GLOSSARY OF SELECTION TOOLS AND COMMANDS

Photoshop’s arsenal of selection tools and commands offer a particular set of skills…

POLYGONAL LASSO TOOL

Click points to make a straight-edged polygonal selection. Press Backspace to remove plotted points, and double-click to close the selection.

QUICK SELECTION TOOL

Found in both the main interface and in Select And Mask, this tool lets you paint a selection while seeking out edges. Hold Alt to subtract if the selection goes astray.

MAGIC WAND TOOL

Click over any point in the image and the Magic Wand tool will seek out similar pixels. Use Tolerance to control how exacting the tool is, and tick Contiguous if you want to concentrate on one enclosed selection.

COLOR RANGE

Found in Select > Color Range. Like the Magic Wand tool, but with extra options for fine-tuning the selected colours.

QUICK MASK

With an active selection, press Q to enter Quick Mask mode, then paint with white to add to the selection, and black to subtract from it. Press Q again to go back to the ‘marching ants’ view.

MARQUEE SELECTION TOOLS

Make a rectangular or circular selection with the two Marquee tools. Hold down Shift for a perfect circle/ square, Alt to drag from the centre, and Space to fine-tune the position while dragging.

PEN TOOL

The Pen tool enables you to plot Bezier curves controlled by anchor points and control handles.

FOCUS AREA

This handy command automatically selects a sharp subject against a blurred backdrop. Go to Select > Focus Area to access it.

SELECTION SHORTCUTS

When using any selection tool hold Shift to add to it, Alt to subtract and Shift+Alt to intersect. Cmd/ Ctrl+click the thumbnail of any layer, mask, channel or path to load the shape as a selection.