Illustrator: Trying to remove many small pieces like the attached

[isabellaw87200276]

Trying to remove small pieces of this object can do one by one want to know a quicker method for doing this. Thanks

[Les ONeill]

Lock the large objects that you don't want to select, then use the lasso tool (Q) and drag to define a shape around the small objects and delete

[isabellaw87200276]

I have many of these to do is there a quicker way?

[Les ONeill]

Without seeing the whole picture it's hard to say. But if it's relatively easy to select the objects that you don't want to delete then do that and then 'select inverse' (from the select menu) and hit delete

[isabellaw87200276]

Here is the whole picture

[Les ONeill · Accepted solution]

OK. I would select one of the small pieces you want to delete (they look like black fill/no stroke, but I can't be certain). Go to the select menu and choose 'Same/ Fill and stroke' this should select all the black dross but possibly also the large black circle/s, if so, then shift select them to deselect and then hit delete

[isabellaw87200276]

Ok I shall try that - thanks

[Monika Gause]

THat is type converted to outlines? So it's a compound path?

In that case what you could try is release the compound path and then use "Unite" from the pathfinder panel (top left button). Will only work for letters that don't have a hole in them.

For the other letters you could try and release the compound path, then color the former "hole" differently. Then select all the parts that belong to the letter and use the button "Merge". Then delete the differently colored "hole"

It would be best to move all the letters to a new layer first and lock all other layers.

[boonheilig]

If I might add, there is also a script that selects paths by size, called fittingly "SelectPathsBySize"
https://github.com/johnwun/js4ai/blob/master/SelectPathsBySize.jsx