Quick Selection Tool Clears Entire Selection

[dnapieralski]

I'm using Alt (option) and Shift to edit my selection in an image. Because of the image, the pen tool, lasso, polygonal lasso, magic wand, elliptical marquee, etc. aren't options. This is a white circular cover plate, photographed head-on, on a white background. I need to remove the background. The most efficient way (or so I thought) turned out to be the quick selection tool. It worked amazingly up until I was about 90% of the way done... Now, even when I use Alt or Shift, OR use the "remove" setting for the quick selection tool, it simply clears the entire selection. This is happening no matter the size of the tool or the size of the selection.

I can't find anything online for this issue. Are there any suggestions, or does anyone have a much better way to remove the background that they might want to suggest? Again, magic wand, pen tool, the lasso tools and using an elliptical marquee aren't efficient.

Thanks!

[Leslie Moak Murray · Accepted solution]

So before you click "Remove," can you see that the selected area is only the background outside of the plate edge? If so,make sure you didn't check "Select/Inverse."

Or: since both the plate and the background are white, the selection tool might not be able to distinguish plate pixels from background pixels in some areas.  Can you post the image here?

[dnapieralski]

I actually can't post the image 😞 I wish I could, but it's for a product we haven't released yet and if I post it online I could get in major trouble. But, I think it had to be that there were instances the quick selection tool wasn't noting the difference in background colors. I could see it clearly and this is why it didn't dawn on me at the time - that is the only reason I can think of. Thanks for the suggestion!

[Leslie Moak Murray]

You're welcome! If all else fails, you might have to duplicate the layer and replace the parts with background still in them with the isolated parts, then erase behind them. (Thank goodness it's a round shape!)