Hi Again,

Today I have a new tutorial for you – with thanks to May from Trunk Show Kids for this one!

We are going to remove the back ground from a photo to make our image pretty for our websites using Photoshop. This technique can be used for many different reasons in this case we will be transforming a flat lay product photo so our background is white! There are actually a few ways of doing this but today’s tutorial is a little sneaky we will be using the MAGIC “Magnetic Lasso Tool”!

It is a good idea to start with a BIG photo to make zooming into the small details easier – once you have a photo open it up in PhotoShop!

As you can see the background is dark and is not going to work with our site! So let’s get going….

The Magnetic Lasso (A little bit of cheating here)

The magnetic lasso tool as shown in the screen shot below will find the edges of your image for you – this only really works if you have a clearly defined edge like the photo we are using.

With the Magnetic Lasso tool selected click a point on the edge of your image to begin selecting the area. This will give Photshop a reference point to compare for the rest of the process.

Now carefully follow the edges with your mouse, you will notice that a line will begin to follow as you progress aroud the edges. Watch this line carefully if it strays from the edges of your image just click along the edge to reset it on its path and continue.

As you reach the end your lasso tool will have a small circle appear underneath it, this shows that you are ready to connect the two ends together!

Click the edge of your image where you started and your image will be selected! This is shown with “Dancing Ants” a moving border around the edges!

Congratulations! That is the ticky part done….

Now we can remove the background

To do this we will need to select the background (Currently the focal part of our image is selected) As shown in the screen shot above we will need to select the Inverse, this can be found in Select > Inverse or using the shortcut Shift + CTRL + I

The image now shows “Dancing Ants” around the focus of the image and around the edge of the photo, showing that the background is selected.

Now using the Paint Bucket Tool we will fill the background with solid white. Click the tool shown above making sure that your foreground colour is white.

Across the top you will see a sub-menu for this tool – ensure that the Foreground is selected and that your Tolerance is high – Mine is set at 100.

Click somewhere within the selected area and watch your background become white!

Now remove the selection (Ctrl + D) and we can zoom in and check the edges (Ctrl + +)

Resize your image and save your new file….

Tah Dah….

Congratulations you have just finsihed your file!

Until Next Time,

Emma