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With this tutorial you will learn to use the PhotoImpact's built-in extraction tool. This is a quick and easy way to extract say a person, or animal from it's background without needing to use the Selection-Lasso, or paint or clone tools. Just extract, the do a quick eraser clean up and you are ready to go.

This is an intermediate level tutorial, so I assume you know the basics of how to open a new image, and where the tools are located.

Please remember to save often as we go along.

What you will need:

PhotoImpact 11 or higher
A copyright free image or photo to extract a portion of.

Let's get started!


  1. Open your image or photo. I am using a photo from the Easy Palette's Fill/Photo Gallery. Make sure your image is RGB True Color. The easy way to do that is to look at the bottom right corner of the program window for this icon example, if you don't see it but see say numbers like 256 click on them and choose RGB from the pop-up box. A new image will form and you can close the original. If you are using your own photo or image press Control + D to duplicate it and close the original to preserve it.
  1. Go to OBJECT on your menu bar, then look for Extract Object.












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  1. You will get the following control box. There will be three or four steps to complete in this box depending on the image you are using.
    Move your mouse to paint with a large soft edge completely around the part of your image you want to extract. In my case that would be the Plane.
    Do NOT completely paint out the plane.


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  1. After you click NEXT you get this screen.


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You are instructed to click anywhere outside the red area and when you do.....The background vanishes just like magic!


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  1. On the next screen which you could click OK. But it's not quite extracted yet. It's not very obvious, but there are still smudges around the plane. Notice where I have placed the red arrows below.
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  1. So click on the Next Button and we can fix that. When the next screen opens you see a whole lot of red surrounding your plane. The red is a mask and shows you the area that is being removed.
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  1. If you look at the tool bar across the top you will see you have some controls.

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    For one you can change that color red to any color you like. So you can pick a color that is not part of the image area we are extracting.
    Just to the left of that you can control the transparency of the color mask. For some images the default of 50 will be just fine, but for others you may want to change it.
    When you move your cursor into the image you can now erase the smudges... Still can't see any? Use the Zoom tools in the bottom left of the control box to zoom in a few times.
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    Then when you can see them go ahead and erase them. To be sure they are all erased, change the Transparency of the color mask to 0.
  1. Now you can click OK. Notice that there is now a selection marquis or marching ants surrounding the plane.
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  1. Now switch to the Pick tool and drag the plane to the workspace. A new image just large enough to hold it will appear behind it.
    Now you are free to save the plane or your extracted object for use anyway you want. You could save it as a .UFO file and then use it as a stamp. You could store it in My Library in the Easy Palette. Or place it over any other photo or background you choose. You can also add a drop shadow to it.
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But what if you didn't use as simple a photo as the one I did...what then?

  • Meet my newest family member Cinni-Mini. Click HERE and download my photo for this part of the tutorial.
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    1. Follow steps 2-5 above. Be sure that this time you don't even touch the fur of the dog in step 2. Because this is a busy image we will need to do some fine tuning to the image in step 5. When you are there you should see something like this... If you look at the controls above the image you will see a Low - High slider. Try moving it back and forth until there are no areas of the dog that are degraded. I put mine on Low.
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    1. But that's still quite messy. Look at the amount of smudging around the outside. Click OK and let's clean her up.
      The first thing we should do is paint around the outside of her fur and legs to get rid of the stool she is standing on and that ugly chewy by her hind paw. You may need to change the size of your paint tool several times before it's right. If you paint out too much or something you shouldn't, you can use the Undo arrow, but it only backs you up one step. If you click the minus sign on the far left you can paint--erase what you didn't intend then click the plus again. This is a time to use the Zoom tools again to make it more obvious what you are doing and what has been missed.
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    1. Don't forget to get the hole made by her tail curving over her back.
      Do be sure your paint touches her fur or your extracted image won't be clean.
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    1. Again before you click OK, change the transparency of the color mask to 0 and with the image zoomed search for and eliminate smudges one last time.
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    1. Once extracted click OK and now you can drag her off that stool and to your workspace and save her or place her in just about any scene.
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    Have fun Extracting..!