"Photoshop Question" Topic

Photoshop Elements 6 on windows 7.

I took some pictures of a game we played. I want to photoshop in a background color to the game rather than entertaining people with the inside of my garage. I know how to use most of the tools and know how select and deselect.

Trying to keep details like trees, buildings, hills and such. I don't want to cover them up with the background color and using the lasso tool or using the brush to try to get it perfect is really a pain. The bucket tool is great but it bleeds onto the game surface or trees etc.

Is there anyway to prevent the background color from bleeding onto the game table using the paint bucket tool?

The short answer is "no". It's the wrong tool for that job.

I use the full version, so I'm a little unsure about what Elements includes. There may be a smart erase tool or smart fill tool that will remove pixels of a certain color while leaving the ones you want (green, I suspect) untouched.

Realistically, there are two ways to do what you want:
1. use the Select Tool to select the unwanted background and then delete it. It's a major pain in the butt. The Path Tool will work better if you have it set to the point-to-point option, but it will also take a while.

2. You can use the Select Tool to delete the background along the edge of your board and then use the Paintbucket Tool to fill the rest of the background and it won't bleed in unless you missed a spot. Then use the bucket to fill in the "moat" you created.

Wyatt

I'd do a broad general outline of the area outside the playing elements, leaving a fairly wide border with the elements, and change that area with your solid color. You can then go over the border with a blurring effect to make a transition from the elements to the background. Alternatively, you could just blur the background elements so that the "garage" ends up being unfocused.

Another option is to instead paste the photo into PowerPoint or Word, select the photo, choose the "Format" menu bar, select Remove Background, and then use the "Mark to Keep" and "Mark to Delete" tool to selectively take out or add back portions of the photo. Depending on the background it can take a while and be a bit tedious, but it does work.

Hate to suggest this but couldn't you make this job easier by hanging a backdrop for your photos?

Hard to do in the middle of a game. We have just so much time for gaming. The other thing is that I don't have to store the background and hanger.

I'm not sure about Photoshop Elements, but you could do in Photoshop is use the blur tool and at least blur out the people in the background.