quick way to make mask from photograph of a face?

I am trying to integrate crazytalk talking heads with flash mx. I can create a flash talking head fine, but now I want to put the head on a body that I will animate in flash. To do this, I need to create a mask over the frames created from the crazytalk avi export. See here:

http://www.reallusion.com/crazytalk/ct_flash_tut.asp

I have not really used masks much, and I have being working with both flash mx and paintshop pro (3.0) to try and create mask from the original photograph that was used to create the talking head. I just cannot seem to figure it out. Yes, I do realize the lasso tool works, but it seems imprecise. There must be a way to simply turn a photo into a mask, no?

thanks.

when i've needed a mask for a picture i take the original photo in photoshop, use the eraser tool to erase around the mask, then turn the brightness all the way down on the mask so it just turns into a black blob, save that as a png, import to flash, break apart, and it's a mask shape

another option that might work depending on complexity of picture - import the whole picture to flash, trace bitmap it, and you can click on any color shape and delete it so you may be able to delete stuff around mask, then you have to drop the mask on to a block of color to create a cutout, drop the cutout on to another color to create a solid color mask

weeeeeeeeeee