Magic Wand Selection in CS4

I do illustrative site plans for an architecture firm. I frequently use the magic wand to create selections in pdf's created from a CAD system. I usually import them as a smart object so that they may be updated regularly as design changes are made. However, in CS4, I am finding it very difficult for the magic wand to make selections in between lines of a pdf. No matter what I set the tolerance at, it seems to select more than the area that I am trying to select. I recently installed all updates and it worked for one day and then returned to making incorrect selections. I need some help or advice.
Thanks,
Caleb Schultz

After I posted this I figured out the problem, and it is just as Josh suggests. Apparently, the magic wand and eye dropper are directly linked to the sample size of the eye dropper. Thanks for your help and suggestions.
Caleb

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Rectangle , Ellipse , Lasso , Magic wand Selection tools

hi
i want implement some Selection tools looks like Rectangle , Ellipse , Lasso , Magic wand with Java2D , i have no idea for implement these tools.
my problems :
1 - nice effect for this selection tools like two color line [Black and white] that have nice move around selection area [like photoshop or gimp]
2 - idea for implement Lasso and magic wand selection tool.
i need any suggestion or sample code and article...
thanks

797494 wrote:
i google it many times but don't catch anything !!! please help people correctly not with some contempt words...I don't know where you got that. Indeed, if you go ahead and complete this project, I would have the greatest respect for you, except that considering my present age, I can't really hope to live that long.
i work with java many years but Graphics Field new for me...OK. Start learning here:
http://download.oracle.com/javase/tutorial/2d/index.html
http://download.oracle.com/javase/tutorial/uiswing/index.html
db

Magic wand selection shape from one layer, drop to sub layer and copy that shape from that layer.

In PS i can Magic wand selection shape from one layer, drop to sub layer and copy that selected shape from that sub layer. How do I do this in illistrator, and moreover, from multiple layer at the same time.
For instance, in PS = Import an image of gold - select a text phrse with wand - drop to gold - copy paste = gold text.
How is this done in illustrator?

Illustrator C6
Basicly I want to do what takes me 10 minutes to do in PS in Illistrator. LOL! I realize I must learn Illistrator; especially for logo design.
I want to select my objects in Illistrator and drop to another layer and copy that layer but with only the selection to create another new layer with that which I
originally selected and then copied from another layer.
1. Select objects
2. copy that selection from another image. "gold effect taken from an image"
3 paste that which was selected = that which was selected, but in gold.

Why can't I delete a selection when I am using magic wand in Photoshop CS4?

I know I've done this before. I want to select part of an image using magic wand, then delete it, so that the background is transparent. The selection will not delete. Do I have some weird setting picked? Thanks!
-- Jane

Did you convert the background into a layer before pressing delete? (by double clicking the background layer in your layers pallete)
otherwise, pressing delete will simply fill the selection with your current background color.
edit:
also make sure you have this option unchecked:

Magic wand selection tool misbehaving

Help.. I've been having this problem almost everytime I use Photoshop CS5 and previously with CS4. (never a problem with CS or CS2). When trying to make selections based on color or contrast with the "magic wand" tool, I find it develops totally erratic behavior. Even setting a tolerance of 1 or 3 (feather = 0), for instance, might select large areas or completely different tonality.
I end up making my masks (selections) either manually or by using a combination of tools like the magnetic lasso. This is causing me to waste a lot of time. If anyone has a clue, please let me know.
My system is an otherwise robust 64bit WIn-7, Xeon CPU, 18GB Ram.
Thanks in advance,
Doug A

C.P.
Thanks for your response. This is just a single layer (16bit). The tool option bar is adjacent to selection areas in question to the left. Am I missing something here? To add or select areas, I usually use the shift or alt key.
Thans,
Doug

Magic Wand Selection Tool Fails to Operate on Precise Pixel Color

I had an interesting thing happen with Photoshop CS5... My Magic Wand tool got to where it wasn't selecting pixel colors based on the one under the tip of the tool when clicked. It was selecting what seemed like similar colors, but its operation wasn't really predictable.
It turns out that in a prior unrelated operation (days ago) I had changed the color picker to look at a very large number of pixels when sampling.
Having chosen the above, the setting was sticky and modal (meaning it subsequently affected samples taken from then on by a variety of tools).
I didn't think that this should affect subsequent samples taken with the Magic Wand tool. I'm not sure this has always been the case, but it doesn't seem as though it should work this way.
Notably I don't see any way, while the Magic Wand tool is active, that the above sample size can be changed. Nor did Resetting the Magic Wand tool correct the situation.
Should the previously selected color picker sample size actually affect the Magic Wand tool, or is this a case where someone at Adobe consolidated the pixel sampling logic a bit too aggressively?
If the latter, here's an adage to post in the halls of Adobe Engineering: "Make everything as simple as possible, but no simpler."
-Noel

