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Toolbox: The Cutout Palette

The Cutout Palette
Cutout Tools
Select Colour Region


The Cutout Palette: icf4fig1.jpg (26136 bytes) Click to view

With the tools on the Cutout palette, you can erase, extract or copy areas of a sprite in a rectangular, oval, polygonal, or freeform shape. When you use one of the Cutout tools to select an area of a sprite, you can erase the selected pixels so that they are transparent, or you can create a new sprite from the selection. When you extract or erase, the shape that you're drawing must be over the currently selected sprite - otherwise the extraction or erasure fails.

The Cutout palette provides two methods for creating a selection:

· Use a tool on the Cutout Tools tab to select a portion of a sprite in a specific shape:
rectangle.jpg (24x21 -- 995 bytes)  Rectangle creates a rectangular selection. You can also use Rectangle with the SHIFT key to create a square selection.
oval.jpg (25x23 -- 962 bytes) Oval creates an oval selection. You can also use Oval with the SHIFT key to create a round selection.
Curve Icon Curve creates a selection in a freeform shape with curved edges. After you create a shape with the Curve tool, you can edit its points to adjust the overall shape of the selection.
Polygon Icon Polygon creates a selection in a freeform shape with straight edges. After you create a shape with the Polygon tool, you can edit its points to adjust the overall shape of the selection.
Stencil Icon Click Stencil creates a new sprite that is an inverse of the selected sprite. The transparent pixels within the bounding box of the selected sprite are filled with the current colour in the new sprite, and the opaque pixels in the selected sprite are transparent in the new sprite.

Use the tool on the Select Colour Region tab to select a portion of a sprite where the pixels have the same or a similar colour.

Select Colour Region: Select Colour RegionClick to view

   Icon  Select Colour Region selects the pixel that you click on as well as the surrounding pixels that have the same colour. You can adjust the settings for this tool to:

· Include pixels in your selection that are similar to, but not exactly the same as, the colour of the pixel you click on.
· Add to or delete from your selection when you select additional colour regions in the sprite.
 Search the entire sprite for pixels that match the colour of the pixel you click on, or search just its neighboring pixels.
· Smooth the edges of your selection to avoid jaggedness. 


Find out How-to use the The Cutout Palette - Create a complementary shape of a sprite using the Stencil Tool

In the Image composer Help Topics (Alt, Shift+ H) if you put the following headings in 'Find'. The rest of the actions detailed above, are covered in more depth. 

Copying colour regions of a sprite
Creating freeform cutouts from a sprite
Creating rectangular and oval cutouts from a sprite
Erasing freeform areas in a sprite
Erasing selected colours in a sprite
Selecting colour regions of a sprite