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Inspiring
January 15, 2025
Answered

Is it possible to have a selection remain in place during image rotation?

  • January 15, 2025
  • 3 replies
  • 479 views

When a previously-saved selection is on screen and I rotate the image, the selection disappears. I can get it back by loading the selection, but I'm hoping I can skip that step and have the selection rotate with the image.

 

Is this possible?

Correct answer Semaphoric

If,  before the rotation, you go into Quick Mask mode from an active Selection, and back to Standard mode after, the selection will be rotated, along with the image.

3 replies

Guy BurnsAuthor
Inspiring
January 15, 2025

And there's a shortcut for it! Never used Quickmask, but I will now.

Semaphoric
Community Expert
SemaphoricCommunity ExpertCorrect answer
Community Expert
January 15, 2025

If,  before the rotation, you go into Quick Mask mode from an active Selection, and back to Standard mode after, the selection will be rotated, along with the image.

Legend
January 15, 2025

Well, Semaphoric, that's thinking with the box. Great idea, doable while we wait for Adobe to evaluate a feature request.

Larry
Conrad_C
Community Expert
Community Expert
January 15, 2025

I can confirm that a selection is lost if an image rotation command is applied. However I also found other ways that it isn’t lost, so maybe try one of those. This is what I found:

 

If there is a…

…during rotation it is…

Marquee selection (animated border)

Lost

Channel (saved selection)

Preserved

Path

Preserved

Marquee selection active during view rotation (Rotate View tool), not canvas rotation

Preserved

 

By “preserved” I also mean the saved selection is rotated at the same angle as the canvas.

 

Based on that, if you have a marquee selection that you want to preserve after rotation, take the extra step to save the selection as a channel or a path. After rotation, you can restore the selection from the Channels panel or Paths panel in a click or two.

 

You could also decide that Photoshop should not drop a marquee selection on canvas rotation. If you want that changed, you can submit a feature request under the Ideas section here or a bug report under Bugs, depending on which one you think it is. But then you have to wait for them to decide it’s a high enough priority to take care of versus the other bugs and feature requests.