I recently learned how to use QuickMask, but ever since, my selection/copy/paste normal routine is now failing me.

Before, when I selected an area then copied that area  (Using ctrlC) and pasted it, (using ctrlV) I used to get the selected area perfectly copied into a new layer.

Job done.

Now, however, when I select an area and then copy that, and then paste it and turn off the background and look at the pasted image - there are lots of nasty patches where the new pasted image has transparent see through areas - the original had no such transparent areas.

I can go into Quickmask mode and laboriously paint out the transparent areas on the background, but this takes a very very long time as the first attempt always - but ALWAYS! - leaves transparent areas still, so I have to go back and paint some more.

Please please, can someone help?

How are you making the selection? Not using the magic wand by any chance? Or are you using Quickmask to paint a selection?

I wasn't intending to use quickmask at all for this, but had to go into it to try and remove the transparency - but why is it doing this??? It never used to do this before I used quickmask for the first time.

I've been battling with this for hours, and it's just not working at all.

Even going into Quickmask I just can't get rid of all the transparent patches - please please can anyone help???

Fran, if you notice you have shades of the background purple reflecting off the surface of your blue blobby object. You must set the fuzziness to a lower or a higher number to try and isolate just that shade of the background purple. The default is 32. The higher this number the wider the shade of the foreground color is selected (foreground color decides the color to be selected). Blue and purple are very close in the color spectrum so you'er getting the bleed over effect.

Sometimes it's best to use the magic wand tool. check off anti-alias and contiguious and in this case set your tolerance to about 20. With the wand tool click on the background color (purple). Play with the tolerance number to get as close as you can. When you notice you have your marching ants generally where you want them take a good close look at the blob's reflections and you'll see that some of them are also selected. Press "Q" to turn on Quickmask and press "B" to select the brush tool. Make sure you have the pencil tool selected (nice hard edge brush). Press "D" to select the default black/white color palette with black being your foreground color and dab in those reflections (make sure your brush is set at 100% opacity and "normal" mode). You can adjust the brush size by pressing either bracket "[" "]". If part of the backround is selected then press "X" to swap the palette foreground color to white and dab to de-select the background. Continue ulternating the quickmask mode with the marching ants by pressing "Q". Patience is a virtue in this case.

There are many other tricks like turning the image to black/white using the treshold feature and adjusting the slides to the best fit and then painting in where it's needed. This then becomes the selection mask for the color image.

I hesitated to use the magic wand tool because before that's always given a fuzzy edge - and I don't want a fuzzy edge.

I used to used the hand selection tool to select things, but my arthritis is becoming worse - and it hurts to spend too long at such a job, so I tried "Select/Colour Range".  I guess that was wrong too, eh?

I've now tried magic wand with the settings as you suggested, and it works, but the edge looks pixelated, even though I deliberately rendered this from Bryce in a larger size than usual (1680x1201) - no real reason for those exact numbers I just picked a larger size from the options in the list.

You see what I'm hoping to do is to create an icon with a transparent background, so I thought 'make it big so that when you reduce it it'll still have decent definition so as to look good as an icon', this is probably wrong too.  I think something in a recent thread said you can't start big and then reduce in size and keep the look of it, so how the heck do you make an icon?  If you start small you can't see it, so you can't tell what you are doing.

I'm asking because I could go back to Bryce and render with a different colour as a background - one that's easier to select to remove?  Plus I could render at a better size for an Icon... if that's possible?

(I'm afraid I can't use P's and Q's and F's and J's - they conflict with me remembering the few keyboard shortcuts that I need for Wings, and Word, and... etc plus it's less effort to keep my hands on the mouse - or pen, than to reach out for the keyboard, so I don't use the keyboard unless I have to, and if I do I have to, I then move it closer, so the tablet and mouse must swap the meager space with the keyboard...)

Don't get joint pain, everything becomes so much more effort!

What does contiguous do?

Is anti-alias the same as it is in rendering in Bryce?

To solve your problem since you rendered this object in Bryce, you can use Bryce to produce a perfect mask for the object by rendering and saving an object mask the same size as the color render in Bryce. Export this object mask into Photoshop and use it as a selection mask. Doing this will select the object perfectly especially at the higher resolution. Must go now expecting company...later.

Mind you there are occasions when I will still need to use a selection in PhotoShop, so I'd need to get that sorted - but I think that Magic Wand will probably work better now, thanks for the tips on that.  But what about Colour Range?

I just tried using object mask in Bryce, it doesn't work.

It works on past of the object, but not the metaballs part of it.

hi, I´m glad you were able to figure it out in bryce, I would sugest a few things in photoshop if I may...
the prob on your first image seems to be because perhaps you are using a brush that has some fading capability, I would suggest you try using a hard edge brush. For quickmasking the hardier the better.
Also, for this particular image I would go about using a pen tool, I should call it marvelous masking tool.
Now about any fuzzyness at least on the edges is mainly due to feather, but that is easy to control using alt+crtl+d or cmd+d in a mac, if I´m not mistaken.
I hope I could be of some help

Quote - hi, I´m glad you were able to figure it out in bryce,

But I didn't - it doesn't work!

