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A Guide to Photoshop
THE PHOTOSHOP INTERFACE
① Menu Bar — All of Photoshop’s available options.
② Toolbox — Various tools for editing images.
③ Options Bar — Options for the currently selected tool.
④ Palettes — Panes that control various aspects of the project: history, colors, layers, etc.
⑤ Image Area — Currently open image(s).
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KEYBOARD SHORTCUTS
Learning a few common keyboard shortcuts will make your life in Photoshop much easier.
Some of these keyboard shortcuts enable you to perform certain frequent actions (such as
zooming in or out or panning) without changing the tool you are using.
Ctrl+A / Cmd+A ................................... Select entire canvas
Ctrl+D / Cmd+D ................................... Deselect
Ctrl+Shift+I / Cmd+Shift+I .................. Invert selection
Ctrl+T / Cmd+T..................................... Free Transform (enables you to Scale, Rotate, Skew,
Distort, etc. by dragging the handles, in combination with
the Ctrl/Cmd, Alt/Opt, and Shift keys)
Ctrl+C / Cmd+C .................................... Copy
Ctrl+X / Cmd+X .................................... Cut
Ctrl+V / Cmd+V .................................... Paste
Ctrl+Z / Cmd+Z .................................... Undo (toggles the last level of History)
Ctrl+Alt+Z / Cmd+Opt+Z .................... Step back in History
Ctrl+Shift+Z / Cmd+Shift+Z ................ Step forward in History
Ctrl++ / Cmd++...................................... Zoom in
Ctrl+- / Cmd+- ....................................... Zoom out
Space bar................................................ Hand Tool (see Tools below)
Ctrl+Alt+I / Cmd+Opt+I ...................... Opens the Image Size dialog
Ctrl+Alt+C / Cmd+Opt+I ..................... Opens the Canvas Size dialog
There are countless others. Many shortcuts are displayed next to the commands on the menus
and on the Tool Hints (which appear when you hover over a tool). Take note of any you use
frequently.
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TOOLS
Tips:
• Every tool has a keystroke shortcut so you can select it quickly. Hover your mouse over the
tool to see the name and shortcut. It pays to memorize the ones you use frequently.
• A small triangle in the lower right-hand corner indicates a group of tools. Click and hold
down the mouse button to see and select the tools hidden underneath.
• Every tool has a set of options for fine-tuning its behavior. The Options Bar appears at the
top of the screen. Make it a habit to consult this bar before you go to use a tool. A few useful
options are pointed out in this guide, but you will find many others by experimenting a little.
SELECTION TOOLS.
Select the area you want to work with. Anything outside the selected area will
not be affected by your editing.
Tips:
• To deselect your current selection, type Ctrl+D / Cmd+D.
• To select everything except a particular area, first select the part you want to
exclude, then choose Select > Inverse (Ctrl+Shift+I / Cmd+Shift+I).
Marquee Tools (M) select a regularly shaped area.
Rectangular Marquee selects a rectangular area.
Tip: Hold down the Shift key to select a perfect square.
Elliptical Marquee selects a round area.
Tip: Hold down the Shift key to select a perfect circle.
Move Tool (V) moves the selected area, or the entire layer (see Layers below) if nothing is
selected.
Lasso Tools (L) select an irregularly shaped area.
Lasso. Draw freehand the area you want to select. (This is fairly clumsy with a mouse,
but easier to control if you use a stylus.)
Polygonal Lasso. Click point by point to surround your selection area.
Magic Wand (W). Use this tool to select an area of a single color or similar colors. It will
automatically choose the selection area based on the color where you click.
Tip: Adjust the “Tolerance” level lower if it selects too much, or higher if it selects too
little. A value of 0 matches a single color exactly, but even colors that appear pure to the
eye often contain small variations of hue, so this may not select the entire area you want.
Some trial and error may be necessary to get it right.
Tip: Uncheck “Contiguous” to select the color everywhere it appears in your picture.
Crop Tool (C). Select the portion of the image you wish to keep. You can adjust the edges
and corners after you have drawn the initial crop box. (Tip: Zoom in close [Ctrl++ /
Cmd++] if you want to be exact.) Click on the Crop button again – or simply hit Enter – to
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eliminate all portions of the image outside of the selection.
Tip: You can rotate the crop box by clicking and dragging the double arrow that appears
outside the corners of the box.
Selection options.
The first four symbols control selection combination: Make a new selection. Add to an
existing selection (= Shift key while selecting). Subtract from an existing selection (= Alt/Opt
key while selecting). Keep only the area where the second selection overlaps the first.
