Lesson 1

Part 5

Now what we are going to do is select the dragon and copy it onto the image with the black background, and then make some changes.

The first thing we need to do, is select the dragon. An easy way to this is to select all the white around the dragon, and then "Invert" the selection. So click on the Magic Wand tool in your Tool Palette.
It's this one: MagicWand

Now click the white space on your dragon image at the top right. Your image should look like this:

Pete - Partial Selection

See the marching ants in the corner? Now we need to select the rest of the white. Simply clicking on other areas of white, won't work. You will need to hold down the "Shift" Key on your keyboard as you click. Keep holding down the "Shift" Key and clicking on the white background, until each area is surrounded by marching ants. It should look like this:

Pete- Selected

Now, we could just flood fill the selected area with black, to make the background black. But that won't teach you how to copy and paste will it? So, now that you have selected the white, its time to select the dragon. Click on "Invert" on your Tool Bar. It looks like this: Invert or go to "Selections" then "Invert".

Hey cool! Now your Dragon is selected!

Pete- Selected

Now Click on "Copy" on your Tool Bar. Copy or go to "Edit" then "copy" on your menu bar.

Now Make sure your blank image with the black background is selected. You can select it by clicking on the title bar. Now we are going to paste the dragon onto the black background.


Click on this button : Paste as New selection "Paste as New Selection" or go to "Edit" then "Paste" then "As new Selection" Your dragon should have appeared in the black image. Move him around with your mouse until he is in a good spot, then click. You'll notice that there is still a bit of white around him, that's ok, we will learn how to get rid of that in another lesson. Your Dragon will still have marching ants around him. Right click somewhere on the image, and they will disappear!

Pete of Black Background

Congratulations! You have learnt how to Select, copy and paste!
Now try the tutorial again, this time using a different background color.
Now lets save our image. Click on Save As or go to "File" then "save as" lets call the image "pete".

Save As

Lets save it in GIF format. Click on Save and voila! You have saved your image.


Assignment: Upload your saved "pete.gif"
Take a look at it, and see if you like it

Then go on to Lesson #2


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