Stop Fighting Hair Selections: How Select and Mask Changed My Compositing Workflow

Every composite artist has a folder of near-misses. Mine has a few too many images where the subject’s hair looks like it was cut out with safety scissors. For years, getting a clean edge around flyaways, curls, and fine strands meant wrestling with channel masks, spending an hour with the smudge tool, or just quietly accepting that the hairline looked slightly wrong. If the background was dark enough, you could hide it.