[Guide]Learning Photoshop: Basics.

Subject: [Guide]Learning Photoshop: Basics. Thu Dec 23, 2010 5:53 pm

Hey guys ,

Imma show you some basic and quick tools and working for photoshop to easily create things in less then an eye blink.
So ill be talking about:

- Tools and their working.
- Layers (What are they handy for?)
- How to make some certain '' Effects '' using filters etc.
- Blending mode and what does it do?

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1. Tools and their working.

Yea so you can see a bunch of tools in the Photoshop side-bar. But what do they do? Ill explain most of them. Some are pretty useless or not even needed EVAR EVAR at all.

Move Tool (Hotkey: V); What does this tool do? It moves a certain '' Picture or Image '' in ONE layer. So make sure your working in different layers so you can actually keep it organised. And more layers means you can make more effects.
+Extra: If you enable ''Show transform Controls'' in the upper bar of Photoshop, You can actually resize, move and spin an image.

Rectangular Marquee (+ The others) (Hotkey: M): This tool is used for selecting a certain area in one layer, It enabled you to only edit the ''Marked'' area.
- Its not really that handy. Only for boxe's or something.

Lasso? Its pretty useless (My opinion).

The Magic Wand and the Quick Selection Wand (Hotkey: W): These are one of the most and usefull tools in Photoshop, It enables you to cut and select area's (Same effect as the Rectangular Marquee tool but now in any shape) The cutting part is where its most used for, It enables you to cut out a certain picture like a fiesta character in a print screen. Often you can find urself strugling with pictures with this tool because they are not: Pixelated Well, or not made ''Static (Bit to hard to understand for most of you). If one picture or character isn't pixelated well it will have trouble with ''Recognizing'' the picture. Cause photoshop works with pixels and the Wand's select pixels from different size's and colour's to mark & select it.

Enough with the Wands, lets move on to the next tool.

Crop Tool (Hotkey: C): This tool enables you to ''Crop'' out a picture. For example: If you have a big picture you can crop out so you can only leave in the most important things in it. Ofcourse if its sticked together on the most part. Go example and try things out with it.

Eye Dropper Tool ''InkCopy''(Hotkey: I): You can use this tool to copy over any colour in a picture. But if its mixed up with different colours like coloured over with some other colours '' Over-lapping'' it might have some trouble but usually everything is fine.

Spot healing brush : This tool usually fails me and its horribly in healing spots, it usually fucks up even worse.

Brush Tools (Hotkey: B): This tool is also a very handy tool and also one of the most used. Experiment with different brushes and try to make your own one's! (Ill make one about this maybe later)

Eraser Tool (Hotkey: E): This tool is used for erasing certain parts in your picture. It removes pixels and makes them transparent if you have a transparent background

Gradient Tool (Hotkey: G) You can use this tool to gradient. What i mean by that is make different colours in 1 swipe and make them overlap and fuse into each other. Click on the image right up top in the bar and start expirimenting with different colours and make your own gradients.

Paint Bucket (Hotkey: G): Yes it exists in photoshop. Over 50% of the Photoshop users dont know that the Paint Bucket tool is under the Gradient Tool. Just hold the gradient tool and it will pop-up. Click on it and you got your paint-bucket. The Paint Bucket is the most famous tool in any painting programm. You can pick a colour and ''Paint'' a certain area.

Pen Tool (Hotkey: P): This tool is usefull for ALOT but i can't explain it all, Its just about the basics this time. Its mostly used to create curvy lines etc.

Text (Hotkey: T): This tool is one of the most famous next to the Paint Bucket. Its recognize-able from the T. Its used to create text into a picture. Download different ''Fonts'' for different text's.

The ''Shape'' Tools (Hotkey: U): If you hold it just like with the gradient tool, Alot of more shapes will pop-up. You can use them to create rectangular's line's etc. Just experiment with them.

The ''Hand'' tool. (Hotkey: H): I Personally use this tool to move the picture once i have ''Zoomed'' in, I click the hand drag and it moves the picture just like it would do in real life (Kinda weird comparison)

The ''Zoom'' Tool (Hotkey: Z): This tool is used to zoom in on a picture, If you zoom in enough you can see the actual pixels of a picture. Use this tool to zoom in a picture to either erase, brush or do something else with it.

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Hehe, Finally the Layers. You might be wondering what they do?

Its really simple:

Layers are simply as they are layers. Make different layers to work in. It will make the result look better and you can add more effects in different layers. So never forget to work in different layers.

How to create them?
Layer -> Create New Layer or press the little ''Page button'' right under in your photoshop interface, Left to the basket.

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Filters and Effects.

Yes these things are the things that make your work different then other people their work.

You can find filters by going to ''Filter Gallery'' but also just clicking on it and find different filters.

Please note that some filters might not be shown in the Gallery i dont exactly know why.

EDIT:

Find filters by going to Filters -> ...

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Blending Mode.

Right click on a layer and click ''Blending Mode'' Different effects will pop-up. They will do exactly as their title's say so. Like: ''Drop Shadow'' it will drop a shadow on the pictures on the CURRENT layer. So its important to work in different layers if you do not want every picture to have a shadow. Experiment with the angle and you can also change the Opacity, Colour and many other things.

Try experimenting with different blending mode's and have fun!

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This was my Tutorial about Photoshop basics, I began to slack off after the tools but they were the most important things to discuss.

I Hope this helped (Even just a tiny bit)

And remember have fun in creating your works.

Greetings, Amethyst.

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