Feather controls the fuzziness at the edges of the selection.
Anti-alias automatically smooths jagged edges around the selection.
RETOUCHING AND PAINTING TOOLS.
Painting & Drawing Tools (B)
Brush Tool applies color with smooth edges.
Pencil Tool applies color with hard edges.
Clone Stamp Tool (S). This is very useful for duplicating part of an
image, for example to copy an object onto another part of the image, or to
cover up a blemish. First Alt- or Opt-click to sample the source area that
you want to duplicate, then begin painting on the target area where you
want to apply it.
Tip: If “Aligned” is checked on the Options Bar, the relative position of your source point
to your target point is set with your first click and remains constant thereafter. If
“Aligned” is unchecked, the source area is applied anew every time you set down the
brush; use this option if you want to paint multiple copies of the item at your source
point.
Eraser Tool (E) essentially paints a “hole” in the active layer (see Layers below), so that
whatever is underneath will show through. If there is nothing underneath, the erased
portion will be transparent.
Blur Tools (R)
Blur Tool softens sharp edges in the image.
Sharpen Tool hardens soft edges in the image.
Smudge Tool runs adjacent colors into each other, much as if you were smudging wet
paint with your finger.
Brush options.
Click on the small down arrow next to the brush to change the size, adjust edge softness, and
choose a brush style.
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Opacity controls the transparency/opacity of the brush.
Fill Tools (G)
Gradient Tool gradually transitions between two colors which are determined by your
foreground and background color choices. Click and drag to establish the angle of the
gradient (Tip: the Shift key constrains the angle to 45° increments) and the points where
the color transition begins and ends.
Paint Bucket Tool fills large areas of similar color with the foreground color. The
Tolerance, Anti-alias, and Contiguous options work just like the Magic Wand tool above.
DRAWING AND TYPE TOOLS.
Text Tool (T) allows you to add text to images or create images of text for
banners and icons. Set your font attributes in the Options Bar, select the
point where you what your text to begin, and start typing. The text is
automatically placed on a new layer (see Layers below), to which you can
add many cool effects such as drop shadow, glow, emboss, bevel, etc.
Shape Tools (U). You can create various shapes, including rectangles, ellipses, polygons,
lines, and custom shapes. Select “Fill pixels” on the Options Bar. The shape will be
filled with your foreground color.
Tip: Hold down the Shift key while dragging the mouse to make a perfect square or
circle.
Tip: This is not the simplest tool for hollow rectangles and circles. Instead, use the
marquee tool to define your shape, then choose Edit > Stroke… (see Edit Menu below)
and set the options for the line’s appearance.
The Line Tool provides an option for adding arrowheads. Click the small
down arrow on the Options Bar to see the choices, and experiment to find
the arrowhead that looks right to you.
VIEWING TOOLS.
Hand Tool (H). This is an alternative to using the scroll bars. Click and
drag to “pull” the image one way or another.
Tip: Press the space bar to select the Hand tool temporarily. Once you let
up the space bar you will return to your previously selected tool. This is
indispensable if you are in the middle of a complex operation such as
selecting with the Polygonal Lasso tool and don’t want to lose your spot.
Zoom Tool (Z). The cursor will change to a magnifying glass with a plus symbol ; click
to zoom in. To zoom out, hold down the Alt/Opt key and click; the cursor will change to
a magnifying glass with a minus symbol .
Tip: Use Ctrl++ / Cmd++ to zoom in and Ctrl+- / Cmd+- and zoom out without changing
the tool you are using.
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EDIT MENU
Tips:
• Only the portion of the image that you have selected (for example, with the Marquee tool)
will be affected. If nothing is selected, the whole layer will be affected (see Layers below).
• Always remember Ctrl+Z / Cmd+Z to undo what you just did if you don’t like it! If you need
to undo back several steps, use Ctrl+Alt+Z / Cmd+Opt+Z (and to redo forward again,
Ctrl+Shift+Z / Cmd+Shift+Z).
Fill… fills your selection with a solid color. (This is the foreground color [i.e., the upper square]
shown in the toolbox. To change it, click on the color box.) Adjust the opacity/transparency if
you want to add a wash rather than completely covering what is underneath.
Stroke… Think “outline”. You can choose the thickness and color of the outline, and whether
it is positioned inside, outside, or straddling the edges of the selection.
Free Transform (Ctrl+T / Cmd+T) enables you to Scale, Rotate, Skew, Distort, etc. by dragging
the handles, in combination with the Ctrl/Cmd, Alt/Opt, and Shift keys.
