Hi rick, and welcome to the forum Refined edge is a wonderful thing, but can take some getting used to. I found it frustrating when first started using it. Before clicking on Refine edge, it can be useful to enter Quick mask for a quick visual indication of how well you have done with Quick Select. OK, Refine Edge... Start with the radius tool. Nudge it up until most of what you are after is contained in the selection, then nudge it back as far as you can without loosing your edge. Then hit Smart radius. You might need to wait a moment for each adjustment to take effect. Other controls depend on the image. If there are no fine elements like hair, then Smoothing is very effective. If there is hair, then little or no smoothing is best. Feather obviously softens the edge, and can make for a more realistic composite to a new background. Contrast can give a very harsh edge, so use with care. When painting in features, take note of the symbol in the brush. It sounds like you might have a minus symbol (it happens sometimes) in which case the Shift key should put that right. The Alt (or Opt) key will remove unwanted parts of the selection, but I find it works best with a small brush size. Shift edge will remove a thin halo, as will Decontaminate colour when there is something like a blue sky showing through whispy hair. Bottom line, Refine edge is not perfect, and does not always work. It has an annoying habit of removing, or rendering semi-selected, areas you want included. When that happens, click OK, and fix with Quick mask.
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