Hm, appears to be an old issue: http://forums.adobe.com/message/3226358
What I can't fathom is that it's never bitten me before. I do tend to leave the eyedropper on 1 x 1 pixels, but I occasionally do sample larger regions.
-Noel

Clipping paths from magic wand selection

I've been looking through dozens of tutorials but even the one's that mention this they all assume you know how to do it. All I would like to do is turn a selection made using either the magic wand tool or the other selection tools/methods and turn that into a clipping path.
This is the selection i've made with the magic wand tool:
http://img414.imageshack.us/img414/9307/screen28qd.jpg
Also is their any way to turn a whole layers contents into clipping paths? For example I have that image on it's own layer with no background, could I turn everything on that layer into a clipping path?
Clipping paths for this kind of thing as far as i'm aware is the only way to import images into quarkxpress with no backgrounds.
thanks
sam

Hey Sam, if I'm not mistaken you simply have to make your selection, then select make "work path" from the Path window, next you save the path and then select "clipping path" from the Path window and select the saved path's name.
I would think this would work with layer selections as well.
Hope this helps...
Dan

Magic wand selects everything. Help!

Hi,
I'm using Illustrator CS6 and I haven't been able to use the magic wand tool. I have Photoshop CS6 and the magic wand works perfectly in that program. The problem is that I mainly use Illustrator to work and if I try to open the image in Photoshop the colours don't fill properly (white fuzzy edges) so it's not really a solution for me to just use photoshop instead. I'd really like to get to the bottom of this. I've looked through dozens of forums and tutorials and can't find anything that solves my problem.
The images I'm working with were created by myself from scratch using illustrator. I was working on a multilayer image, and I selected the option to use all layers in the magic wand tool option bar but it didn't work. So, I flattened all layers so that I would be working on a single layer image and still nothiing. The image has been fully coloured using live paint. I want to be able to quickly change the colours in the image without having to reselect and colour every portion. I worked with a limited colour palette of maybe 10 colours, so really this image should be perfect for magic wand. I have set the tolerance at zero for fill colour. The other options are deselected. If someone could help it would be much appreciated. It's very frustrating!!
Thanks!
Shira

The magic wand does not select objects it selects the color. That color is placed in the swatch well at the bottom of the toolbar.
What you can do it use the selection tool (the back arrow at top of toolbar or the lowercase v on keyboard.) Select one of the colors you want to change, then in the top menu goto Select>Same>(choose an option) This will allow you to select all the same colored fills or strokes and change that color all at the same time. Just a matter of double clicking on that color swatch at the bottom of the toolbar to bring up the color picker or use the swatches in the top tool bar when the selection tool is active.

Magic Wand selects the whole picture

Hey, i tried using the Magic Wand Tool to select an area before and it works. But yesterday idk what happened and whenever i used magic want tool to select a specific area it keeps selecting the whole picture. How do i get this fixed? Please reply asap. Thanks!

Hi SepetMTJ22,
I would try looking at Charles' suggestions. It is most likely that you have an empty or solid layer selected, which would select everything for you:
Or that you have a sample size that is too large, make sure you have it set to a small enough point sample. One is recommended.

Magic wand selects too much

Hey guys/gals,
I have photos of a few models (not super models, lol) photographed in front of a chroma color green matt. When I used the magic wand to select the green matt for deletion it selects some of the model. The model is a stark contrast in color (purple) to the green matt. There doesn't appear to be any green reflection on the model. It was shot in a light tent/cube to prevent this. Is there anything I can do short of manually deleting the green material? If I have to I'll manually cut out the image one pixel at a time, but I prefer a quicker solution.
Thanks!

kugar13 wrote:
I'll look up some tutorials on the pen tool. It's about time I learned more about it's use.
Here'a good one!
http://www.gurusnetwork.com/tutorial/pen

Contiguous magic wand selections

This feature would be fantastic. I want a multi-option contiguous feature for wanding. Hotkeys could govern which selection is made.
1. same group contiguous
2. same layer contiguous
3. entire image contiguous
(e.g. overlapping or touching precisely in 2D space)
AND
Another "same color values" hotkey that can combine with the previous 3.
AND
Just to challenge the programmers... if the user preselects multiple groups, then uses the special magic wand, the selection spans just those groups.
wouldn't that be grand?
d

It looks like if I did this I would have to have an F key to tuen it on and then another f key to turn it off.
Scripting is best I think as I would be able to assign any key as opposed to F keys
Thanks just posted on PS-scripts in the hope I get an answer too
http://http://www.ps-scripts.com/bb/viewtopic.php?f=2&t=5106&sid=7160fc1ffb8b25a9db943c436 9d7f7db
Many Thanks