Transform ► lets you to perform individual transformations by dragging the handles.
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IMAGE MENU
Mode.
RGB is the normal color mode for computer screens. It stands for Red, Green, and Blue, the
three primary colors of light that when combined make white on a computer monitor.
Indexed Color… reduces the color palette to a maximum of 256 colors. This is the mode used
for GIF files.
Grayscale is an image with shades of gray but no color.
Bitmap is a pure black & white image (no color and no shades of gray).
Tip: You cannot change directly from a color format to Bitmap. You must first convert the
image to Grayscale to remove the color, then change it to Bitmap to change the shades of gray to
black and white.
Image Size (Ctrl+Alt+I / Cmd+Opt+I). The Image Size
dialogue box allows you to specify the exact size and resolution
image.
Resolution: First set the resolution of the image:
Standard screen resolution is 72 pixels per inch (or 96 ppi
on some monitors).
Printing requires much higher resolution. 300 dots per
inch is usually sufficient for JPEG images, but for high-
resolution images in other formats, use 600 dpi or more.
Note: Technically pixels per inch (ppi) should refer to screen resolution and dots per inch
(dpi) to printing resolution, but in practice the two terms are often used interchangeably.
Width and Height: After setting the resolution, set the size of the image. Besides the
default pixels and inches, there are also options for percent, centimeters, etc.
Tip: “Constrain Proportions” assures that the picture’s aspect ratio (the ratio of width to
height) remains the same. Make sure this is checked, unless you want to stretch or
squeeze the image one way or another.
Tip: If you try to enlarge a low-resolution image very much, the low image quality becomes
very obvious. There are no similar issues shrinking down a high-quality image, however, so it
is better to acquire a high-resolution image from the start if possible.
HMS Resolution enlarged vs. reduced
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Canvas Size (Ctrl+Alt+C / Cmd+Opt+C). Use this option if you want to keep the picture the
same size but increase or decrease the working area (for example, if you would like to add more
elements that will make the final picture bigger). If you want to make the image itself bigger or
smaller, use Image Size above.
Increasing the canvas size will add white space around the edges. Decreasing the canvas size
you will cut off the edges of your image, so use caution when doing this (and remember, you
can always undo with Ctrl+Z / Cmd+Z).
Rotate Canvas. You can flip or rotate the canvas. Choose “Arbitrary” to rotate the image by
tiny increments (including fractions of degrees).
Adjustments ►
You can often make your image look better by adding some minor adjustments.
LEVELS control the lightness/darkness of your image. Photoshop’s automatic adjustments are
usually pretty good, so try applying Auto Levels or Auto Contrast first. If you don’t like the
results, you can make your own manual adjustments.
Auto Levels (Ctrl+Alt+L / Cmd+Opt+L) and Auto Contrast (Ctrl+Alt+Shift+L /
Cmd+Opt+Shift+L) let Photoshop try to figure out the optimal adjustments.
Levels… (Ctrl+L / Cmd+L). You can adjust the sliders or
enter specific values in the boxes.
Tip: Make sure “Preview” is checked so you can see how
your image will look before you accept your changes.
Brightness/Contrast… You can adjust the sliders or
enter specific values in the boxes.
COLORS. There is a large variety of options if you want to make manual adjustments to the
color, especially if you want to create special effects.
Tips:
• If you have selected a portion of the image, these adjustmets will only apply to the selection.
If nothing is selected, they will apply to the entire layer (see Layers below).
• If you are simply trying to improve the overall color, try Auto Color (Ctrl+Shift+B /
Cmd+Shift+B) first. It is much simpler than trying to make manual adjustments, and the results
are usually quite good on photographs.
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Hue/Saturation… (Ctrl+U / Cmd+U). This adjustment
allows you to shift all the colors in the selected area in
three possible ways.
Hue controls the color broadly speaking (red, yellow,
blue, etc.). The slider scrolls through the colors of the
rainbow on the bars at the bottom; the top one shows
the current color spread, the bottom shows the target
color spread.
Saturation controls the intensity of the color, i.e., “bright” vs. “dull”. Removing all
saturation produces a shade of gray.
Lightness controls how “light” or “dark” the colors are.
Replace Color… Employ this adjustment to replace
individual colors in your image.
Use the eyedropper to select a color on your image, and
adjust the Fuzziness slider to change the tolerance. The
Selection box will indicate what parts of the image will be
affected. Then change the Hue, Saturation, and Lightness
sliders to create the target color.
