Week 4 - Review questions

1. If you needed to create a square selection, what selection tools would you use?: The rectangular marquee.
2. What shape of selection does the Elliptical Marquee create?: Circles and elipses.
3. What short-cut key would you use to form a perfect square or circle as you select?: Just hold the shift key after begining the drag.
4. If you have an image or graphic with a large area of blue pixels, what would be the easiest tool to use to select these same-colored pixels?: The magic wand.
5. True or False? The Magic Wand selects pixels based on edge-contrast. Why or why not?: False. It selects by choosing the same-colored pixels.
6. Explain the term 'Fixed Aspect Ratio' when working with Selections: If checked and when using a rectangular marquee, the ratio between the width and the height of the selection will always be the same.
7. If you have already created a selection and you want to add or subtract from the selection, what would you do?: Select the add or substract icons in the toolbar.
8. If you wanted to create a Fixed Size Rectangular Selection, where would you input your Width and Height values?: In the boxes provided in the marquee toolbar.
9. While using the Magnetic Lasso, how and where would you control the value of the edge contrast so Photoshop snaps to the edges you need it to?: By changing the value in the edge contrast box of the Magnetic Lasso toolbar.
10. I have an unsteady hand! What settings for the Magnetic Lasso can help me with this issue and why?: If the edge is well defined, you can increase the number of pixels in the width box, this means than you can wander off more from the edge. You can also change the number of anchor points photoshop decide to put by decreasing the number in the frequency box, that way you can wander off and be back on track before an anchor point is made. You can also always use the backspace key to erase the last anchor point and try again.
11. Explain in detail what the 'Contiguous' setting affects when using the Magic Wand Tool.: By clicking contiguous, the magic wand will only select the similar pixels that are next to each other. For example, if the picture contains two simming pools separated by another color, it will only select one swimming pool.
12. What settings can help you achieve smoother and softer edges for selections?: The feather and the anti-alias settings.
13. Explain the differences between Feather and Anti-Alias.: The feather setting blurs the edges, the anti-alias works with the eliptical marquee and the lasso selection and makes the border smooth instead of jagged.
14. Describe two ways to activate the Feather command on a selection.: Select from the option bar, or from Select submenu and enter a value.
15. True or False: You can check off the Anti-Alias check box before or after you've create a selection in order for it to take effect.: False. You have to select it before.
16. Describe three ways to access/execute Transformation commands for Selections.: Go to the Menu Bar_Select and choose Transformation Selection, or right click within the selection and choose Transformation selection or Free Transform.
17. What are some of the benefits of working with layers?
: Each layers can be worked on independentely, they can be re-arranged, deleted, duplicated, linked and put into sets of layers.
18. How would you know which layer is currently active?: When there is a small brush next to it, and the layer is highlighted,
19. What would you need to do to manipulate or move more than one layer at once?: Link them by making the first one you want to link, active, and then clicking the link icon for any other layers that you want to link to that one.
20. How would you combine more than one layer together to obtain only one layer and minimize file size?: By fusing them using Layer_Merge down, or Layer_Merge visible
21. How do you arrange artwork on one layer to appear behind or in front of, artwork on another layer?: By moving the order of the layers.
22. Describe in your own words what a Quick Mask is and how you can use it in your work.: By editing in quick mask mode I can see better the selection made and adjust it accordingly. I can also control better the feathering settings by seing it before hand.
23. When working in Quick Mask Mode, what would you do to add to your present selection?: I woud choose the painting brush tool and paint in white the areas I want to add to the selection.
24. Why would you want to preview your feathered selection using Quick Mask Mode?
: Because with the normal mode you can only see the marching ants and only guess what the feathered result will look like. With the quick mask mode you can preview the effect.
25. Explain three ways to create Feathered selections when you are working with Quick Mask Mode.: You can use the Gaussian Blur to control and preview the feather effect in direct. Not sure about the other two...