Photoshop 101

The Photoshop Interface

If this is your first time using Adobe Photoshop, everything might look and feel very foreign to you. There are a few things you need to note about your workspace that will help make your life a lot easier.

Toolbar interface

File For saving and opening files. Save as web & devices allow you to make small sized gifs and images quick and easily

Edit Basic commands such as cut, paste, transform. You wont need to access this menu once you master the shortcuts

Image Adjustments pertaining to the image selected

Layer Adjustment layers are more versatile because you can turn them on and off and do adjustments later on, but they blow up your file size exponentially

Select If you want to save your current selection, deselect or invert your selection, you refer to this menu. However shortcuts are much better.

Filter Creative filters to improve your outputs

Window When things go terribly wrong, like missing tools and palettes, you can always reset to default workspace. Advanced users can save their own preferred workspace.

Help Self-explanatory term

Troubleshooting

Before we start, we learn the most important technique in photoshop. Cleaning up your own mess. Photoshop saves all your settings and preferences even after you close the application. This can be a good thing for users, but for beginners, if you accidentally did something wrong and you do not know how to rectify it, reloading the application is not going to resolve your problem. To reset all photoshop settings to their defaults, close the application. Hold down ctrl+alt+shift and open the application. You will get a prompt to "Delete Photoshop Settings File" and click yes.

First Step

Choosing canvas, resize, transform, invert, rotate, copy & paste

Saving as tiff, jpg and png.

Layers. Turning on and off

Making selections.

Introduction to the palette menu

History states

Reading the histogram

Layers and channels

Foreground and background colour

New layer and deleting layer

Introduction to the tools menu

Useful tools:

Lasso Tool, Quick select and Magic wand for masking

Cropping tool

Spot healing and healing brush

Brush tool

Clone stamp

Eraser

Paint Bucket

Dodge and Burn and the alternatives

Type Tool

Eyedropper tool

Hand Tool

Zoom Tool

Useful tutorials

Quick mask and its uses

Mastering Layers and Overlays

Non-destructive dodging and burning

Sharpening your photos using high pass filter

Liquify filter

Correcting exposures using curves and levels

Changing hair colour

Cheatsheet: Expanding your possibilities ( Photoshop actions, brushes and fonts)