100 PHOTOSHOP TIPS and TRICKS

(21-40)

21) WANNA LIGHTEN OR DARKEN AN AREA IN YOUR IMAGE? To lighten or darken an area of a photograph, make a selection around the problem area with a feathered edge. Press MAC: Command-J (PC: Control-J) to turn the selection into a layer. Change the Blend Mode to Screen or Multiply and adjust the Opacity in the Layers palette to correct the area. Multiply Mode will darken and Screen Mode will lighten the area while protecting the contrast of the affected area.

22a) GET RID OF FRINGE PIXELS, TAKE 1: Sometimes when your combine multiple images for a collage, you see a slight fringe around the edges of layers that are copied from other images. In many cases you can remove that fringe by going to Layers>Matting>Defringe. Try using the default setting of 1. That will often do the trick, but if not, choose Undo (from the Edit menu) and go back and try a Defringe setting of 2.

b) GET RID OF FRINGE PIXELS, TAKE 2: If defringe doesn't work, or the edges end up looking a little jagged, here's another alternative to Defringe. MAC: Command-Click (PC: Control-click) on the layer name in the Layers palette to load a selection of the contents of the layer. Then from the Select menu, choose Modify>Contract and contract by 1-3 pixels. Go back to the Select menu and choose inverse. Press MAC: Command-H (PC: Control-H) to hide your selection then add a very slight Gaussian Blur (Filter>Blur>Gaussian Blur) of 1 pixel or less.

c) GET RID OF THE FRINGE PIXELS, TAKE 3: Here's another variation on the same theme. MAC: Command-click (PC: Control-click) on the layer name in the Layers palette to load a selection of the contents of the layer. Then from the Select menu, choose Modify>Border and enter 2 for the value. In the layers palette, switch to the Background layer, then press MAC: Command-J (PC: Control-J) to copy the selected area on to its own layer. Move the "border layer" above the fringed layer and change the mode to Lighten to hide a light colored fringe, Darken to hide a dark fringe.

23) REMEMBER MORE FILES: By default, PS remembers the last 10 files you've opened. Actually, that's not quite true: it remembers 30 files but only shows the last 10 because that's the default preference. To see a list of the last 30 files you worked on, press MAC: Command-K (PC: Control-K) to open Preferences, and then press the Next button to go to the File Handling dialogue. At the bottom you'll see that the "Recent file list contains" box is set to 10. Change that to 30 and you'll have a nice long list under File>Open Recent.

24) PAINT AWAY COLOR: When you're working on a color image, you can use the Brush tool to selectively "paint away" color so that the image looks black and white. Whit the Brush tool active, go to the Options Bar and change the Blending mode from Normal to Color, use Black as your Foreground color, and start "painting away" the color.

25) NAVIGATION WHILE IN DIALOGS: Even when you're working in dialogs such as Levels, or in most filters, you can still access most of the View menu features. This enables you to navigate within your document, change your views, and toggle rulers on and off, etc. while the dialog is open. You can also press MAC: Command-+ or - (PC: Control-+ or -) to zoom in and out, or use the Spacebar to activate the Hand tool to scroll your view.

26) ACCESSING GRAYED OUT FILTERS IN CMYK: If you're working in CMYK mode, you'll notice that many of the filters are "grayed" out in the Filter menu, so you cannot access them. Rather than converting to RGB, which could affect the colors, try this: go to the Channels palette and click on the CYAN channel. Now look in the Filter menu and you'll see that all filters are available. All you have to do is apply the same filter to all four channels, one at a time. To do this quickly apply the filter to the CYAN channel, then press MAC: Command-2 (PC: Control-2) to activate the Magenta channel, and MAC: Command-F (PC: Control-F) to reapply the same filter. Press Command-3, Command-F for the Yellow channel then Command-4, Command-F to apply it to the Black channel. (One note: this doesn't work as well with "random" filters such as Render Clouds).

27) IMAGE TOO LARGE TO SCAN?: Got an image that's too large to scan in one piece? Simply scan each half, making sure that there is a significant overlap between the pieces (for example, include the same person or portion of the same building in each scan). Then open both halves and use File>Automat>Photomerge to automatically stitch the two halves together.

28) QUICKLY MAKE WHITE YOUR BACKGROUND COLOR: Just press the letters "d" and "y" and your Foreground color will instantly be white.

