MAGIC WAND???

OG
Posted By
osito_grande
May 14, 2005
Views
357
Replies
10
Status
Closed
Using PS CS and XP

I have several photographs of objetcs like chairs, stools. lamps and i need to remove (make transparent) the whole background so the object can be used as a logo or icon.
I was thinking of using the wand and delete area or inversing the selection to remove unwanted background.
Is there a better or faster technique or method?

Thank you
Related Tags
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ML
Mike_Logan
May 14, 2005
Assuming they all have a plain background, there’s no better method that I can think of !!
OG
osito_grande
May 14, 2005
pics were badly taken. they have wall adn floor as background. Fairly plain though.
am just afraid of losing some of edge quality of the objects.
JJ
John Joslin
May 14, 2005
Do a rough selection around the object with the Lasso Tool.

Tidy it up with Quick Mask and/or the Magic Wand set on "add".

Convert the selection to a path and give it a final tweak with the pen tools, then convert it back to a selection.

Do Ctrl+J to put it on a new layer; delete the old Background layer and Save as… under a new name to preserve the original.

If they are furniture, they won’t have fuzzy hair to make things difficult.
LM
Lynch_Mike
May 14, 2005
hold Shift to add to selection
hold Allt to subtract from selection
C
chrisjbirchall
May 14, 2005
Investigate the Extract filter. It is much better at separating subjects from a fussy background the any of the other selection methods.

Read up about it in the help files then practice on a simple image first. Once you get the hang of it, you’ll be flying along.

Chris.
OG
osito_grande
May 15, 2005
Topic: MAGIC WAND???
Thank you so much to:
John Joslin , Lynch Mike and chrisjbirchall

OG
JJ
John Joslin
May 15, 2005
Glad to help. 🙂
LM
Lynch_Mike
May 16, 2005
extract tool?
hmmm, I’ll have to try it…
Y
YrbkMgr
May 16, 2005
I use it all the time Mike. It’s a little quirky, but a great tool. I use it for rough selections, then tweak it once extracted.
S
Sepen
May 16, 2005
Well, the best way to get a precise selection from an object with hard edges is the pen tool. Problem with this is you have to be comfortable using the pen tool to make selections which most people arenÂ’t.

Also, this very precise method is 100% manual and for that reason, can be time consuming even when you do know what you are doing but if you are looking for quality, it will give you the best results of any by far and since you get the selection you want the first time without having to go back and forth ‘tweakingÂ’ an automated process, it might not take as much longer as one would think….

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