Deleting my whole picture instead of selection...Why?

[mrcool88]

I recently upgraded to gimp 2.10.8. I am just starting to get back to removing the background from images for work.

When I use the fuzzy select tool or the color select tool and I try to delete the selection the same way that I always have, it ends up deleting the entire photo and not just the selection.

I haven't changed anything that I know of. Any help would greatly be appreciated!
Please don't hesitate to ask me questions!

THANK YOU SO MUCH IN ADVANCE!!

[rich2005]

Not able to reproduce that. Do you get the 'crawling ants' around the foreground after selecting in the background?

Quote:... I try to delete the selection the same way that I always have..

What is the same way ?

The only way I can delete the whole image after a fuzzy or colour select is when the threshold value is maxed out - but then I get the 'crawling ants' around the image border.

[mrcool88]

Previously I would use the fuzzy select to select a portion on an image and then press delete on my keyboard and it would delete the selected portion. Or, I would use the color select tool and select a certain color and delete that color by pressing the delete key.

Now when it selects a portion of a picture, either by fuzzy select or with the color select tool, and I press delete, it deletes the entire photo, not just the selected area.

[rich2005]

The only other way I can reproduce that is when there is no selection. You do get those 'crawling ants` marking the selection after using the fuzzy / color sectect tool? Are they visible?

An alternative to the delete key is ctrl-x

Can you post a screenshot of the whole Gimp interface, tools, image, layers

[mrcool88]

Sure. I do get the "crawling ants" when I select the white portion of the shown picture. 


   

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I figured it out!!!! The keyboard shortcut was changed somehow to delete the layer instead of clearing the selection.

Thanks for looking out for me rich2005!!

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I figured it out!!!! The keyboard shortcut was changed somehow to delete the layer instead of clearing the selection.

Thanks for looking out for me rich2005!!

[Blighty]

Two things:

1) You have the Fuzzy Select tool selected. In the Tool Options for the Fuzzy Select you have the Mode set to "Subtract From Current Selection" ie the 3rd option. Set that to the 1st option "Replace Current Selecton"

2) You don't have an alpha channel. So Delete will clear to the background colour (white), not transparent.

[rich2005]

Screenshot is great - thanks.

Ninja'd by Blighty 

Quote:I figured it out!!!! The keyboard shortcut was changed somehow to delete the layer instead of clearing the selection.

or maybe not   Blighty picked up on the selection mode, but other things to look out for when things like that happen.

   

First thing I see (or do not see) are those crawling ants. The yellow dotted line is the layer boundary. Check in View -> Show Selection (Ctrl-T toggles on/off) that it is on. If nothing shows after using say fuzzy select then that is a problem.

The next one is, your image does not have an alpha channel. The bold name in the layer dialogue gives that away. Even with a selection delete will do nothing except replace the selection with the BackGround colour, White.

Add an Alpha, channel Layer -> Transparency -> Add Alpha Channel Choose fuzzy select tool. Click in the canvas to make a selection. Hit the delete key.

[jytou]

This happened to me as well, I was used to hit [Delete] and get only the selection cleared, but now it deleted the whole image. Seems like I was able to get to the old behavior by checking the option Edit/Preference/Tool Options/Move Tool/Set Layer or Path as Active. The tooltip on hover does show that it was the default in previous versions.

[Ofnuts]

If [Delete] (or Edit > Clear) deletes the whole image, then either you have a full selection or no selection at all. After that, the deletion happens on the active layer/mask/channel so it's always worth having a look at the Layers list (highlighted layer) or the status bar at the bottom (but this can be masked by some tool infirmation if the pointer in on the canvas):