29) CHANGE OPACITY FROM YOUR KEYBOARD: For any tool that has a slider for Opacity (or Strength, Exposure, or Tolerance), don't bother going to the Options Bar to change the setting. Just press the first number of the percentage you want: for example, 1 for 10%, 8 for 80%, etc. Use 0 for 100%. If the Move tool is selected, the same key strokes will change the opacity of your active layer (as long as the Layers palette is floating - it will not work if the palette is docked).

30) BETTER GRAYSCALE CONVERSIONS: Using the Channel Mixer is a great way to convert a color image to grayscale, but it does take some experimentation. Another way to do this (with less control but excellent results) is to convert your file to Lab mode. In the Channels palette, just click on the Lightness channel and then change the mode to Grayscale.

31) TURN LAYERS INTO SEPARATE DOCUMENTS: If you have created a multi-layered document and you need to create separate documents from those layers, there' s an automated way to do this. From the File menu choose Scripts>Export Layers to Files. A dialog will offer lots of choices as to what formant you want, file naming, etc.

32) CHANGE CHANNELS IN ADJUSTMEN DIALOGUE BOXES: When you're using Levels, Curves or other Adjustment commands, use the keyboard to switch between channels:

MAC: Command-1 (PC: Control-1): Red (Cyan in CMYK Mode)

Command-2 (Control-2): Green (Magenta in CMYK Mode)

Command-3 (Control-3): Blue (Yellow in CMYK Mode)

Command-4 (Control-4): Black (only in CMYK Mode)

Command-~ (Control-~): Master/overall (RGB or CMYK, depending on the mode)

33) RESET THE PREFERENCES AS YOU LAUNCH: You've probably heard that the best way to fix many common problems in PS is to delete the Preferences. Rather than struggling to find the preference file and delete it, instead, quit Photoshop and then re-launch it, holding down MAC: Command-Option-Shift (PC: Control-Alt-Shift). You'll be asked if you want to delete the preferences. Click OK and all your settings will revert back to the original "out-of-the-box" defaults.

34) ZOOM TRICK: To keep your document window the same size while zooming up and down, hold MAC: Option (PC: Alt) while pressing MAC: Command-+ or - (PC: Control - + or -).

35) OPEN MULTIPLE FILES: In the Open command, you can open several images at once from the same folder by using Shift or Command (PC: Control). In the Open dialog, Shift-click to open documents "in a row", or use MAC: Command (PC: Control) and click on "discontinuous" names. Then click Open.

36) CHANGE RULER MEASUREMENT: To change the unit of measurement for your rulers, don't bother going to the Preferences, just MAC: Control-click (PC: Right-click) on the rulers and a pop-up box will let you choose the new unit of measurement.

37) SEE YOUR TYPE COLOR: When you've highlighted type and are trying to change the color you can't actually see the color since the text is highlighted. To see the color you want to apply, press MAC: Command-H (PC: Control-H) to hide the highlighting. Now you'll be able to see the colors as you choose them for your text.

38) MAXIMIZE FILE BROWSER: Give yourself the maximum viewing area for the File Browser by viewing it in Full Screen Mode, with all palettes hidden. To do this, hold the MAC: Command key (PC: Control) and then click on the File Browser button in the Options bar and you'll get the maximum view File Browser. Closing the Browser won't get your palettes back - you have to MAC: Command-click (PC: Control-click) the File Browser button again. To get back to the regular setup (the standard size File Browser and all your palettes back) just click the Browser's Zoom button, then press the Tab key on your keyboard twice.

39) CYCLE THROUGH LAYER BLEND MODES: With the Move tool selected, press Shift-+ or - to cycle through the Layer Blending Modes.

40) UNDO ON A SLIDER: After you've applied a filter, used a tool such as the Brush, Blur or Dodge tools (any tool that uses a brush shape) or used an adjustment command like Levels, you can use the Fade command to gradually reduce the effects. After using any of these techniques, look under the Edit menu for the Fade command - it will be labeled "Fade Gaussian Blur", "Fade Brush Tool", "Fade Levels", etc. Drag the slider to gradually fade out the effects of the last step you did - undo using the slider!

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100 Photoshop Tips and Tricks: 21-40. 41/60 on Monday