How To Use The Object Selection Tool In Photoshop 2020

Object Selection Tool

So the object selection tool is really most useful when you have an object or a single object that you want to cut out in an image that has multiple objects in it. So I’ll go through some examples here. You could use it to cut out like a piece of clothing, people from an image, pets, furniture. So let’s work with this image here. The object selection tool is up here on the toolbar. It’s in the same menu as the quick selection tool and a magic wand. If you don’t see the object selection tool right away, just come up here to where you see the quick selection tool and right click and you’ll, you’ll see the object selection tool. At the top, we have sample all layers, if we’re working with more than one layer and we want to consider the layer below. Auto-enhance, that kind of reduces the roughness and blockiness in the selection boundary. And also, check the object subtract, it automatically subtracts an object inside a defined region. So we have a couple of choices here. Two choices actually, mode rectangle or lasso. So we can use either one of those tools to make a selection. In this case, I’m going to select the pants here and I’m gonna use a rectangle. I’m going to draw in that Photoshop, Select the pants as it did, just by itself. So we selected, I’m drawing the rectangle. I could have, I think say Command+D and deselect that and I’m going to use the lasso so I can draw around the pants and it will select it that way. So it just depends on what’s easier for you. A lot of times just selecting using a rectangle is the most direct way to do it. Now that we have a selection made, so we want to change the color of the pants. So I’m going to click on new layer. I’m gonna create a group by itself, Command+G and I’m going to copy the layer mask to that group holding down Alt or option and copying up to the group. And I’m going to delete the layer mask on the layer below. So now that I have a group, with the layer mask on the group, inside that group I’m going to add a levels adjustment to that group and I’m going to add a solid color adjustment layer to that group also. And I’m gonna use the solid color adjustment layer put the blend mode of color to control the hue and saturation. And I’m going to use the levels adjustment layer to control the brightness. So now if I want to change the color of the pants, let me select a color in the top. Lighter color. And then I can use the levels adjustment layer to make the colors how I want them in order for them to blend in or have the, maintain the texture and everything. So, there you go. Changed it to a color that looks more matching. That’s an example of what you can do with clothing, with the object select tool. So the object select tool is an automatic tool. Basically, what I mean by that is, it’s one click and automatically does a selection similar to what you can do with the Select subject tool. So if I come up here to the, just click on quick selection tool, the Select subject button up here appears. If I click on that, what it did is it selected the whole image.

Remove Background Feature

So there is an additional feature in Photoshop 2020 that I wanted to show you and it is another automatic tool. So if I’m on a layer and I come up here to info and click on the properties, there is something new called remove background. If I click on remove background, it basically removed the background with one click. Now, there’s a little bit more work that needs to be done. Right here you can see in the middle, some of this area didn’t get selected but I can use a tool like the quick selection tool and select that area and with the Oregon color black, click option delete and that filled that with black and that’s all I had to do. But that’s just an example of remove background, another automatic tool that we have it, I was gonna explain to you. So here’s another example. In this one we’re going to work with this chair. We’re gonna select out the chair and add another chair to the scene. So so far, we’ve been working with the object selection tool and we’ve gotten to it through the menu on the left here. But we’re gonna get to an example where we’re going to actually use it and use it through the select and mask tool. So let’s choose rectangle. So I’m gonna draw a rectangle here. And you can see that it didn’t get all this leg but what you can do is hold the shift down and draw another rectangle, right around that area. And there you go, Photoshop has completed the selection of the chair leg and if I wanted to remove any portion of a selection, I could just press Alt or option and draw another rectangle and remove part of the selection. So now if I come down here to the add layer, new layer mask, there is my chair. I’m gonna make a copy of this layer. And on that one layer, I’m going to delete the layer mask. And on this layer that I just cut out the chair, I’m going to do a Command+T to bring up the transform. Right click and flip horizontal. Press the check mark and enable the layer below. And here’s the chair over here. So, if I wanted, I could move this chair anywhere in the photo that I wanted. Now, this was just a rough, this was just a rough cut out and so it just gives you an idea of what you could do with the furniture. I didn’t actually, I didn’t actually account for the shadows or anything like in a real composite but it just gives you an idea of what you can do with furniture and again the object selection tool. Now so far we’ve seen that with the object selection tool, sometimes you can get a pretty good selection and that’s gonna vary depending on what your subject is.

Object Selection with Select and Mask

But, let’s try something a little bit more challenging. So in the case where you’re trying to select out subjects and it’s like this, a group photo, we’re going to actually use the select and mask tool to work on this right away. So once we click over here on the menu, to one of the selection tools, you’ll see that the select and mask button is available. So we’re gonna go right into select and mask and, now we have the object selection tool in the select and mask tool interface also. I’m going to draw a rectangle over one subject. And as you can see, Photoshop did a pretty good job of that selection. Now we can use any of the tools in here. And I’m just going to use the refine edge tool and go over just the area around the hair. I’m not trying to make this a perfect cut out. It takes some time to cut out hair and we’re just gonna do a quick job here. So I might add that this is great, this tool. It may require some work here and there but it’s good to like if you wanna try out, like in this case where, we’re cutting out a subject and if I wanna put her on a different background, then I can try the different backgrounds and see how the subject would fit in the image. So here we go, let’s create a new layer with new layer mask. Say okay. And there we have our subject cut out. And I’m gonna make this background layer another layer. And I think I will make us a little bit more challenging. I am going to cut out another subject that is right in the middle of everything. So back in to select and mask, back to the object selection tool and I’m going to draw my rectangle right in the middle of this subject right here. And let’s see what Photoshop does. Pretty good. And again I’m going to, I’ll put this to a new layer with layer mask and say okay. And so they both are cut out. So I’m going to bring in a background later just as a test. As I mentioned, this is something that you can actually do. I’m not gonna actually composite this but this is like an idea of what you can actually do is bring your subjects into a background, just to see if it works. Now, what you would normally do is, you would match the brightness of the subject to the background and also the colors. So I’ve added two levels adjustment layers and clip them both to the layers below and just adjusted it so it kinda looks a little bit better where the subject is, at least the brightness is close as, closer to the way it looks. And of course you would match the shadows and everything in the image but that’s what you can do with your object selection tool.

Object Selection Tool FAQ

What is the Object Selection tool in Photoshop?

The Object Selection tool simplifies the process selecting a single object or part of an object in an image—people, cars, furniture, pets, clothes, and more. You simply draw a rectangular region or a lasso around the object, the Object Selection tool automatically selects the object inside the defined region. The tool works better on well-defined objects than on regions without contrast. 

Where can you acess the Object Selection tool in Photoshop?

From the main application Tools panel in Photoshop. 
From the Tools panel in the Select and Mask Workspace.

How is the Object Selection tool different from the Select Subject command?

The Object Selection tool is useful when you only need to select one of the objects or part of an object within an image that contains multiple objects. While the Select Subject command is designed to select all the main subjects in the image.

How do you use the Object Selection tool in Photoshop?

1. Select the Object Selection tool from the Tools panel.
2. Choose a selection mode and define a region around the object.
In the options bar, choose a selection Mode: Rectangle or Lasso.
Rectangle mode: Drag the pointer to define a rectangular region around the object.
Lasso mode: Draw a rough lasso outside the boundary of the object.
Photoshop automatically selects the object inside the defined region.