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How do I invert a selection on just one layer?


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Just now, Mr. K said:

I'll play around with that, but so far the inversion affects the entire file, not the single layer I want to adjust.

Make sure you use the inversion from the Select menu, not the inversion from the Layers menu.

-- Walt
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10 minutes ago, Mr. K said:

The flood select tool is not what I need. I want to select the foot, shoe and pant leg in this layer, invert that selection and then apply an adjustment to the inverted selection.

image.png.6537f37ac1aceec8bef9ceb0aef1cb5e.png

This is simple, literally as you said:

  1. create the selection by any method you like
  2. Invert selection 
  3. add an adjustment layer (it uses the selection as mask)

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7 minutes ago, walt.farrell said:

"No" referred to your statement that a Flood Fill Selection has to be "associated with a layer". It is not.

But it is associated with a layer: as I said already: in the moment of getting created.

Another layer section will result in another flood tool selection / no layer selection will result in no flood selection.

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8 minutes ago, thomaso said:

Another layer section will result in another flood tool selection / no layer selection will result in no flood selection.

That is still only about what generates the selection. Immediately switch to a different layer and you still have the same selection, it will just affect different pixels. A selection is just an area of the canvas, and knows nothing about layers.

 

-- Walt
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17 minutes ago, Mr. K said:

I'll play around with that, but so far the inversion affects the entire file, not the single layer I want to adjust.

Also, thanks for the screenshot, but you started out saying you have multiple layers. Is all of the stuff you want to affect with your adjustment (and all the pixels you want to select) on a single layer, or are they scattered among the multiple layers.

-- Walt
Designer, Photo, and Publisher V1 and V2 at latest retail and beta releases
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9 minutes ago, Mr. K said:

I'll play around with that, but so far the inversion affects the entire file, not the single layer I want to adjust.

The inversion of a Selection affects the selection only (the running ants) and does not alter any image content.

The inversion of a Layer affects the selected layer(s) only. If there is a pixel selection active, then a Layer inversion affects the content within this selection only. If no layer is selected, then the command for Layer inversion is grayed out.

If you want to invert a masked adjustment layer – as alternative to a previous selection inversion – then you use the Layer inversion, because you want to turn white to black and vice versa. If you then have a pixel (ants) selection active then you limit the area of the inverted mask inversion. So, to invert an entire mask layer you don't want a pixel selection and thus should not have one active.

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1 hour ago, walt.farrell said:

That is still only about what generates the selection. Immediately switch to a different layer and you still have the same selection, it will just affect different pixels. A selection is just an area of the canvas, and knows nothing about layers.

So what? –  I was talking about generating a selection + Flood Fill Tool. An inverted pixel selection fundamentally depends on the layer content in the moment the Flood Fill  Select Tool generates the selection. Layer + Selection are directly associated: in the moment the selection gets created … as I mentioned several times meanwhile.

I did not doubt about the difference between creating and affecting but rather pointed literally to the importance of this difference. So I absolutely don't understand what you want when replying to my posts about selection creation with "No" … but then talk about the other aspect (the affect of a created selection). It is just both true.

Edited by thomaso
typo corrected

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34 minutes ago, thomaso said:

So what? –  I was talking about generating a selection + Flood Fill Tool. An inverted pixel selection fundamentally depends on the layer content in the moment the Flood Fill Tool generates the selection. Layer + Selection are directly associated: in the moment the selection gets created … as I mentioned several times meanwhile.

What are you talking about? The Flood Fill Tool does not & cannot generate marching ants selections.

Regardless, as has been mentioned many times now, no matter how a 'marching ants' selection is created, or which of the several tools that create a new selection (or add to, subtract from. or intersect with an existing one), the marching ants selection itself is completely independent of the content of any layer in the document.

In fact, many of the pixel selection tools can create a marching ants selection when no layer is selected & some can even do that in a document that has no layers at all.

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I may have it figured out... I'm playing with it more, but it appears I need to add the "Adjustment" and then move the adjustment on top of the layer I want to adjust. That seems to work even though I can see all of my file is selected when I do the inversion.

1545761945_ScreenShot2022-06-26at12_16_18PM.thumb.png.3e4b99eb21f14476f4dbd84e24b1a86d.png

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You need to subtract the rectangular shape of the lower part of the lower image.

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28 minutes ago, R C-R said:

Flood Fill Tool

This was a typo, sorry. Of course it meant Select, not Fill.

29 minutes ago, R C-R said:

Regardless, as has been mentioned many times now,

So what? –  Why are you now also starting to mention this? I did neither doubt nor talk about the "affecting" of a pixel selection. According to this topic I focused on "creating" a selection and mentioned this fact several times, together with the reason and the additional importance to distinguish between creating and affecting.

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9 minutes ago, Mr. K said:

I may have it figured out... I'm playing with it more, but it appears I need to add the "Adjustment" and then move the adjustment on top of the layer I want to adjust. That seems to work even though I can see all of my file is selected when I do the inversion.

You have a choice when creating Adjustment layers of where they are located.

