INTRODUCTION
What is Photoshop?
Adobe Photoshop is a professional image editing software package that can be used for both creating and
editing images. Adobe Photoshop is one of the most powerful software applications for image editing, touch
up, color correction, and painting and drawing. You can use it to work with images that have been digitized
on flatbed or film/slide scanners, or to create original artwork. The image files you create in Photoshop can
be printed to paper or optimized for use in multimedia presentations, web pages, or animation/video
projects.
Photoshop is used for most of the following real world examples such as Web Design, Logo Design, Movie
Posters, Photos, Graphics, Brochures, T-Shirt Design etc.
Basic concepts
Bitmap images and vector graphics
Computer graphics fall into two main categories - bitmap and vector. You can work with both types of
graphics in Photoshop; moreover, a Photoshop file can contain both bitmap and vector data. It’s helpful to
understand the difference between the two categories as you create, edit, and import artwork.
Raster or Bitmap images
Bitmap images technically called raster images which are made up of a grid of dots known as pixels. When
working with bitmap images, you edit pixels rather than objects or shapes. Bitmap images are the most
common electronic medium for continuous-tone images, such as photographs or digital paintings, because
they can represent subtle gradations of shades and color. Bitmap images can lose detail when scaled on
screen because they are resolution dependent, they contain a fixed number of pixels, and each pixel is
assigned a specific location and color value. Bitmapped images can look jagged if they’re printed at too low
a resolution because the size of each pixel is increased.
Vector Graphics
Vector graphics are made up of mathematically defined lines and curves called vectors. You can move,
resize, or change the color of a line without losing the quality of the graphic. Vector graphics are resolution-
independent—that is, they can be scaled to any size and printed at any resolution without losing detail or
clarity. As a result, vector graphics are the best choice for representing bold graphics that must retain crisp
lines when scaled to various sizes (logos, for example).
File Format: GIF or JPEG
When considering what format to save images in there are three basic things to consider: color, size and
compression which affects the loading time. Making image files smaller is useful for transmitting files across
networks and for archiving libraries of images. This saves disk space and improves transmission time.
It takes longer to decode and view a JPEG image than to view an image of a simpler format such as GIF.
Thus using JPEG is essentially a time/space tradeoff: you give up some time in order to store or transmit
an image more cheaply. GIF is superior in image quality, file size, or both.
Graphics Interchange Format (GIF) Joint Photographic Experts Group
(JPEG)
COLOR Only stores 8 bits/pixel (256 or fewer 24 bits/pixel (16 million colors) so
colors) so you lose colors and quality for stores full color information.
complex images Therefore stores more realistic
photographs more faithfully
SIZE and COMPRESSION No compression(compression Compressed file so smaller file size
determines quality of the output
image)
Smaller pictures are faster to load
and very accurate
larger pictures take longer to load
than higher quality JPEG images
General USE CASES: Good for images with few distinct colors, Large complex images like
Rule of Thumb such as line drawings and simple photographs of people, scenery
cartoons. and backgrounds
Used for compressing either
full-color or gray-scale images
of natural, real-world scenes.
Good for photographs,
naturalistic artwork, and similar
material
NOT good for lettering, simple
cartoons, or line drawings.
Handles only still images.
Never for Plain black-and-white
(two level) images
Other file type
i. .PSD This is the PhotoShop format and it preserves layers.
ii. .JPG This is for the web and is used for graphics on the web.
iii. .TFF A great cross platform format that preserves all quality for printing.
iv. .PCT Another good format for print and cross platform.
CREATING A NEW CANVAS / IMAGE
Go to the “File” menu and select “New” (or press Ctrl+N). Your canvas will open as a blank, white window. The
top of it will say “Untitled” ( until you save it),
A window will appear asking you how large you would like your canvas (or working area) to be. Pick a size
large enough to work with; you can always “crop” your image later, so it’s better to have too large an area
than too small an area.
For comparisons sake, your monitor’s total space is probably 1024 x 768. Make your decision, and click
“OK.”
OPENING A PRE-EXISTING IMAGE
Go to the “File” menu and select “Open” (or press Ctrl+O). Find the image on your computer that you wish
to edit, and click “Open.” Your image will open in a new window within Photoshop.
EDITING AN IMAGE
Once you have an image created or opened, you can edit or draw on top of it with Photoshop’s “Tools”
window, which is the long, thin window that is automatically open on the left side. Here is a break down of
all the tools contained on this bar:
Defining the work area
The Photoshop work area is arranged to help you focus on creating and editing images.
Check Tutorials https://helpx.adobe.com/photoshop/how-to/ps-basics-fundamentals.html
Photoshop work area
The work area has these components:
i. Menu bar are probably the most familiar interface elements to a new Photoshop user. They contain all
sorts of options, but since there are not as visible as panes or the toolbar, they are often only partially
explored. I’ll take time right now to go over the menus and give a brief description to orient you to each.
File – contains all of the stuff you’d expect it to like create new images, open pre-existing images, print,
exit the program, with a few extras including Import, which deals with scanning, and Save for Web,
which allows you to export a web-ready image from your Photoshop file.
Edit – is another familiar menu like undo, copy, paste, cut, preferences, basic image manipulation, etc.
