Drawing with Brushes, Shapes, and Other Tools - Photoshop Elements 13: The Missing Manual - page 646

3. Drag in your photo .
Move around the edge of the object you want to keep, being careful not to let the
crosshairs touch the object itself, or else you'll start erasing it, too. If you make a mis-
take, just press Ctrl+Z/ ⌘ -Z.
The Background Eraser has three Tool Options settings to help you refine how it works
(though you may not need to change any of these settings to get the results you want):
▪ Tolerance . This setting tells the Background Eraser how similar colors have to be for it
to remove them. It's just like the Magic Wand's Tolerance setting ( The Lasso Tools ) .
▪ Brush Settings . If you want to use a different brush style, click this button and then
choose your settings (they're explained on Modifying Your Brush ).
▪ Limits . Do you want the Background Eraser to remove only contiguous color or all the
patches of a certain color, no matter where they are in your image? This works exactly
like the Magic Wand's Contiguous setting ( The Lasso Tools ) .
If you want to remove the background around an object, you may find it most effective to
start by using the Background Eraser around the object's edges, and then switch to the other
Erasers to clean up. The advantage of this method is that you don't have to clean up junk left
over from the Magic Eraser. Plus it's easier to maneuver the Background Eraser than the reg-
ular Eraser, especially if you don't have a graphics tablet.