How to Create a Vector Mask in Photoshop 2021

How to Create a Vector Mask in Photoshop

Using a vector mask in Photoshop will give you a cutout with very sharp edges. Use the pen tool or shape tool to create a vector mask in Photoshop. Easily edit the path of your vector mask. Selections with a vector mask are far more efficient than pixel-based selections.

Today, I’m gonna show you how to use vector masks in Photoshop. We’ll use the Pen tool to cut out this bottle to create our vector mask. Then we’ll learn how to edit our vector mask, and place it in this background.

So what is a vector mask? Well, the vector mask is a mask that clips out the contents of the layer. Vector masks are more accurate than those created with pixel-based tools, especially when working on images with hard edges. To create a vector mask, you can use a couple of different tools. Here we have the Pen tool, the Curvature Pen tool, and you can use any of these shape tools to create your vector mask in photoshop.

How to Create a Vector Mask Path with the Pen Tool

I’m going to be using the Pen tool, and to start off using the Pen tool, I’m just gonna make sure that I have a couple of settings taken care of up here at the toolbar on the top. I want to make sure that Path is selected. Also there’s something called shape operations, right here, and I want to make sure that Combine Shapes is checked.

Also notice my cursor. This is a pretty standard cursor for the Pen tool, but if you press down the Caps lock, it changes to a crosshair like this. I prefer working that way to create a vector mask in photoshop.

Also in the top of the toolbar, in Path options, there is something called Rubber Band, and I have that checked. That allows you to see where your line is going to be drawn, and that’ll give you a guide to kind of help you get your points.

So I’m gonna start off with the Pen tool here, and I’m gonna explain as much as I can about what I’m doing, but you want to know more about the Pen tool, I’ll leave a link in the description and in the card above. So the Pen tool is ideal for cutting out objects with hard edges. We hit Alt or Option, and click there, so I can make my point, and go around the image to create a vector mask in photoshop.

So with vector masks, you’ll be able to fine-tune images much faster and easier. Now I’m gonna speed up the process of cutting out this bottle with the Pen tool. You can use the Curvature Pen tool. It works well when there is a lot of curves, like on this bottle, but this is okay. Always trying to create as few points as necessary.

So with our vector mask created, we’re gonna be able to fine-tune images much faster and easier. Other selection methods like Quick Selection and Magic Wand are not going to be able to produce a nice edge detail, especially when you have background colors that are similar to the color of the actual object.

How to edit your vector mask

So after creating our path using the Pen tool, to quickly convert a path to a vector mask, I’m gonna hold down the Command key on a Mac, or the Control key on Windows, and click on the Add Layer Mask below, and there is our vector mask. So if you look at the mask on this layer, it has a gray background. That’s how you know you’ve created a vector mask.

You can also hold Shift and click on the vector mask to disable it. Click on it again, and you have your vector mask back. So you’re gonna find that a vector mask is resolution-independent. It’s not going to lose quality. Though to better see my selection, I’m gonna turn on this Color Fill adjustment layer that I have created here. There are some areas for me to work on, but this is a nice sharp edge here, and you can only get that by using the Pen tool to create your vector mask in photoshop.

So now, if I want to make any changes to the path of my vector mask, I select the mask itself and then press the letter A. That will put me in the Direct Selection tool, and if I want to make a change, I can make a marquee selection. It’s selected that anchor point, and I can move the anchor point, and as I move it, you could see it’d change my vector mask in photoshop.

So you’re kind of seeing in realtime how changing your handles will affect your vector mask right away. And I can click and move these in if I want to. If I hold down Alt or Option, I can move these handles independently, and I can go through and make any changes. Anything that I didn’t do correctly,

I could select, and down here move the path itself, I can bring it out. Use my handles to change it. Select path as I go, so I can change the shape. Get select point with a marquee selection. And I can use my arrow keys to bring that in or out, or up or down. I could select more than one point, and bring that in with my arrow keys.

I can move my handles on my vector mask. I can hold Alt or Option and move one of the handles independently of the other one. So these are some of the ways that you can edit your vector mask. Up here I didn’t do such a good job on my round circle up here, so I can use my arrow keys after I’ve selected that. And because I have this background color, I could kind of see where I’m at while making my vector mask in photoshop.

How to Add a Path to a Vector Mask

There’s one thing I forgot here, and if you need to add to your vector path, you can use a shape. I’m going to come over here to my Shape tool. So with my Ellipse tool selected, I’m gonna draw my ellipse. Hold down my Spacebar, and draw the same time to try and get it positioned. I’m going to come up to the toolbar and select Subtract Font Shape, and that adds that selection I just made to the current path.

How to Use a Vector Mask

Now I’m ready to use my vector mask with this layer on the bottom, and so I’ll turn off my Color Fill layer. There’s a background layer that I can use for this. If I click on my vector mask thumbnail, and double-click on it, here’s my Properties. I can feather my edges a little bit, just so it blends in. Can also go back to my Density here and bring in the original background, if I wanted to see how that looks, if there’s anything that I want to adjust. I could still adjust my vector mask here, with my vector mask thumbnail selected, and I’m in the Direct Select tool. I can grab this and change it.

So I can still go back and edit. I bring my Density back up again. And if I wanted to make it blend in a little bit more, create a group, Command-G. Select my vector mask, hit Alt or Option, drag it up to my group. And I’m gonna delete my vector mask here. Right-click, say Delete Vector Mask.

Now this layer, my bottle layer, is in my group, and that mask is working on that, and any adjustment that I put in this group is gonna work with my bottle layer. So I’m going to add a Levels adjustment, clip it to my bottle layer with this icon. I’m going to change my bottle layer blend mode to Luminosity. I want to try and get some of that yellow coloring in the background showing through the bottle. And now I’m going to adjust my levels. Bring the midtones down, darken it a little bit more, and I think I want to change that blend mode of the levels adjustment to Multiply.

Now I want to work on that cork a little bit, so if I make a copy of the bottle layer, Command-J, I want to move the bottle layer above my levels. Make sure that this is clipped still. Change my bottle copy back to normal, and I’m going to add a black layer mask on the bottle copy, and hold Alt or Option and click on the Add Layer Mask.

And now I’m gonna paint with white, using my brush tool on my bottle copy layer. And bring back the cork, and this part up here at the top, something like this. And there’s a lot of ways to work with this, I just wanted to bring some of those color lights behind the bottle in. How to Create a Vector Mask in Photoshop

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