15 Essential Photoshop Useability Tips
Photoshop can be overwhelming for some users but as a photographer, it is the next best thing since slice bread.
To help you with being more efficient with Photoshop CS4, I present to you 15 of some of the greatest useability tips and important keyboard shortcuts you should ever know about.
Table of Contents:
- Useful Bridge CS4 Shortcuts
- Keep Your Layers Organized
- Grouping Layers On The Fly
- Duplicate Then Merge – The Faster Way
- Faster Layer Duplication
- Letter X is Your New Bestfriend
- Setting Your Image With Rule of Thirds
- Reset Your Tools
- Paint Behind You
- Brush Options On the Fly
- Zooming and Panning With Your Keyboard
- Bird’s Eye View
- Spring Loaded Tools
- Drag-and-Drop Layer Styles
- Optimize Your Screen
Useful Bridge CS4 Shortcuts
Review Mode
In Bridge CS4, a good way to review your photos is go into Review mode by selecting your photos then use the keyboard shortcut keys Ctrl-B (Mac: Command-B). This displays your photos in a “carousel” view. In this view you can rate your photos and if you want to drop a photo out of the batch, use the Down arrow on your keyboard.
Another keyboard shortcut you should know about is Ctrl-R (Mac: Command-R). This will open up the selected photos in Adobe Camera Raw, where you can do batch editing.
Full Screen Preview
Pressing the Spacebar while an image is selected will render a full screen preview. Press the Spacebar again will return to the previous view.
Hide Those Pins Quicker
When working with the Adjustment Brush in Camera Raw, simply hold the letter V to temporarily hide the pin. Much faster than clicking on Show/Hide Pin box.
Keep Your Layers Organized
At one point in your Photoshop career, you will deal with many layers. It’s inevitable. To find layers you want to work on, it is best to keep them organized. The first thing you want to do is always name your layers. In addition to this, change the color of each layer or layer groups by right clicking on the layer and selecting Layer Properties.
Group Layers On The Fly
Highlight the layers you wish to put in the same Group folder then drag it to the New Folder icon on the bottom of the Layers panel.
Duplicate Then Merge – The Faster Way
Rather than duplicating your layers then merging them, try stamping them to a new layer instead. Select the layers you want to merge and press Ctrl-Alt-E (Mac: Command-Option-E).
You can hide the visibility of the original layers and store them as backups just incase for future edits.
Faster Layer Duplication
To duplicate layers or the selected content, you can use Ctrl-J to duplicate the layer and keep the same location as the original layer. If you are going to move the duplicate layer anyway, use the Move tool (V) and Alt-drag (Mac: Option-drag) the content you wish to duplicate.
More on Duplicating Layers
If you want to copy a layer on to another opened file, simply use the Move tool (V) to drag the element into the new image tab, wait till it becomes active and drop it into the empty canvas.
Letter X is Your New Bestfriend
When working with layer masks with the Brush tool (B), keep your foreground/background color to White/Black. When painting, keep your finger on the X key so you can quickly swap colors (from white to black then back to white) without stopping a beat.
Setting Your Image With Rule Of Thirds
When working on your photos, sometimes you forget to follow some of the basic photography rules, such as Rules of Thirds. To help you with cropping your photo to follow this rule, set your Preferences->Guide, Grid, & Slices to show Gridline Every 33.33 percent with 1 Subdivision. Then display the grid by going to View>Show>Grid (Ctrl-’; apostrophe).
Reset Your Tools
Everyone once in awhile, a tool will make some weird and unexpected results; brushstrokes are not right, weird display on the text.
Instead of figuring out which tools are causing the problem, simply go to the left end of the Options bar, right click the tool icon, and select Reset Tool. This option takes you back to the tool’s default settings.
Paint Behind You
Need to paint something behind an element on a layer? Try switching the Blend mode to Behind. With this option selected, the Brush tool won’t paint over opaque pixels. This is more efficient with creating a layer underneath then merging the two layers after.
Brush Options On The Fly
When using the Brush tool (B), right click on your canvas and it will bring up the tool’s options such as brush size and opacity. You can use this instead of changing it up on the Tools Option on the top.
You can also use the keyboard shortcut [ and ] to decrease/increase the brush size.
Another neat shortcut is to press-and-hold the Alt key, then right-click and drag the mouse. For Mac, the keyboard shortcut is Control and Option together. Press-and-hold the Shift with the Alt key and you can adjust the hardness of the brush. For PC users, you will see a red circle appear onscreen that previews the changes.
Zooming and Panning With Your Keyboard
Panning Left To Right
To pan your image from left to right, hold the Ctrl key down and use your mouse wheel to scroll.
Zooming In and Out
To zoom in and out, hold the Alt (Mac: Option) key and use your mouse wheel to scroll. Scrolling up will zoom in and scrolling down will zoom out. Don’t forget Ctrl-0 will zoom out to fit the whole image to your screen. Ctrl-1 will zoom out to 100%.
Continuous Zoom
With the Zool tool (z) selected, click-and-hold on an area you wish to zoom in. Watch as Photoshop animates the zoom. Just let go of your mouse click when you are satisfied with the zoom level. Holding the Alt (Mac: Option), triggers the Zoom Out function.
Hand Tool With The Spacebar
You can also hold down the Spacebar and the Hand tool icon will appear letting you to move around your images. Let go of the spacebar to return to your previously selected tool.
Bird’s Eye View
When working on an image that is magnified (let’s say 800x) and you would like to move to another section of your image, you typically have to zoom out first, locate the section, then zoom into it again. With CS4, this is so much more efficient. While zoomed in, press-and-hold the H key then click-and-hold on your canvas to temporarily zoom out of your image. Move the rectangle box to the part you want to zoom into, then release your mouse.
Spring Loaded Tools
Pressing and holding a keyboard shortcut (i.e. E for the Eraser tool) will make that tool active. After using it, release the key and you will return to the tool that was previously active.
Drag-and-Drop Layer Styles
If you want to move a Layer Style to another layer, simply drag-and-drop the style to the layer you want it in. Simple as that.
Optimize Your Screen
Want to utilize all your monitor space? Hitting the TAB key will hide all of the current open tool windows. Want to go further? Hit the F key a couple times and you will get the canvas with a black background. Make sure you know all your useful keyboard shortcuts in this mode.
References and Further Reading
- Photoshop User Magazine Issue: October/November 2009 and July/August 2009
- 10 Quick Tips for Photoshop Users.
- Photoshop and Photoshop Elements Quick Tips
- Quick text tips for Photoshop
