Tips and Tricks for Photoshop

Here's another great tip from Marci at the Digital Designer Shop Blog. To keep up on all the new happenings at DDS, subscribe to the newsletter by using the signup link on the sidebar of this blog.

Now let's see what Marci has for us today...

Manic Monday Photoshop Tip: Keyboard Shortcuts For Changing Brush Size

Hopefully,  following along with these Manic Monday Photoshop tips is helping you become more efficient in Photoshop and therefore giving you more time to scrapbook! Try to work the tips into your daily workflow and before you know it you will have them all memorized.  Special thanks to Kathleen for sharing  today’s tip about changing the size of the brush!

For review here are the basic brush tool commands that we previously covered:

• B (Brush Tool) — I’m constantly using this command along with the hand and zoom tools.
• [ (Decrease Brush Size) — Quickly decrease your brush size to get into those tighter spots.
• ] (Increase Brush Size) — Quickly increase your brush size for the larger areas.

With any painting or brush tool active you can use the shortcuts below to easily and precisely change the brush size by dragging the mouse or pen tool.  This is super cool because you'll see an immediate, interactive on-screen visual as you drag your mouse or pen tool. 

Notes:

The commands for Mac and PC are different so be sure to use the correct one for your machine.

Hint hold down the alt/option key and then drag to the right to increase or drag to the left to decrease.

Macintosh:

Change brush size: option-ctrl-drag
Change brush edge softness: command-option-ctrl-drag

Windows:
Change brush size: alt-right mouse button drag
Change brush edge softness: shift-alt-right mouse button drag

That’s it for this week. See you back here next Monday with another Photoshop Tip.

Marcie

Tips and Tricks for Photoshop

Here's another Photoshop tip that Marcie posted on the Digital Designer Shop Blog. I thought I would share it with you. To check the blog for more tips and tricks each Monday, just click Digital Designer Shop Blog. 

Manic Monday Photoshop Tips: Reset Dialog

Have you ever canceled a dialog menu so that you could start over?  If so this shortcut is sure to make your day! When working with any dialog menu that uses the OK or Cancel option simply press and hold the Alt (Mac: Option) key when you are in the dialog menu and the Cancel button will turn into a Reset button. This will allow you to try the effect again without having to leave the panel.

Quick Photoshop Trick

Marcie added this post on Monday over at the Digital Designer Shop blog. I am always amazed at how these tips and tricks are seemingly endless and I love reading posts like this to see how many of them I know about. Did you know this one???

Manic Monday Photoshop Tips: Cycle through all open documents

marcie

Manic Monday Photoshop Tips: Cycle through all open documents    

      

Hello! Can you believe it’s only 5 days until Christmas? Today’s tips is a simple but powerful keyboard shortcut to help you cycle through your open documents. Just press control-tab (on both PC and a Mac) multiple times to cycle through all of the documents that are currently open in Photoshop.  That’s it!

I'm taking next week off so there won't be a blog post next Monday but I’ll see you back here on Monday, January 3, 2011!

Have a very Merry Christmas,

Marcie

More Photoshop Tips and Tricks...

Check the blog at the Digital Designer Shop each Monday for Photoshop tips and tricks. This post was presented by CT Marcie. It may say beginners but intermediate to advanced users may find a new trick in this post...

Manic Monday Photoshop: 5 Tips for Photoshop Beginners

marcie

5 Tips for Photoshop Beginners

Getting started in Photoshop can be overwhelming and require lots of time to mater. Today we’ll look at 5 tips to help you get more comfortable working in the Photoshop environment.

• Select all pixels on a layer
• To select everything on a layer press the CTRL Key and then click on the layer in the palette. You should see "marching ants" around your selection now. To de-select press CTRL D. 
• Change your Screen Mode         
• It’s easy to rotate between the various screen modes by pressing the “F” key. Pressing the “F” key repeatedly will cycle  through the default screen,  full screen,  and full screen without menu/editing bar.
• Drawing a straight line
• Draw a straight line with the paintbrush, line and move tools by simply holding down the “Shift” key while dragging the mouse to draw the line.
• Open file shortcut          
• Want to use the ope file menu without having to go to the file menu bar? Simply double click anywhere in the gray Photoshop background and the file open menu box instantly pops up.
• Use TAB to hide palettes
• Want to hide those palettes from your workspace? Simply click on the TAB button to hide and then click it again and they reappear.

More Photoshop Tips and Tricks...

Every Monday you can find great tips and tricks like these on the Digital Designer Shop blog. Start your week off right by learning something new or reviewing things you may have learned but have forgotten. These particular tips revolve around the Type tool. Check it out!


And while you are there, grab the first gift of the 12 Days of December designed specially for you. There are new gifts everyday so don't miss out. Check Digital Designer Shop daily as we begin the month of December! Can you believe it???