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Rectangular Marquee
Marquee
Select rectangular areas
Photoshop Versions: All
Keyboard Shortcut: M
Now playing in selected cities.
(As always, I hope your city has been selected.)

The Rectangular Marquee tool is used for making rectangular selections within an image. It is among the most basic of tools, and appears in most every image editing program available.

It can be used to prepare an image for cropping, while the similar Crop tool automatically completes the crop when used.

Options[]

  • Selection tool common options

Because it is based on a rectangle, there are additional numerical options for modifying its shape:

Normal
This is the most familiar mode, defining a selection as opposing corners of a drag motion.
Fixed Ratio
Allows a certain aspect ratio to be maintained while selecting. This is useful when you need to scale the image to a common print size.
Fixed Size
Allows a specific height and/or width to be defined, along with units of scale.

The selection borders can snap to the image boundary or any Extra (e.g. guides, grid). This behavior can be controlled in the View menu.

The Alt/Option modifier key allows the selection to originate from a central point, and can be combined with snapping when the center has been predefined by guides.

The Shift modifier key allows for square selections to be made.

The Space bar allows the selection to be repositioned while it is active.

See also[]

  • Crop tool
  • Shape tool
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