It totally ignores metaballs!!!

Quote - I would sugest a few things in photoshop if I may...
the prob on your first image seems to be because perhaps you are using a brush that has some fading capability,

To begin with I wasn't using a brush or a pencil at all - just "Select/Colour range"

Quote - I would suggest you try using a hard edge brush. For quickmasking the hardier the better.

Right... but how do you tell which "brush" is the hardest?  They all look much the same.

Quote - Also, for this particular image I would go about using a pen tool, I should call it marvelous masking tool.

I have no idea how you use that.

Quote - Now about any fuzzyness at least on the edges is mainly due to feather, but that is easy to control using alt+crtl+d or cmd+d in a mac, if I´m not mistaken.
I hope I could be of some help 

Um... well, alt+crtl+d doesn't work for me on my PC.  Nothing happened at all.

Where is feather really?  i.e. not using keyboard shortcuts?

Right... but how do you tell which "brush" is the hardest?  They all look much the same.

---->on the brushes selector you can right click on a little drop down menu on the right top corner and choose how do you wish to see the brushes, like thombnails and so on. If you can not find this, just click on f5, or go on view>brushes and view the brush selector, on it you will be able to see the names of the brushes and if you are using the regular brushes, meaning if you did not install any new brushes than there should be one there named hard round brush, and thats a good brush for quick masking, if you do find it and if you do use it, make sure to use with opacity and fill on 100.

Quote - " Also, for this particular image I would go about using a pen tool, I should call it marvelous masking tool."

I have no idea how you use that.
--->Pen tool is a vector tool just like the one on ilustrator, flash.... and once you make a path with you can make the path a mask.

Quote - " Now about any fuzzyness at least on the edges is mainly due to feather, but that is easy to control using alt+crtl+d or cmd+d in a mac, if I´m not mistaken.
I hope I could be of some help  "

Um... well, alt+crtl+d doesn't work for me on my PC.  Nothing happened at all.
this shortcut only works if you have a mask already drawn, meaning you can use any tool or way you wish to make masks, once you have your mask than on the work bar(title bar) there is a title called select, it is a menu with all kinds of masking commands, from feather to shrink and grow masks and so on.

I hope I could be of some help

Some non-Photoshop thoughts on tackling the problem:

I've never used Bryce (bought it a long time ago, and never even installed it; don't know what I was thinking at the time...), but I'll assume that rendering with transparent backgrounds isn't an option (if I'm mistaken and that is an option, then I'd suggest doing that).

One thing you might be able to do is to make a copy of your Bryce scene, then in the copy retexture everything white (with no highlights or reflection) and set the background color to black. I don't know how much trouble that would be, but if you could do that, you'd have a second image that you could make a Photoshop mask from, and which could then be applied to the original image.

Another possibility, if Bryce can do it, would be to export the scene in some compatible format, say OBJ, and then import it into another rendering program (like Carrara) that can render with a transparent background, which will bypass the whole masking problem altogther.

The problem with select color range is that it will select anything that even looks close to the primary color you selected. I only use clor range when the color I want to select is completely different than everything else. Otherwise i use the magic wand. And even that sometimes fails me, as it sometimes seems to have a problem if the tonal range is similar.

I can't export metaballs....  The "re-texture as white" - might just be possible, I'll have to try that.  It's fairly simple to do but I dunno if it'll work or not...

Now... what was I doing with it?

I wanted to make a logo... and Icon in fact.

Those are 32 by 32... aren't they?

Only I just tried reducing it to 32 (by 13 as it turned out) - but it's too fuzzy at that reduction...

How do people reduce images for icons yet they still look right, i.e. not fuzzy?  Or do you need some special program to make an icon?

Quote - I wanted to make a logo... and Icon in fact.

Those are 32 by 32... aren't they?

Only I just tried reducing it to 32 (by 13 as it turned out) - but it's too fuzzy at that reduction...

How do people reduce images for icons yet they still look right, i.e. not fuzzy?  Or do you need some special program to make an icon?

If you're talking about a Windows Icon, I usually use a free program called Icon Sushi to convert PNG's to icons, which works pretty well. Windows icon files can come in a variety of sizes, although older versions of Windows were limited to either 16x16 or 32x32 (or both; the file format spec allows for more than one of the same image at different resolutions in the same file).

When I make icons, I usually try to make a very simple image, and make it small to begin with, so I have some idea of how it's going to look when it's reduced. Most of the time, I have to hand paint over what I end up with, to make it more legibile. I think a lot of icon makers do their icons by hand. rather than using a larger picture.

I get a lot of icons I use for work from Icon Archive; I don't know if it would help, but you could look to see what kinds of icons they have there, and maybe that would give you some ideas for laying out your own icon.

And as that is all I want to do, I really do NOT want to be told to buy a new piece of software (So I like the sound of "Free".) to do this, as I don't expect to be making any more icons. 

I really like Wings3D so I wanted to use this really nice (and I think classier) design I made a while ago for it.

Is it possible, do you think?

That's brilliant!

I'm so happy now, thank you so much!