  1. If you create them (or make them) a child of a layer, they affect only that layer.
  2. But if you simply put them somewhere "standalone" in the layer stack, they affect everything below them in the stack.

You may have the application configured to create the Adjustments as standalone layers. That's controlled in the Assistant options (View > Assistant Manager, or click the tuxedo icon in the Toolbar):

image.png.ab353578ba3727d2f18e7e15952290db.png

If you have it set to "Add adjustment as new layer" then the Adjustment will be a new standalone layer, located above the currently selected layer (or at the top of the stack if no layer is selected) and it will affect everything below it.

It sounds like perhaps that's what you had.

 

-- Walt
Designer, Photo, and Publisher V1 and V2 at latest retail and beta releases
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3 hours ago, NotMyFault said:

You need to subtract the rectangular shape of the lower part of the lower image

That is what I don't want to do. What I have in my example is what I want. Thank you Walt for showing me the way to change how the adjustment layer is configurable to where it adjusts.

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4 hours ago, thomaso said:

So what? –  Why are you now also starting to mention this? I did neither doubt nor talk about the "affecting" of a pixel selection. According to this topic I focused on "creating" a selection and mentioned this fact several times, together with the reason and the additional importance to distinguish between creating and affecting.

Again, you can create a marching ants selection even when no layer is selected, for example using the Freehand Selection Tool. You can even do that in a document that has no layers at all. Therefore, it does not necessarily depend on the layer content at the moment of creation or at any time thereafter, fundamentally or otherwise. This obviously is also true for inverting a marching ants selection.

So your assertion that it does depend on layer content is wrong.

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15 minutes ago, R C-R said:

So your assertion that it does depend on layer content is wrong.

No, definitely not.

Instead it is absolutely right for every selection done with the Flood Select Tool – as I mentioned several posts ago and repeated various times for those who did not read. This tool can NOT be used to create a selection without having a layer selected, AND its selections are ALWAYS and DIRECTLY associated to certain layer content. However, you are free to ignore this facts + focus on the other selection tools only.

Point.

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44 minutes ago, thomaso said:

Instead it is absolutely right for every selection done with the Flood Select Tool

Yes, that is correct for that one specific selection tool, but not for the others. So even for the special case where the initial selection is created with the Flood Select Fill Tool, the others can be used to add to or subtract from that selection before inverting it, even if at that point no layer is selected.

Edited by R C-R
typos are contagious?

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12 minutes ago, R C-R said:

So even for the special case where the initial selection is created with the Flood Fill Tool

Well, I wonder how one can ever do an initial selection with the Flood Fill Tool ?

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1 minute ago, v_kyr said:

Well, I wonder how one can ever do an initial selection with the Flood Fill Tool ?

Great. Now I am making the same typo @thomaso did.

Thanks! Will fix that now.

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10 minutes ago, R C-R said:

Great. Now I am making the same typo

Oh, I didn't expect it to be contagious but just an individual foreign language problem of mine. To me, "flood" & "select" sound somehow contradictory, whereas flood + fill rather seem to complement each other.

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14 hours ago, thomaso said:

... To me, "flood" & "select" sound somehow contradictory, whereas flood + fill rather seem to complement each other.

Again we see poorly named items. I would have gone with Zone Select. My choice of Zone is a tip of the hat to Minor White et al.

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5 minutes ago, Old Bruce said:

Again we see poorly named items.

I would go by naming with the shown icon and the fact that this tool in the past also has been often called "magic wand" ("Zauberstab" in german) in certain other bitmap graphics apps.

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11 minutes ago, Old Bruce said:

I would have gone with Zone Select. My choice of Zone is a tip of the hat to Minor White et al.

Why 'Zone' ? Isn't a manually drawn selection also a Zone? –  To me 'Auto' sounds quite practically.
(though 'auto' is neither absolutely correct nor particularly attractive, it at least has a learned, (globally?) well-known meaning)

(btw: who are 'Minor White et al.' ?)

13 minutes ago, v_kyr said:

shown icon and the fact that this tool in the past also has been often called "magic wand" ("Zauberstab" in german)

This icon makes the Affinity name 'Flood' indeed more confusing. Whereas the term 'magic wand' to me always feels odd in an UI, reminding me of unicorn, fairy, elf … and a glittering sound when the tool is used … :234_unicorn:🧝‍♀️ 🧚‍♀️

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1 minute ago, thomaso said:

btw: who are 'Minor White et al.' ?

Minor White was a photographer and teacher who was involved in the development and use of the Zone System for Black and White photography.

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9 minutes ago, Old Bruce said:

I would have gone with Zone Select. My choice of Zone is a tip of the hat to Minor White et al.

I would have to disagree with that name. To me, "zone select" would imply selecting based on brightness (luminance?), but that's not what the tool does. It selects primarily based on Hue (H). If you have a fixed L value, it will select based on H and the S (saturation) is not relevant.

So Hue Select or possibly Color Select (if we wanted something analogous to the misnamed Color Replacement Brush might be better. But Zone Select just seems wrong, to me.

-- Walt
Designer, Photo, and Publisher V1 and V2 at latest retail and beta releases
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