Photoshop CS Savvy

Many of Photoshop s tools and operations are displayed in a system of floating palettes, which appear on the desktop when you launch the program. These palettes let you efficiently apply operations directly to the image, thereby saving the time and hassle of following a sequence of windows to accomplish a task.

To display or hide a palette, click the Window menu and choose the palette s name . To hide or display all palettes simultaneously , press the Tab key. Press Shift-Tab to hide all palettes except for the Tool palette.

Using Palette Clusters

By default, palettes appear in clusters that can be separated or reconfigured according to how you might want to use them. To place a palette into a cluster, click the palette s tab and drag it into the cluster. When you see a heavy black outline appear around the cluster, release the mouse button. To separate a palette from a cluster, click its tab and drag it away from the cluster. The palette s new position is wherever you release the mouse.

Open palettes can be docked (joined) and moved as a unit. To dock a palette to another palette while keeping both visible, click the palette s tab, drag it, and place it on the bottom of the target palette. When you see a bold double line, release the mouse; the palette should snap to the bottom of the target palette. To move the palettes as a group , click the bar of the topmost palette and drag the set into position.

Organizing Palettes

Palettes can be organized to use the desktop space more efficiently. You can move a palette or a cluster by placing the cursor on the bar at the top of the palette and dragging it. You can reduce the size of a palette by clicking the Minimize button on the bar at the top of the palette. This method unfortunately conceals the tabs that identify the palette, and you will have to maximize the palette to see its contents. A more efficient method of decreasing a palette s size is to double-click the tab; the palette will collapse, but the name tab will remain visible, as shown in Figure 4.8.

Figure 4.8: The tab remains visible when you collapse the palette.

After you ve moved or separated the palettes, or changed the way they function, you might want to reset them to their original positions and reset their values to the original defaults of the program. You can accomplish this quickly and easily by choosing Window ’ Workspace ’ Reset Palette Locations.

If desired, you can save your current workspace before you reset the palette locations to their defaults. Choose Window ’ Workspace ’ Save Workspace.

Using the Palette Dock

The Palette Dock provides a neat way to organize your palettes so that you can easily locate them. The dock is at the far right of the Options bar (discussed in the next section.) To place a palette in the Palette Dock, click its tab, drag it to the dock, and release the mouse. You can place as many palettes in the dock as you wish, but their names will become obscured if you place too many. To find a palette, drag over the dock and each palette s name will appear. Click to expand the palette, and click again to collapse it.

Using the Tool Palette

Photoshop s Tool palette displays the icons for 22 tools. Some of the tool icons expand to access tools that are not visible, bringing the entire number of tools to 56, plus paint swatches, Quick Mask icons, view modes, and the Edit In command. Figures 4.9 and 4.10 show the Tool palette with all of its pop-up tools and their shortcut keys. If you see a small black arrow next to the tool, click it with your mouse and hold down the mouse button, and the additional related tools will pop up.

Figure 4.9: The Tool palette showing the expanded tools

Figure 4.10: The Tool palette, bottom portion

Don t be intimidated by the Tool palette! When you place your cursor over a tool, a helpful label, or tool tip, identifies the tool, and its shortcut key appears within a few seconds. Photoshop extends the use of tool tips to describe the function of many of its operations inside palettes, toolbars , and dialog boxes, which can be an asset to obtaining a quick understanding of the program. To activate a tool tip, hover your cursor on the function or operation and wait a few seconds.

The Tool palette is divided into nine general sections. Under the Photoshop Online access logo, from top to bottom, the very broad categories include the selection tools, painting tools, editing tools, vector tools, and display tools. Below that are the foreground and background color swatches, Quick Mask options, display options, and (at the very bottom of the palette) the Edit In command.

Photoshop CS has only one new tool ”the Color Replacement tool which is clustered with the Healing brush and the Patch tool. See Appendix A for a complete list of tools and descriptions of what they do and how they operate .

The Tool palette is designed to place all of the program s primary manual operations in full view on the desktop for easy access. Each tool is represented by a different cursor icon. To choose a tool, click its button on the Tool palette. Then place the cursor where you want to affect the image. Click the mouse, or click and drag (depending on the tool), to apply the tool s function to the image.

The Options Bar

Photoshop, by default, displays an Options bar at the top of the screen when you launch the program. This element is similar to the Options palette in earlier versions of the program, but more convenient because it is easier to locate. After you select a tool, its options become visible in the Options bar, and you can determine the behavioral characteristics of the tool. Figure 4.11 shows the Options bar with the Brush tool selected. A tool s performance can vary considerably with different options, so it s a good idea to check out the settings before you apply the tool to the image.

Figure 4.11: The Options bar (with the Brush tool selected)

Tool Presets

The tool icon on the far left side of the Options bar accesses the current Tool Preset menu (see Figure 4.12). This menu provides a handy way to save and access tool configurations that you frequently use. To access a tool, click the desired tool in the Tool palette. Place your cursor on the arrow next to the tool icon on the Options bar, and press the mouse button to display the list. Scroll down and choose a preset from the list.

Figure 4.12: Photoshop s Tool Preset menu

To save a new tool preset, follow these steps:

1. Choose a tool from the Tool palette and set its characteristics in the Options bar.

2. Click the small arrow next to the tool icon on the Options bar to display the Tool Presets list.

3. Click the New Tool Preset icon in the upper-right of the palette, or click the small arrow at the upper-right side of the palette, to display the pull-down menu. Choose New Tool Preset.

4. In the dialog box that appears (see Figure 4.13), name the tool preset and click OK. It now appears in the Tool Preset list.

Figure 4.13: The New Tool Preset dialog box

The Notes Tool

Two tools let you conveniently attach reminder notes to the image. You can create an annotation as either a sticky note or an audio recording.

To create a written annotation:

1. Click the Notes tool in the Tool palette, or press N on the keyboard.

2. Click the image, and a yellow sticky note appears.

3. Enter the information, as shown in Figure 4.14, and click Close.

   Figure 4.14: A written notation

4. To access the information on the note, double-click the note icon on the image.

To record an audio annotation, you ll need a microphone and audio input capabilities.

Then follow these steps:

1. Click the Notes tool and hold down the mouse to expand the palette. Choose the Audio Annotation tool .

2. Click the image, and the Audio Notation dialog box appears.

3. Click the Start button to record; click Stop when you ve completed the recording.

4. To play the annotation, double-click the audio icon on the image.