Toolbox Reference

This section of the site is a comprehensive Toolbox reference Icon

Tool

Key

Purpose

Icon

Tool

Elliptical Marquee

M

selecting

Single Row Marquee

Rectangular Marquee

M

selecting

Single Column Marquee

Lasso

L

selecting

Move

V

transforming

Polygonal Lasso

L

selecting

Magic Wand

W

selecting

Magnetic Lasso

L

selecting

Crop

C

transforming

Slice

K

web design

Slice Select

K

web design

Healing Brush (Photoshop7)

J

retouching

Patch (Photoshop7)

J

retouching

Brush (Paintbrush)

B

painting

Pencil

B

painting

Clone Stamp

S

painting

Pattern Stamp

S

painting

Art History Brush

Y

painting

History Brush

Y

restores to selected history state

Eraser

E

erasing

Airbrush

J

painting

Magic Eraser

E

erasing

Background Eraser

E

erasing

Gradient

G

painting

Sharpen

R

focusing

Paint Bucket

G

painting

Sponge

O

color adjustment

Blur

R

unfocusing

Burn

O

tonal adjustment

Smudge

R

painting

Vertical Type

T

typing

Dodge

O

tonal adjustment

Vertical Type Mask

T

typing

Horizontal Type

T

typing

Horizontal Type Mask

A

drawing

T

typing

Path (Component) Selection Freeform Pen

P

drawing

Direct Selection

A

drawing

Delete Anchor Point

-

drawing

Pen

P

drawing

Rectangle

U

drawing

Add Anchor Point

-

drawing

Ellipse

U

drawing

Convert Point

-

drawing

LIne

U

drawing

Rounded Rectangle

U

drawing

Eyedropper

I

choosing color

Polygon

U

drawing

Measure

I

geometrical measurements

Custom Shape

U

drawing

Audio Annotation

N

non-printable data

Color Sampler

I

color information

Zoom

Z

image viewing

Notes

N

non-printable data

Color Replacement

J

retouching

Hand

H

navigating

Color Selecting box

-

displays current color

Shift+ Ctrl+m

web design

Mode Selector

Q

selecting

Jump to Image Ready

Key

Purpose selecting

-

The Adobe Photoshop Toolbox The tools in the toolbox allow you to select, paint, edit, and view images.

selecting

Listed below are descriptions of the tools in the toolbox.

The tools The marquee tool is used to make rectangular and elliptical selections within the image. The lasso tool is essentially the same as the marquee toll, except that the lasso tool enables the user to define the selection freehand. This tool is especially helpful in isolating irregularly-shaped objects surrounded by other objects. The magic wand tool makes selections based on the color similarities of adjacent pixels. This tool is useful in selecting part of an image without tracing the outline with the lasso tool. The move tool is used to move selections by dragging the mouse. The hand tool is used to scroll through an image that does not fit in the active window. The zoom tool is used to magnify an image (not to change its size). This tool can also be used in conjunction with the Option key on the keyboard to zoom out. The cropping tool discards the remainder of the image outside of the region selected by the tool. The paint bucket tool fills in areas that are adjacent to the point you click with the current foreground color. The gradient fill tool creates a gradual transition from the foreground to the background color. The line tool paints straight line segments. Properties of the lines, including width and arrowheads, can be changed by double-clicking on the line tool in the toolbox. The eyedropper tool is used to sample and match colors in an image. The eraser tool erases pixels and changes them to the same color as the background color (usually white). The pencil tool can be used to color individual pixels. The airbrush tool is used to apply a diffused spray of the foreground color on the image. The paintbrush tool paints soft-edged strokes of the foreground color. |The rubber stamp tool samples a part of an image and can place an exact copy of that sample elsewhere. The smudge tool simulates the effect of dragging a finger through wet paint. The blur/sharpen tools blur or sharpen parts of an image. The dodge/burn/sponge tools can lighten, darken, or change the saturation of part of an image.

Beginners' Guide to Adobe Photoshop – Page 1 of 4 Introduction to Photoshop

Ever wanted to learn how to use Adobe Photoshop, but had no idea where to start? Most Adobe Photoshop tutorials (including my own) are for people who are already familiar with Adobe Photoshop. This tutorial goes right back to the DAWN OF TIME! :) ...and is designed for the Adobe Photoshop beginner. This basic, thirty-minute tutorial is not a comprehensive instruction manual. It only gives you the very basic features you need to know to start using Adobe Photoshop. From there, you'll quickly discover most of the other features of the program. The images in this tutorial are from Adobe Photoshop 7.0, but they're very similar to those from earlier versions of Photoshop. Let's get the tutorial started... Click File > New, and create a new image of any size you desire.

1 – Setting Adobe Photoshop's Undo option Press Ctrl+K to bring up the Preferences window. (In Adobe Photoshop 5.0, you'll need to click on the Settings tab, on the File menu.) Change your "Redo Key" to Ctrl+Shift+Z. This enables you to press Ctrl+Z while working to undo your last actions. Remember this.

2 – Using Adobe Photoshop's Layers window The Layers window shows the various layers that your image is made up of. To make a new layer, click the New Layer button, as shown by the red arrow. To work on a different layer, click on that layer. The eyeball will apear next to that layer. You can drag layers up and down the list. Remember – create a new layer for each part of your image. This allows you to go back and edit the layers individually. Every Adobe Photoshop novice at some time makes a masterpiece, only to find out that they did it all on one layer, and now they can't remove those pink clouds they put on it. :)

Selection and Manipulation

3 – Learning about Selection One of the most important concepts in Adobe Photoshop is Selection. This is the Rectangular Selection Tool. Use this tool on your image to select an area of the image. This lets Photoshop know that that's the area you want to work on.

