Selections - Adobe Photoshop Elements 11 for Photographers - page 274

Growing Selections
As well as the options listed under the Select > Modify menu, an active selection can also
be altered and adjusted using the Grow command. The Select > Grow feature increases the
size of an existing selection by incorporating pixels of similar color and tone to those already
in the selection. For a pixel to be included in the 'grown' selection it must be adjacent to the
existing selection and fall within the current Tolerance settings located in the options bar.

Step-by-step selection growing:
Use these steps to increase the size of the selection to include adjacent pixels of the same color and tone.

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Create a Selection First:
Like the Similar command below, the Grow
feature works on an existing selection, so
the first step is to create a new selection.

Apply Grow Command:
With the selection established you can now
choose Select > Grow. This instruct the pro-
gram to increase the selection's edges to in-
clude adjacent pixels that have similar tones
and colors.

Adjust Tolerance Setting:
Elements uses the current Tolerance setting
of the Magic Wand to determine how similar
pixels have to be to be included in the new
selection. Use a lower value to be more se-
lective and a higher setting to include pixels
with more variation.

Selecting Similar Picture Parts
Listed under the Select menu is a range of options for adjusting selections after they have
been created. Select > Similar is one of these options available to Photoshop Elements users.
The feature looks for, and selects, pixels throughout the whole picture with similar color and
tonal characteristics to those already included in an existing selection.

Step-by-step selection of similar pixels:
Follow this three step process to locate and include pixels from the rest of the image that are similar to those already selected.

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Make First Selection:
Using the Select > Similar feature is a two
step process and is really meant to be used
as a refinement tool rather than a primary
selection strategy. So the first step in the
process is to make a selection. You can use
any of the selection tools to do this.

Use Select > Similar:
Now choose Select > Similar. Automatically
the program looks for other pixels in the
image with similar characteristics and
creates a new selection that encompasses
the ones it finds that are a match.

Re-select with Different Settings:
The Tolerance settings of the selection tool
used to make the initial selection are used
when creating the new 'similar' selection. If
the tool you used doesn't have a tolerance
setting, and you need to fine-tune the selec-
tion process then switch to the Magic Wand
before re-selecting and applying the Similar
function again.