Photoshop Selections: The Elliptical Marquee Tool

By default, the Elliptical Marquee Tool is hiding behind the Rectangular Marquee Tool in the Tools panel. To access it, simply click on the Rectangular Marquee Tool, then hold your mouse button down for a second or two until a fly-out menu appears showing you the other tools that are nested behind it. Click on the Elliptical Marquee Tool in the fly-out menu to select it:

Many of Photoshop's tools are located behind other tools in the Tools panel.

Once you've chosen the Elliptical Marquee Tool, it will appear in place of the Rectangular Marquee Tool in the Tools panel. To get back to the Rectangular Marquee Tool, you'll need to click and hold on the Elliptical Marquee Tool, then select the Rectangular Marquee Tool from the fly-out menu:

Whichever Marquee Tool you selected previously appears in the Tools panel.

You can easily switch between the Rectangular and Elliptical Marquee Tools from your keyboard, although exactly how you do it will depend on how you have things set up in Photoshop's Preferences. Every tool in the Tools panel can be accessed by pressing a certain letter on your keyboard. Both the Rectangular and Elliptical Marquee Tools can be selected by pressing the letter M, and to switch between them, you either press M again by itself or you'll need to press Shift+M. Again, this depends on how you have it set up in the Preferences.

On a PC, you'll find the Preferences option under the Edit menu at the top of the screen. On a Mac, you'll find it under the Photoshop menu. In the General section, look for the option called Use Shift Key for Tool Switch. With this option checked, you'll need to add the Shift key to switch between the two Marquee tools (as well as other tools in the Tools panel that share the same keyboard shortcut). Uncheck the option if you'd rather just use the M key by itself to switch between them. It's completely up to you:

The "Use Shift Key for Tool Switch" option in Photoshop's Preferences allows you to control how you switch between nested tools in the Tools panel.

Drawing Oval Selections

To draw an oval selection with the Elliptical Marquee Tool, simply click at the point where you want to begin the selection, then hold your mouse button down and drag in the direction you need until you have the object or area surrounded by the selection outline. Release your mouse button to complete the selection. Here's a wedding photo that I have open in Photoshop:

A smiling bride and groom, happy to be helping us learn about selections.

I want to add a classic white vignette effect to this photo, and the Elliptical Marquee Tool will make it easy. First, I'll add a new blank layer so I can create my effect without damaging the original image. I'll do that by clicking on the New Layer icon at the bottom of the Layers panel:

Add a new blank layer by clicking on the New Layer icon in the Layers panel.

This adds a new blank layer named "Layer 1" above the Background layer:

Photoshop always gives new layers generic names like "Layer 1".

I'm going to fill this new layer with white using Photoshop's Fill command. To select it, I'll go up to the Edit menu at the top of the screen and choose Fill:

The Fill command is found under the Edit menu.

This brings up the Fill dialog box. I'll select White in the Contents section in the top half of the dialog box, then I'll click OK to exit out of the dialog box and fill "Layer 1" with white:

The Fill command allows us to fill layers or selections with color.

At this point, my entire document window is filled with white, blocking the photo of the wedding couple from view. To temporarily hide "Layer 1" so I can see the original photo again, I'll click on the Layer Visibility icon (also known as the "eyeball") to the left of "Layer 1" in the Layers panel:

You can temporarily turn layers on or off by clicking the Layer Visibility icon.

Now that I can see the original image, I'll begin my vignetting effect by drawing an oval selection around the wedding couple. I'll select the Elliptical Marquee Tool from the Tools panel as we saw earlier and I'll click somewhere in the top left corner of the photo to mark the spot where I want to begin my selection. Then, while still holding down my mouse button, I'll drag down towards the bottom right corner of the photo. As I drag, an oval selection outline appears around the couple in the center of the image:

Click and hoTooltip trigger goes here.ld on the spot where you want to begin the oval selection, then drag in the direction you need to draw the selection outline.


source: http://www.photoshopessentials.com/basics/selections/elliptical-marquee-tool/

Posted in: Photoshop