4 – Adding to a Selection and making a square To add to a selection, hold Shift before dragging. To make the selection exactly square, start dragging, then hold Shift. You can press Ctrl+D to "deselect" and remove the selection at any time.

5 – Elliptical Selections and subtracting Selections Hold down on the Selection Tool on the Toolbar, and choose the Ellipse. To move the selection, just click inside it and drag. Holding Alt while selecting subtracts that area from the selection. I've done that with the Ellipse Selection Tool.

6 – A Selection exercise If you're following this tutorial in Adobe Photoshop, see if you can make these shapes.

Other relevant Adobe Photoshop tools Lasso Tool – Allows you to draw a selection area with the cursor. Magic Wand – Summons elves. (Also believed to select an area of one colour.) :P

Colouring Your Selection

7 – Choosing a colour Now that you know how to select an area in Adobe Photoshop, we can look at some tools that can do something with that area. Before we get started on colouring your selection, you'll need to pick a colour. This part of the Toolbox is where you select your colours. The top square is the foreground colour. If you use a brush or paint bucket, it will apply this colour. The bottom square is the background colour. It has various purposes, but it's also a good place to store a second colour that you're using. Click on either square to change its colour. Click the arrow to swap the two colours. Click the little squares to reset the colours to black and white.

8 – The Paint Bucket and Gradient tools These two tools are on separate buttons in Adobe Photoshop 5.0, but share a button in Adobe Photoshop 6.0 and Adobe Photoshop 7.0. To select one, click and hold. On a new layer, just click the Paint Bucket tool inside the area of your selection to fill it with the colour you've selected. Click and drag from one area to another to fill the area. The point where you started to click will be the colour of your foreground colour, and the point where you took your finger off the mouse button will be the colour of your background colour. The area in between will gradually change from one colour to the other. In this case, I went from corner to corner, with the default white and black selected.

9 – A colour exercise With what you've learned so far, you should be able to recreate this piece of hippy history. :) Remember to create each step on a new layer.

Other Adobe Photoshop tools of interest include The Text Tool – Just click it wherever you want text to appear. Choose a font, colour, and size, and start typing. The Move Tool – Use this tool to drag things around. If you have a selection, it will drag the contents of the selection. If not, it will drag the contents of the layer you're on.

Blending Options & Special Effects

10 – Adding Effects Now that you know the basics, it's time to start adding some easy special effects. To demonstrate Adobe Photoshop's special effects, here's an unembellished button for a website. Each part of this image is on a separate layer.

11 – Key Adobe Photoshop Blending Options In the Layers list, right-click on a layer, and select Blending Options (Adobe Photoshop 6.0 & Adobe Photoshop 7.0) or Effects (Adobe Photoshop 5.0.) This is a picture of the left-hand portion of the Blending Options window that will appear. (The window is much smaller in Photoshop 5.0.)

Drop Shadow Selecting this option will make your layer cast a shadow on layers below it.

Bevel and Emboss Makes the layer like a block of gold bullion - raised in the centre, with edges that slope down. (This is a good effect for creating buttons.)

Texture Makes the surface of the layer look like it's made of wood, stone etc. Use the "Overlay" setting.

Stroke Stroke is just another word for "outline". A Stroke is useful to make an object stand out from its background. (In Adobe Photoshop 5.0, this option doesn't exist. Use Outer Glow as an alternative.)

12 – The end result Other than using some of the Blending Options, nothing else has been done to this button. It's really that easy.

A final few Adobe Photoshop features Zoom: Press (Ctrl and +) to zoom in. Press (Ctrl and -) to zoom out. This is very useful if you're a bit of a pixel pirate :) Transformation: To Transform (resize/rotate/distort) an object, press Ctrl+T. To Transform a selection, click Select > Transform Selection. Use the Shift key while transforming to stop the image distorting.

"Special Message" I hope this tutorial has helped you get the idea of Adobe Photoshop. You can now face the "wall of random icons and palettes" with confidence. :)

Displacement It's easy to make a coloured block of text, or a simple diagram (e.g. a flag), but to make it look like it's actually real, you'll need to follow these steps:

1 – Setting Up

Take your object (Australian flag in this case), and make some space around it, by clicking Image > Canvas Size, and putting in a greater height and width for the canvas.

2 – Creating a Gradient Now make a new image, the same size as your first image. Select the "Gradient" tool, and edit the gradient (Click on the visual representation of the gradient, or click on "Edit" on the Options tab.) Put in lots of black and white markers, as I've done in the image (this will make your gradient produce black and white bars).

3 – Applying the Gradient Hold down Shift, and apply the gradient across your new image from left to right.

4 – Softening the Gradient Click Filter > Blur > Gaussian Blur, and blur your image a bit. This image is now your "displacement map". Save this image (I generally use the name "dispmap.psd").

5 – Applying the Displacement Map Now go back to your original flag image, and click Filter > Distort > Displace. Put 0% in "Horizontal Scale" and 5% in "Vertical Scale". (You can go higher if you want the waves to be bigger.) When it asks for a file, select your displacement map. (This will distort your image depending on how dark the displacement map is at that point.)

6 – Bringing in the Displacement Map Now grab your displacement map image, and drag it onto your image. Use the arrow keys to nudge the displacement map until it covers the whole image.

7 – Using an Overlay to Create Some Light Change the displacement map layer's Mode from Normal to Overlay, and reduce its opacity (75% is good). Voila, a funky flag. Scroll up and compare this image to the first one, and you'll really notice the difference. This technique can also be used to make realistic curtains, ribbons, and banners.