Adobe Illustrator magic wand and lasso tool problems

[Xarzu]

Hello Forum.

How do you make the background of an object transparent in Adobe Illustrator?

I have been having issues with using the Magic Wand tool in Adobe Illustrator as well as the lasso tool.

Basically, I am trying to put a small graphic into a new Illustrator file.

The first thing I tried to do is to use the magic wand tool. But I found out that this did not work on a jpeg image since it did not have any individual objects to select.

So I tried something new. I opened the file in Adobe Photoshop and used the lasso tool to select an area. Then I coped this area. Then I tried to paste it into Adobe Illustrator. But the background was not transparent for the pasted image.

How do I make the background transparent.

I made this small video to show what I am talking about:

h t t p : / / y o u t u . b e / K Q r o v A q 5 9 z k

I noticed that the background is a layer in the image I made in photoshop. I tried turning it off or making it invisible, but that did not help.

http://i67.photobucket.com/albums/h292/Athono/hidebackground_zps0338ed4b.png

http://i67.photobucket.com/albums/h292/Athono/backgroundinphotoshop_zps04ea33fd.png