selection "Build a Highway "

Selections: Those precise freehand selections can get sort of slippery


	1. Select along the edge of your subject one bite at a time and nibble away at your background. Lasso tool set at Antialias Move out and away from your subject and then release your mouse. It will "snap back" and reconnect itself, cutting your mousing time in half. Take special care along the actual subject edges, but the rest of this selection process can be quick and dirty.
	Once you have a clean edge drawn along the border of your subject move your tool out and away from the subject. Release the mouse from that outside point and it will snap back to connect itself. CUT away that "bite" of the background and continue moving along to take the next bite. Once you have cleared a path around your subject, run the freehand tool along that open highway to select your subject. Invert your selection and CUT to remove the background.
	Double check your subject against a background similar to it's final destination to look for stray pixels that may need cleaning up. That nasty white halo is invisible on a light background.
	Subject was PASTED AS A NEW LAYER over a black background and the ERASER TOOL (hardness set at 1) was used to remove the light halo so he could be safely be placed on any color background.

2. Build a highway with your eraser

This marquee floats outside the actual image because the brush hardness was set at 1 to create a softer edge. For a hard edge and tighter marquee set brush hardness at 100.

Select All & Promote to Layer
Delete original layer

Set eraser tool:
Round Size 3 <if a larger size works...even better>
Hardness & Step 1
Opacity & Density 100
Zoom in close
Erase a path along the edge of your image

Once you've built your highway

Set Lasso at Freehand and "run it along the highway"
Loop back and select the entire remaining background
Hit CUT to remove background
An alternative is to select the woman,
INVERT and hit CUT...same results