Magic wand selection to outlined border

I have a white "O" on a varied background that I've outlined with Magic Wand, but I want to turn the running ants line into an actual black 3 pixel border. Is this possible? Or is there some other less simple way to do this? CS3/Mac

Edit > Stroke

Script with magic wand

I noticed there's no documentaion on scripting (javascript) with the magic wand selection. I'd assume that it's along the lines of magicwand.(X,Y).tolerance.contigious.true.samplealllayers.true. or something like that. But it's guess work.
var id176 = charIDToTypeID( "setd" );
    var desc34 = new ActionDescriptor();
    var id177 = charIDToTypeID( "null" );
        var ref15 = new ActionReference();
        var id178 = charIDToTypeID( "Chnl" );
        var id179 = charIDToTypeID( "fsel" );
        ref15.putProperty( id178, id179 );
    desc34.putReference( id177, ref15 );
    var id180 = charIDToTypeID( "T   " );
        var desc35 = new ActionDescriptor();
        var id181 = charIDToTypeID( "Hrzn" );
        var id182 = charIDToTypeID( "#Pxl" );
        desc35.putUnitDouble( id181, id182, 0.000000 );
        var id183 = charIDToTypeID( "Vrtc" );
        var id184 = charIDToTypeID( "#Pxl" );
        desc35.putUnitDouble( id183, id184, 0.000000 );
    var id185 = charIDToTypeID( "Pnt " );
    desc34.putObject( id180, id185, desc35 );
    var id186 = charIDToTypeID( "Tlrn" );
    desc34.putInteger( id186, 32 );
    var id187 = charIDToTypeID( "Mrgd" );
    desc34.putBoolean( id187, true );
    var id188 = charIDToTypeID( "AntA" );
    desc34.putBoolean( id188, true );
executeAction( id176, desc34, DialogModes.NO );
I've got the above by the old script listener and I was just trying to tidy it up (and learn a bit in the process)
Cheers

This is one of the things you can only do with scriptlistener. Here is one way to clean up the code.
function magicWand(x,y,t,a,c,s) {
    if(arguments.length < 2) return;// make sure have x,y
    if(undefined == t) var t = 32;// set defaults of optional arguments
    if(undefined == a) var a = true;
    if(undefined == c) var c = false;
     if(undefined == s) var s = false;
    var desc = new ActionDescriptor();
        var ref = new ActionReference();
        ref.putProperty( charIDToTypeID('Chnl'), charIDToTypeID('fsel') );
    desc.putReference( charIDToTypeID('null'), ref );
        var positionDesc = new ActionDescriptor();
        positionDesc.putUnitDouble( charIDToTypeID('Hrzn'), charIDToTypeID('#Rlt'), x );// in pixels
        positionDesc.putUnitDouble( charIDToTypeID('Vrtc'), charIDToTypeID('#Rlt'), y );
    desc.putObject( charIDToTypeID('T   '), charIDToTypeID('Pnt '), positionDesc );
    desc.putInteger( charIDToTypeID('Tlrn'), t);// tolerance
    desc.putBoolean( charIDToTypeID('Mrgd'), s );// sample all layers
    if(!c) desc.putBoolean( charIDToTypeID( "Cntg" ), false );// contiguous
    desc.putBoolean( charIDToTypeID('AntA'), a );// anti-alias
    executeAction( charIDToTypeID('setd'), desc, DialogModes.NO );
You could clean it up more by adding data type checks for the arguments.

How to use Magic Wand to select in Active Artboard only - CS5

I've run into a problem that I would think already has a solution. I have a layout with 7 artboards, each a variation on a logo design. I want to select a specific color, but only in the active artboard. The Magic Wand would seem to be the right choice, but I see no way of specifying this. Every attempt I make, the color is selected in every artboard that it exists. I know that Select All can narrow its scope to the active artboard by adding the option key to the command but see no equivalent for the Magic Wand. Am I missing something or is Illustrator missing the ability?

Use locking or hiding to make you selection.
Draw a frame around the elements on one artbaord
Select >> Inverse
Object >> Lock
(use your magic wand and make your change)
Object unlock all

Cannot find the Quick Selection Tool (previously paired with the magic wand tool) on Illustrator CC (newest version installed on October 14, 2014)

I have just installed a new version of Illustrator CC and CS6 on October 14, 2014 and I couldn't find the Quick Selection Tool on this version, previously this tool is located with the magic wand tool

I don't remember a quick selection tool in Illustrator. Are you sure this was in Illustrator?

Magic Wand Selection in CS4

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