understand what this question has to do with Layers or Airbrush, though.

Thanks for that tip - I'm trying it out now.

The layers thing is me trying to understand when to use them and when not (this applies to any photo editing software - I've just never advanced that far). The airbrush thingy is me getting confused about the brush selection tool (on another thread when I was searching here someone had described it the Airbrush) that exists in PS and trying to find if there was something similar in PDN.

Neil

[NeilMacG]

To use the magic wand select it and click on the part of the image you want to select. If it selects too much of the image press Ctrl-Z, drag the tolerance until the number is a bit lower and try again. To select more than one part with MW hold down Ctrl while selecting. To move the selection to a new layer press Ctrl-X and then Ctrl-Shift-V.

Thanks - I'm getting to grips with this (I think) there was some very useful stuff about the Magic wand in the link I found and put in my second posting.

Neil