One of the tasks I do most often in Fireworks MX is isolate and
remove parts of images. It doesn't matter how many photo cds or
custom images I have, I always have to modify at least some part
of an image to make it work in a project and a lot of those times
I'm simply removing an image from a solid colored background.
I know Fireworks is normally regarded as an awesome vector program
but its bitmap editing tools are equally as. So powerful, in fact,
that I can do just about any type of object or image selecting
I need to without leaving Fireworks MX.
This example is a good starting point for using the Magic
Wand tool to select and remove a solid background from
an image.
Step 1: Getting Started
Open an object or image that has a solid background
you'd like to remove. You can even use the example below.
In the Property inspector set the Wand Tool's Tolerance to 20 and the Edge
to Anti-Alias.
Click anywhere in the white area to select the background.
You may need to click and hold the Shift Key to create more than
one selection. Sometimes the white background is not contiguous
because the object covers a larger portion of the canvas.
Click Delete to remove the background
Import a new graphic (Control-R
or Command-R) for the background or click and drag your image
on to another open document in Fireworks
Note: Rather than deleting the background you can reverse
your selection to select the rocket. Currently, the white background
is selected. Go up to Select>Select
Inverse to reverse the selection and select the rocket. This
turns the selection "inside out" and you can verify this
by the "marching ants" around only the rocket.
You can now Cut (Control-X or Command-X) to cut the rocket out
and then Paste (Control-V or Command-V) it on top of another image
or background.
Want more information?
What if the object is a piece of clip art or a logo? What if you only wanted
to change part of the logo's color or background? Do you know which images
work best with hard edges vs. anti-alias edges?
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