In Photoshop, edit houses all of the expected options as well as Fill & Stroke, and other image-altering
functions
Image – affect a whole image, for the most part. Change the image or canvas size, rotate, color
adjustments, size adjustments, and any other changes you need to make globally when working with a
Photoshop file
Layer – Create / delete layers, merge layers together, layer effects, etc.
Select – Adjust the selected area of your image. Selecting the specific parts of an image you’d like to
alter is a difficult part of working in Photoshop. This menu gives you some options regarding selections,
including the ability to save selections, reverse them, or add to them. Learning the options on the
selection menu can really save you some time
Filter – Apply filters and effects to your images. It is probably what most people think about when they
think about Photoshop. The filter menu allows you to apply filters to any part of your image. These
filters include ways to change the texture of the image, with some potentially radical results.
View – Zoom in and out of your images. You can use this to show and display guidelines on the image,
and to zoom in and out, among other things.
Window – Open or close different windows within Photoshop
ii. Options bar Provides options for using a tool. It is located directly underneath the menus, is a useful
tool when working with the different Photoshop tools.
iii. Toolbox contains tools for creating and editing images.
Contains selection tools, painting and editing tools, foreground and background color selection
boxes, and viewing tools.
To select, simply click on the icon on the toolbox (the name of each tool will appear by
positioning the pointer over the icon).
A small triangle at the bottom corner of the icon indicates the presence of additional hidden
tools
Now it's time to learn how to use some of the tools in the Photoshop toolbar.
1. Marquee Tool – used for selecting areas of an image
The following tools allow you to select regions in your image to alter, copy, move, and apply filters.
a. Rectangular marquee tool: This is the default selection setting. You can make a
selection of any rectangular size and shape.
b. Elliptical marquee tool: This tool, available when you click and hold down on the
selection tool region of the tool bar, selects elliptical spaces. To select a round area, hold
the shift key while clicking and dragging.
c. Single row: This tool will select a 1pixel region that is as wide as your image. Very
useful for trimming edges and making straight lines.
d. Single column: The tool will select a 1pixel region that is as tall as your image. Also
very useful for trimming edges and making straight lines.
A Note on Selection Modes (in the options bar):
Normal mode allows you to drag the cursor to create the selection size you want.
Constrained aspect ratio allows you to choose a scalable rectangle, say with a width to height
ratio of 1 to 2. The selection will grow when you drag, but will remain the same shape.
Fixed Size/Fixed Aspect Ratio allows you to predetermine the size, in pixels or a ratio, of the
selection you will make. When you click with fixed size selected, a selection box of the exact size
you specified will automatically appear. With fixed aspect ratio, you can make different-sized
selections of the same shape. This is a particularly helpful tool when cropping images to a certain
size or drawing identical boxes.
2. Move Tool – used for moving an image to a different area of the canvas
3. Lasso Tool – used for selecting areas of an image that may not necessarily be comprised of straight
lines. They are used to make freehand selections of generally irregular shapes
There are three different lasso tools:
a. Lasso tool, which allows you to draw a selection by dragging the cursor freehand. The
selection will close itself.
b. Polygon Lasso tool, which creates a selection, composed of straight lines that can be as
short as one pixel. The selection grows with each additional click. This tool is especially useful
for cutting out objects in an image to place on new backgrounds.
c. Magnetic Polygon Lasso tool works a little like a combination of the other two lasso tool.
As you drag, the selection maps to natural borders in the image. This is a useful tool when
dealing with well-defined and high-contrast images.
A note about lasso tool options: When extracting part of an image from its background, the
result will be choppy and rough around the edges unless you adjust the feather value in the
options bar. This fades the edges you create and can smooth the region into its new
background.
4. Magic Wand Tool – used for auto selecting large areas of an image that are similar in color
5. Crop Tool – used for reducing the image to a certain area (“cropping”)
6. Slice Tool – used to “slice” an image into different sections; generally used for the creation of images
for a web page design
7. Healing Brush Tool – used to fix imperfections in an image by copying other pixels from the image. The
Healing Brush tool will also match the texture, lighting, and shading to perfectly match the are you are
fixing
8. Brush Tool – used with the mouse to simply draw lines on your image
9. Clone Stamp Tool – used to “clone” or copy one area of an image to another; first hold “Alt” and click
an area of the image to copy, then click on a different area to copy it there
10. History Brush Tool – used to copy and draw a pre-existing image in different artistic styles
11. Eraser Tool – used to erase certain areas of an image
12. Gradient Tool – used to create gradient fills for an image, of any color
13. Blur Tool – used to blur or blend areas of an image
14. Dodge Tool – used to uniquely adjust the brightness and contrast of an image
15. Path Selection Tool – used merge overlapping components into a single component
16. Type Tool – used to place text on an image
17. Pen Tool – used to draw lines and curves with better precision
18. Rectangle Tool – used to draw rectangles and other polygons
19. Notes Tool – used to leave notes for yourself on your image
20. Eyedropper Tool – used to select and match specific colors
21. Hand Tool – used to quickly view different areas of an image
22. Zoom Tool – used to zoom in and out of an image
23. Set Foreground / Background Color – used to set the foreground (front) and background (back) colors
of an image; can also be used to change the colors of text, etc. Click on the boxes to change the colors
(a new window will appear).
24. Edit Modes – used to switch back and forth between modes
25. Switch Screen Modes – used to switch between full screen and standard screen modes
