On the left is the image I'm going to create, it has a much more solemn mood to it, and the flower stands out. On the right is the original image I took in the Arizona desert near Horseshoe Bend at Lake Powell.

The first step you need to do is make a copy of your background layer when you open the file in Adobe Photoshop.  I like to do this just so I have something to easiliy refer back to.  There's a couple of ways to do this, but I like to click on the layer, drag it, and drop it on the new layer icon in the layers pallete.  If you don't know which icon it is, just move your mouse over them and wait until it says "New Layer"

You just now have "Background Copy" selected.  Select the magnetic lasso tool .  I like to have a little bit of feather, usually between 2-5 px so that you don't get a harsh transition.  At this point I also like to use the add to selection mask option.  Start at a point on the outline of your object, and try to follow the edge around.  Whenever you reach a point that curves sharply, I recommend you click a point at that spot to help Photoshop bend around the corner.

Once you've got the basic outline, choose "remove from selection" for your layer mask.  You can now go around the edges or insides of your object to remove any part of it you don't actually want to select.

Now we are going to copy the selection onto a new layer.  Press Ctrl + C, or Command C if your on a Mac, and than click on the "New Layer" icon again, and press Ctrl + V or Command V on the Mac.  We are now free to edit our object and background seperately.

Here are the layers I created for this tutorial. You can see the Hue/Saturation adjustment layer for my background copy, as well as I have applied a little bit of curves to my foreground layer.

To desaturate the background, click on "Background Copy" (the layer we were previously working on, and go to the Layers -> New Adjustment Layer -> Hue/Saturation menu.  You will get a little pop up box.  If you want to tone the background a little, you can click the "colorize" box and play around with the hue.  To desaturate the background slide the saturation level down to what you think is appropriate for the photo.  You can mix the combination as well as adjust the lightness to brighten or darken your background.

Here you can see my flower has been selected and ready to be isolated from the background. As well the hue/saturation dialogue box with the settings I used for this photo.

Your all done! Pretty easy isn't it? I love to hear from you guys, please let me know if you found this tutorial helpful by clicking the contact me button at the top of this page. 

And the final result. The image stands out much more than when we originally started.