Reference Notes for Adobe Photoshop

Restoring default preferences On the desktop, double-click the Adobe Photoshop icon to start Adobe Photoshop and then immediately hold down Ctrl-Alt-Shift (Windows) or Command-Option-Shift (Mac OS) to reset the default settings.

Undoing multiple actions The Undo command (CONTOL + z) reverses only one step. However, you can still step back through multiple actions using the History palette. By default, the Photoshop History palette retains only the last 20 actions. You can change the number of levels in the History palette by choosing Edit- Preferences – General. You can also use CONTROL + ALT + z to undo more than 1 action.

Tools

• The marquee tools make rectangular, elliptical, single row, and single column selections.
• The Move tool moves selections, layers, and guides.
• The lasso tools make freehand, polygonal (straightedge), and magnetic* (snap-to) selections.
• The Magic Wand tool selects similarly colored areas.
• The Crop tool trims images.
• The Slice tool creates slices.
• The Slice Select tool selects slices.
• The Healing Brush tool paints with a sample or pattern to repair imperfections in an image. The Spot Healing Brush tool quickly removes blemishes and imperfections from photographs with a uniform background.
• The Red Eye tool removes red-eye in flash photos with one click.
• The Patch tool repairs imperfections in a selected area of an image using a sample or pattern.
• The Color Replacement tool substitutes one color for another.
• The Brush tool paints brush strokes.
• The Pencil tool paints hardedged strokes.
• The Clone Stamp tool paints with a sample of an image.
• The Pattern Stamp tool paints with a part of an image as a pattern. The History Brush tool paints a copy of the selected state or snapshot into the current image window.
• The Art History Brush tool paints stylized strokes that simulate the look of different paint styles, using a selected state or snapshot.
• The Eraser tool erases pixels and restores parts of an image to a previously saved state.
• The Magic Eraser tool erases solid-colored areas to transparency with a single click.
• The Background Eraser tool erases areas to transparency by dragging.
• The Gradient tool creates straight-line, radial, angle, reflected, and diamond blends between colors. The Paint Bucket tool fills similarly colored areas with the foreground color.
• The Blur tool blurs hard edges in an image.
• The Sharpen tool sharpens soft edges in an image.
• The Smudge tool smudges data in an image.
• The Dodge tool lightens areas in an image.
• The Burn tool darkens areas in an image.
• The Sponge tool changes the color saturation of an area.
• The path selection tools make shape or segment selections showing anchor points, direction lines, and direction points
• The type tools create type on an image.
• The type mask tools create a selection in the shape of type.
• The pen tools draw smooth-edged paths.
• The Custom Shape tool makes customized shapes selected from a custom shape list.
• The annotations tools* make notes and audio annotations that can be attached to an image.
• The Eyedropper tool samples colors in an image.
• The Sharpen tool sharpens soft edges in an image.
• The Smudge tool smudges data in an image.
• The Dodge tool lightens areas in an image.
• The Burn tool darkens areas in an image.
• The Sponge tool changes the color saturation of an area.
• The path selection tools make shape or segment selections showing anchor points, irection lines, and direction points.
• The type tools create type on an image.
• The type mask tools create a selection in the shape of type.
• The pen tools draw smooth-edged paths.
• The Custom Shape tool makes customized shapes selected from a custom shape list.
• The annotations tools make notes and audio annotations that can be attached to an image.

The Eyedropper tool samples colors in an image. Using a context menu Context menus are short menus that are appropriate to specific elements in the work area. They are sometimes referred to as “right-click” or “shortcut” menus. Usually, the commands on a context menu are also available in some other area of the user interface, but using the context menu can save time. Palettes and palette locations Photoshop palettes are powerful and varied. You rarely would have a project in which you needed to see all palettes simultaneously.

That’s why they’re in palette groups and why the default configurations leave some palettes unopened. The complete list of palettes appears on the Window menu, with check marks by the names of the palettes that are open at the front of their palette groups. You can open a closed palette or close an open one by selecting the palette name on the Window menu. You can hide all palettes at once—including the tool options bar and toolbox—by Pressing the Tab key. To reopen them, press Tab again. Expanding and collapsing palettes You can also resize a palette to see more or fewer of the available options it contains, either by dragging or clicking to toggle between preset sizes.

To change the height of a palette, drag its lower right corner.

