Make Complex Selections Easy Using Affinity Photo Selection Tools

in today's video i'll show you how to easily  make complex selections using affinity photo   let's start by using the flood select  tool to select the sky in this image   after clicking the magic wand icon in the tools  palette i just need to click on an area of the sky   when i do this you can see the marching ants  appear around what affinity photo is selected   you may be able to see this better if i turn on  the quick match view by clicking the icon in the   toolbar now you can see a red mask over the area  of the image that isn't selected if i zoom in you   can see the flood select tool has selected the sky  right up to the fine branches of the tree but the   problem with this is that it hasn't selected  the sky you can see between the tree branches   let's switch back to the view with the marching  ants and i'll show you a couple of ways to fix   this in the toolbar you'll see that there's a  mode section with four icons these icons change   the behavior of the selection tool allowing  you to modify any current selection the default   option is to create a new selection this creates  an entirely new selection replacing any existing   selection you might have made if i click on an  area of sky showing between the tree branches it   then selects that and removes the selection from  the larger area of the sky what we really need to   do in this situation though is to use the add mode  so we can add new areas to an existing selection   whilst the add mode is useful and i can use it  to select all the additional areas between the   branches that isn't very practical fortunately  there's a much easier and faster way the reason   the flood select tool didn't include the areas of  the sky between the branches was because they were   surrounded and not considered part of the sky  what controls this behavior is the contiguous   option in the toolbar when using the contiguous  option an area must be next to another area that's   included in the selection for that area to be  included because the sky between the branches   is cut off from the rest of the sky it's ignored  here's what happens when i turn off the contiguous   option and click the sky again this time all the  pixels that match the color sampled in the sky   are included in the selection this is a much  better selection but there are still some problems   we now have other areas of the image that are  included in the selection but which aren't part   of the sky let's look at a couple of tools we can  use to fix this and which you can use in all sorts   of circumstances i'll start with the freehand  selection tool which allows me to draw around   areas with the mouse to select them this has three  type settings that change how you use the tool   the one to use in this example is the freehand  option because it allows me to quickly draw   around areas to select them when i zoom into  the image you can see the lake is currently   including the selection to remove it i can use  the subtract mode with the freehand selection   now i can draw roughly around the leg and when i  release the mouse it's removed from the selection   this is easy and fast to do and i don't even  need to close the area i'm drawing around   as soon as i release my mouse button affinity  completes the selection and removes it   i can also use this tool to easily clean up other  problem areas look more closely at the horizon you   can see the selection is spilling onto the hills  in the distance because they aren't well defined   against the sky it's very easy to use the freehand  selection tool to draw along the mountains to   remove them having done that let's zoom out to  see the entire image and you might notice other   areas of the foreground that are included in the  selection i could use the freehand selection tool   to remove these as well but i can also use the  rectangular marquee tool using this with the   subtract mode i can draw around the entire lower  part of the image to remove it from the selection   let's do a check with the quick mask and you can  see that it's pretty much a perfect selection i'll   save the selection in case i want to use it again  you can do this in the select menu by choosing   save selection as a spare channel this saves  the selection you've made as part of the image   so that it's easy to find when you want to use it  again if i go to the channel studio panel you can   see the new spare channel that's been saved by  right clicking on the channel i can rename it to   sky selection so that it's easily recognized after  that i can clear my selection now the mistake lots   of people make when using affinity photo is to try  to create a selection using a single tool this is   probably because the tools seem so good at what  they do but it hardly ever works unless it's a   very simple selection instead you need to combine  the different tools as we've done in this example   also be sure to use the add and subtract  modes because creating a complex selection   with one click is almost impossible break down the  selection you want to make into sections or stages   another common mistake is trying to use the wrong  selection tool for the job look at what happens   when i try to select the sky with the selection  brush tool it just can't handle the fine branches   or the gaps between the trees the selection brush  tool is better for making large selections where   there's a contiguous area to select and a clear  and smooth edge a better option in situations   like this is to use the flood select tool where  you can turn off the contiguous option to create   the bulk of the selection with a single click we  can then refine that selection with the freehand   selection tool this excels at allowing you to  quickly draw rough selections around objects   there's also the rectangular marquee tool which  is great for selecting rectangular shaped areas   let's go back to the original selection we saved  in the channel studio panel when i right click on   the save channel i can choose the load to pixel  selection option i'll then turn on the quick mask   so you can see the unselected areas in red zooming  in affinity photo has made an excellent job of   selecting even the finest details but if it hadn't  we can use the refine button to easily fix problem   areas if you want to know how to use the refine  tools watch this video next and if you enjoyed   this video let me know in the youtube comment and  please share it with other affinity photo users

Channel: Robin Whalley

Views: 2,134

Keywords: affinity photo, affinity photo selection, affinity photo selection tool, affinity photo selection mask, affinity photo select object, affinity photo select sky, flood select tool affinity, flood select tool affinity photo, using affinity photo, affinity photo tutorial, affinity photo selection tutorial, affinity photo editing

Id: PUmwGYcWdk8

Length: 6min 15sec (375 seconds)

Published: Thu Dec 16 2021