Desaturate (Ctrl+Shift+U / Cmd+Shift+U) removes all color, leaving behind only shades
of gray.
Tip: This is not the same as changing your picture type to grayscale (Image > Mode >
Grayscale), though the immediate effect may be similar. Desaturate affects only the
current selection or the current layer; other areas of the picture can still have color, and
you can add color back in. By contrast, grayscale changes the actual image definition to
exclude color from the entire picture.
Black & White… (Ctrl+Alt+Shift+B /
Cmd+Opt+Shift+B). This adjustment removes all color,
leaving shades of gray in place of the different color
ranges. Leaving the default levels will approximate
Desaturate (see above), but you have the option to adjust
lightness/darkness levels for each color separately.
Check the Tint box to apply a color tone instead of gray –
for instance, to add a sepia tint to a photograph to make
it look yellowed with age.
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FILTERS
Filters are used to apply artistic effects and unique transformations. Covered here are filters
used for some more common editing and retouching tasks.
Tips:
• Once you have applied a filter, the shortcut Ctrl+F / Cmd+F will reapply the same filter.
• As with all editing tools, filters apply only to the area you have selected, but if nothing is
selected, they will apply to the entire layer (see Layers below).
Blur softens the image by creating smooth transitions between significantly contrasting colors.
Blur and Blur More are two preset levels of blur. Blur More is equivalent to applying
Blur three or four times.
Use Box Blur… or Gaussian Blur… to have more control over the amount applied.
Smart Blur… gives you even more control over the settings.
Radius determines the size of the area sampled in determining what to blur.
Threshold determines how dissimilar the colors must be before the blur is applied.
Pixels with tonal value differences less than the Threshold value are excluded.
Surface Blur… preserves edges while applying the blur elsewhere.
Sharpen does the opposite of Blur by increasing the contrast of adjacent pixels.
Tip: This filter can help clarify blurry images but cannot successfully restore low-resolution
images to high resolution.
Sharpen and Sharpen More are preset levels of sharpening.
Sharpen Edges and Unsharp Mask… selectively apply sharpening to areas of higher
contrast, emphasizing edges but leaving the rest of the image untouched. Sharpen Edges
is a simple preset whereas Unsharp Mask gives you control over the various settings.
Smart Sharpen… gives full control over all the settings.
Noise. Use these filters add or reduce speckles in an image.
Add Noise… applies random color pixels to the image. The Monochrome option adds
only black and white levels to the existing tones, so no new colors are introduced.
Despeckle and Reduce Noise… remove noise while preserving detail by blurring low-
contrast areas and leaving high-contrast areas alone. Despeckle is a simple preset
whereas Reduce Noise gives you full control over the various settings.
Dust & Scratches… reduces noise by changing dissimilar pixels (thus essentially the
opposite of the above, blurring areas of high contrast more than areas low contrast).
Tip: Images scanned from books and magazines
have distracting patterns of halftone dots which
are a product of the four-color printing process. ➙
Dust & Scratches provides a convenient method for
eliminating or at least reducing this effect. (enlarged)
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LAYERS
Layers are a very versatile feature, especially useful for editing complex images because they
give you individual control over the different elements. Each layer can be edited, manipulated,
turned on and off, etc., independently of the others.
Tips:
• Edits are applied to the layer that is selected. Always check to see which layer is highlighted
before performing any action, or you may end up changing the wrong part of your image!
• If you find you cannot add a new layer, check your image type (Image > Mode). The Bitmap
and Indexed Color modes do not support layers. Change this to Grayscale (for black and
white) or RGB (for color) and you will have full layer capability.
Layers Palette.
Most of the options you will use are found on the layers palette.
Tips:
• Layers at the top of the list display in front of the layers
below them. To move a layer, simply click and drag it to the
desired position.
• When you paste anything from the clipboard, Photoshop
automatically creates a new layer on top of the current one.
• Deleting or erasing a portion of the image cuts a hole in that
layer, revealing the layer underneath. (See Blending Layers
below.)
The eye indicates which layers are visible. Click on the eye to hide the layer, click on the
blank box to make it visible again. Hidden layers are still there in the file, they simply are
not displayed at the moment.
Click on the trash can to delete the highlighted layer. Alternatively, you can drag a layer
to the trash can to delete it.
Clicking on the new layer button will add a new, blank layer immediately above the one
that is currently highlighted.
You can duplicate an existing layer by dragging it onto the new layer button. An exact
copy will be created immediately above that layer.
There are Blending Options for adding various effects to a layer, including shadows,
glows, embossing or beveling, color overlays, etc. These are especially useful in
conjunction with text (see Text Tool above).