To expand a palette to show as much as possible of its contents, click the minimize/ maximize button (Windows) or the zoom button (Mac OS).Click a second time to collapse the palette group. The toolbox and the tool options bar share some characteristics with the other palettes:

You can drag the toolbox by its title bar to a different location in the work area. You can move the tool options bar to another location by dragging the grab bar at the far left end of the palette. You can hide the toolbox and tool options bar. However, there are other palette features that are not available or do not apply to the toolbox or tool options bar: You cannot group the toolbox or tool options bar with other palettes. You cannot resize the toolbox or tool options bar.

You cannot dock the toolbox in the palette well. (The same is true for the tool options bar, because the palette well appears on the tool options bar. ) The toolbox and tool options bar do not have palette menus. You can drag the toolbox by its title bar to a different location in the work area. You can move the tool options bar to another location by dragging the grab bar at the far left end of the palette. You can hide the toolbox and tool options bar. However, there are other palette features that are not available or do not apply to the toolbox or tool options bar: You cannot group the toolbox or tool options bar with other palettes.

You cannot resize the toolbox or tool options bar. You cannot dock the toolbox in the palette well. (The same is true for the tool options bar, because the palette well appears on the tool options bar. ) The toolbox and tool options bar do not have palette menus. Customizing the workspace Choose Window > Workspace > select the appropriate selection Crop ToolUse the Crop tool to crop images. Select perspective to manipulate the boundaries of the crop area You can crop outside of the canvas to make a larger image Painting with the Spot Healing Brush The Spot Healing Brush tool quickly removes blemishes and other imperfections from photos. It works similarly to the Healing Brush: It paints with sampled pixels from an image or pattern and matches the texture, lighting, transparency, and shading of the sampled pixels to the pixels being healed.

Selecting parts of an image Shift adds to the selection Alt subtracts from the selectionLayer Masks Create transparency without being destructive. Click on the layer mask icon in the layers palette and paint black and white to create transparency Quick masks In Adobe Photoshop, you can make temporary masks, called quick masks, or you can create permanent masks and store them as special grayscale channels called alpha channels. Photoshop also uses channels to store an image’s color information and information about spot color. Unlike layers, channels do not print. You use the Channels palette to view and work with alpha channels. Creating a quick maskClick the Quick Mask mode button in the toolbox. (By default, you have been working in Standard mode.

) In Quick Mask mode, a red overlay appears, masking and protecting the area outside the selection the way rubylith, or red acetate, masked images in traditional print shops. You can apply changes only to the unprotected area that is visible and selected. Note: A partial selection must exist to see the overlay in Quick Mask mode. Creating an adjustment layer Adjustment layers can be added to an image to apply color and tonal adjustments without permanently changing the pixel values in the image.For example, if you add a Color Balance adjustment layer to an image, you can experiment with different colors repeatedly, because the change occurs only on the adjustment layer. If you decide to return to the original pixel values, you can hide or delete the adjustment layer. Adjustment layers affect all of the layers below it.

Layer styles Layer styles are automated special effects that you can apply to a layer. In the Layer Style dialog box, make sure that the Preview check box is selected, or select it now so that you’ll be able to see the changes as you work.Examine the options for Drop Shadow in the Layer Style dialog box. You can either leave them at the default settings, or experiment with various changes until you like the results you see in the image window. To copy a selection or a layer Use the move tool while pressing the ALT key to make a copy of the selection or the layer Typographic Design When you add type to an image in Photoshop, the characters are composed of pixels and have the same resolution as the image file—zooming in on characters shows jagged edges.However, Photoshop preserves the vector-based type outlines and uses them when you scale or resize type, save a PDF or EPS file, or print the image to a PostScript printer. As a result, you can produce type with crisp, resolution-independent edges, apply effects and styles to type, and transform its shape and size.

Type tool tricks

Shift-click in the image window with the Type tool (T) to create a new type layer—in case you’re close to another block of type and Photoshop tries to auto select it. Double-click the T thumbnail icon on any text layer in the Layers palette to select all of the type on that layer.

With any text selected right-click (Windows) or Control-click (Mac OS) on the text to access the contextual menu. Choose Check Spelling to run a spell check.

Text on a path – create a path – select the type tool and bring the tool close to the path. When the tool changes appearance, start typing! Your text will be on the path!! Warping a layer Use the free transform tool (CONTROL + t) and select the warp icon to add curves to your selection