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Hold SHIFT to draw straight line for selection brush tool


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The regular paint brush tool already has this built-in. If you paint an area, then hold SHIFT key and paint in another area Photo will draw a straight line between those two points the size of the paint brush.

This would be very helpful with selection brush when trying to add or subtract selection area that's a straight line. It's hard to draw a straight line by hand, so it would be great if we could hold down SHIFT key and Photo would paint straight line selection the size of the selection brush between the two points. 

Thanks.

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I don't understand this request. The nature of the Selection Brush is to automatically calculate where the edges of the selection are going to be based on the pixel colors. If the thing to be selected has a straight edge, the selection brush will automatically find that edge. If I want straight selection edges made freehand, I would use the Free Selection lasso tool and combine with SHIFT key.

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  • 3 weeks later...

A selection brush is a still a brush, it should behave like a brush. Which includes the ability to draw a straight line from one point to another while holding SHIFT key. Regular brushes have it for a reason, so you don't have to switch tools to draw a straight line. I think the same logic applies here, too.

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But, again, the Selection Brush is not intended to make straight selections. It's very nature is to calculate the selection based on pixel color, contrast, etc. I hate to say "you're using it wrong" but… Maybe you could show us a screen recording of an instance where you'd like the tool to perform the way you want so we could better understand the circumstances?

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On 10/23/2021 at 6:23 PM, v1ktor said:

Regular brushes have it for a reason, so you don't have to switch tools to draw a straight line.

What other tool would you switch to when using the Paint Brush?

You could use other tools to draw a straight line, but the line would be different to using the Paint Brush Tool.

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32 minutes ago, prophet said:

But, again, the Selection Brush is not intended to make straight selections. It's very nature is to calculate the selection based on pixel color, contrast, etc. I hate to say "you're using it wrong" but… Maybe you could show us a screen recording of an instance where you'd like the tool to perform the way you want so we could better understand the circumstances?

I've been doing a lot of product photography in a lightbox, needing to remove the white background. The problem is when the product is either white (or very light color) or transparent, then any automatic selection doesn't work even though I can see the difference between the product and the background. I've tried selection brush and flood selection tool. None of them (with various settings) could identify the difference between white and very light colors. So I had to do a lot of work with the selection brush tool.

Luckily, the selection brush tool has an option to disable snap to edges so it paints like a regular brush without automatic detection of edges. When snap to edges is disabled, the selection brush should be able to draw a straight line using SHIFT key. It would make life a little easier working with selections and not switching between tools. 

 

24 minutes ago, PaulEC said:

What other tool would you switch to when using the Paint Brush?

You could use other tools to draw a straight line, but the line would be different to using the Paint Brush Tool.

My point here was that you don't need another tool to draw a straight line using paint brush tool. However, if you create a selection using rectangular marquee tool you can fill it using flood fill tool. That basically works like a paint brush tool. 

You could also use shapes tool. Create a rectangular shape, then simply merge the layers. Basically, the end result is the same as the paint brush tool.

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4 minutes ago, v1ktor said:

Luckily, the selection brush tool has an option to disable snap to edges so it paints like a regular brush without automatic detection of edges. When snap to edges is disabled, the selection brush should be able to draw a straight line using SHIFT key. It would make life a little easier working with selections and not switching between tools. 

Ah, interesting. That does make some sense. Very well, you've convinced me.

+1

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5 minutes ago, v1ktor said:

Luckily, the selection brush tool has an option to disable snap to edges so it paints like a regular brush without automatic detection of edges. When snap to edges is disabled, the selection brush should be able to draw a straight line using SHIFT key. It would make life a little easier working with selections and not switching between tools.

I would start with a polygonal selection (i.e. choosing the ‘Polygon’ type for the Freehand Selection Tool) and then use the Selection Brush Tool in ‘Add’ mode to expand the selection into the nooks and crannies.

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I don't know if this would work with what you're trying to do, but if you don't need to use "snap to edges", but do want straight lines, you could use the Quick Mask and just paint in the selection area with the Paint Brush.

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