Your quick guide to Selection tools

01 Marquee tools  The basic Selection tools. Click-drag to create a rectangular or elliptical shape. While dragging out the shape, you can reposition the selection by holding down the spacebar.

02 Lasso tools  The Lasso tools (original flavour, Polygonal and Magnetic) are the next step up – they are used to create irregular shaped outlines. These handy tools are very quick and easy to use.

03 Selection options  The Selection options are indispensable for crafting selections with the tools. Learn to use Add To, Subtract From and Intersect With to get more control over your selections.

04 The Select menu This has many features for modifying selections. Inverse, Feather, Contract and Expand are particularly useful. Use the Save and Load options to file a selection away for future use.

05 Layer masks  When you’ve made a selection, what’s the best way to use it? Deleting leaves you few options if you want to get those pixels back in future. Using a layer mask is a better, non-destructive way that’s far more flexible.

06 Your judgement  Ultimately, the best tool is experience. No one tool will work in every case. Each technique has its own strengths and limitations. Become familiar with these and learn which tool is best suited to each situation.