Re: [Gimp-user] freehand selection lost since image was already selected

[Ofnuts <ofnuts laposte net>]

On 08/15/2013 11:15 AM, Kevin Brubeck Unhammer wrote:
> Say you've zoomed in to start this painstaking freehand selection with
> lots and lots of points, and when you get to the end, nothing gets
> selected. Then you notice that, once again, you had done a Select All
> some time ago (invisible because you zoomed in) and forgotten to Select
> None before clicking the lasso.
>
> What do people do to avoid this? (I know the obvious answer is "remember
> to check what your selection is all the time", but that's seriously
> flow-disruptive.)

People don't do anything because having  a "Select all" or  any 
previously existing selection doesn't prevent a freehand selection (or 
any other kind of selection), which will replace the existing 
selection(*). What often happens is that the person forgets s/he turned 
off the "marching ants", so as soon as the selection is completed, all 
indication of selection disappears. while the selection is indeed there 
(display it with the quick mask or with Ctrl-T).

(*) or add/substract/intersect with it depending on key combos when 
starting the tool. Of course if you shift-click (asking for addition) 
with an existing full selection, you will get the full selection.
> Ideally GIMP could blink the image or something when you add selection
> points that don't increase/decrease the already selected area, but I
> guess that might take some time to implement.