Layer Transparency. You can adjust the opacity/transparency
level of a layer. 100% is fully opaque, 0% is fully transparent.
Renaming Layers. Photoshop will generate a default name (Layer 1, Layer 2, etc.) when a layer
is created. If you want to change this to something more meaningful or descriptive, double-
click on the layer name and type in your new name.
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Saving Images. Only layers that are currently showing will be used when you export to an
image format such as JPEG (using Save As… or Save for Web…, see under File Menu below).
This will not affect your “master” Photoshop file, which will still retain all the layers, visible
and invisible.
Tip: By selectively hiding and revealing the various layers, you can create multiple versions of
an image from a single master file.
Merging Layers. You may wish to combine some or all of your layers at some point. You have
several options.
Merge Layers (Ctrl+E / Cmd+E). To merge two or more layers, first select the layers you
want to merge. Hold down the Ctrl or Cmd key while you select the layers you want to
merge; they do not have to be next to each other. Then choose Layer > Merge Layers
(Ctrl+E / Cmd+E). (Note that this option is not available – for obvious reasons – if you
only have one layer selected.)
Merge Down (Ctrl+Shift+E / Cmd+Shift+E). This command merges the selected layer
with the layer immediately below it.
Flatten Image merges all layers in your file.
Tip: You do not need to merge the layers in your file. In fact, you may not want to do so,
because once merged the elements are no longer separately editable, in case you ever want to go
back and make changes. On the other hand, merging certain layers may be useful for
organizing and cleaning up your master file.
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FILE MENU
Tip: It is a good practice to keep a permanent copy of your master file in Photoshop’s native
(PSD) format. This preserves all parts of your edited image, including visible and hidden
layers. This way you can always go back and change something if you need to, then re-export
the updated image file.
Save As… (Ctrl+Shift+S / Cmd+Shift+S). The image format you choose when saving your file
will partly depend on the type of image and its use.
• For web delivery of photographs, including photographs of artwork, you will want to save as
a JPEG file (file extension .jpg or .jpeg). If you are not concerned about file size/memory issues,
choose high or maximum quality. But if size is an issue (as it always is for web pages), use Save
for Web… (see below) to choose the best compromise between quality and file size. JPEG
images do not support any transparency.
• For images with a limited color palette, such as line art drawings, cartoons, or simple icons,
save as a GIF file (file extension .gif). GIF files can have transparent areas.
• PNG (file extension .png) is a relatively new format that creates small file sizes without losing
image quality. PNG files also allow transparencies, and unlike GIFs these can be any level of
partial to full transparency. All modern browsers now support PNG, but some older ones do
not.
• TIFF (file extension .tif or .tiff) is a lossless format and widely compatible, so it is a standard
for archive images. Uncompressed, however, the files can become huge. Use a compression
option such as LZW when you save the file to bring down the storage size. Transparency is not
supported.
Save for Web… (Ctrl+Alt+Shift+S / Cmd+Opt+Shift+S). This is a very useful tool to find the
optimal quality for saving a web image. You are presented with previews of your image at
different levels of quality, displayed side by side for easy comparison, with information for each
on file type, size, and download speed on a slow modem. Choose the lowest file size that still
looks good and click Save.
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SOME ADDITIONAL IMAGE EDITING FUNCTIONS
Red Eye Tool. If you would like to eliminate red-eye from a photo, use the red eye tool,
found in the same group as the healing brush tool (symbolized by the band-aid). Simply
drag the tool over the eye, and voilà! The red eye is gone.
Blending Layers. If you want to blend from one image to another in a collage, first place all
your images on different layers.
To combine elements: Use the Polygon Lasso tool (see under Tools above) to select the
part that you want to keep (top layer) and choose a feather of about 10 for the blending
effect. Once you have selected what you want to keep, invert the selection (Select >
Inverse [Ctrl+Shift+I / Cmd+Shift+I]) and delete.
To fade between layers: Select the layer that you want to fade, choose the mask tool
button (at the bottom of the layers palette, the circle inside a rectangle). Choose the
gradient tool (tools palette), black to white, normal mode, opacity 100%. Then select the
edge of the part to fade and draw the gradient tool line across the part that you want to
fade.
Final Tips. Photoshop is a very powerful program, so we recommend that you experiment
with various features, consult Photoshop Help (F1), browse Adobe.com for more information,
and search the web for tutorials and tips. And always save back-ups of your images at full
resolution in the Photoshop file format (PSD) in case you need to modify your work later.
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