How do I "cut" my image out?

[*princess*chick]

I downloaded the "snowglobe" kit by Lauren Bavin and am anxious to use it w/a beautiful pic I have, but I don't know how to get that "cut out" look where the background is erased. I have photoshop cs, and try using the eraser tool (background erase and magic erase), but I don't know what to do to make the edges look more blended. My lasso doesn't work well at all b/c the computer mouse is lousy, and the lasso grabs the wrong parts unless I can cut out everything in one "lassoing". . .make sense?? :confused: Also. . .my pic looks huge and it becomes distorted if I try to resize it using "cntrl - T" Is there something else I should do to make it fit and not look smooshed? Any help is much appreciated! TIA!

[serena812]

You can add a layer mask (the icon on the bottom of the layers pallette that looks like a circle inside a square) and then paint out anything you don't want with a brush. Anything you "paint" black will not show. If you mistakenly paint out something you can paint it back in by painting over the area in white.

To keep your picture from being distorted hold the Shift key as you tranform. That will keep it in proportion.

Hope this helps. :)

[*princess*chick]

Thanks Serena - that helps huge - and I just read the extraction tutorial and tried that which worked wonderfully too! The layout turned out so cute! =)
Amber

[serena812]

Glad that I could help. This is the method that works best for me. Make sure you post so we can enjoy your work. :)