A Basic Tutorial
By David Peters
Understanding Photoshop can be a daunting task especially when facing the program's lack of simple tutorials and somewhat unintuitive interface. Set aside any worries though as the basics of Photoshop are easy to understand.
Photoshop is basically made up of four areas: the menu bar, at the top, the toolbar just below it, the toolbox on the left and the palettes on the right. The menu bar and toolbox always stay the same, as they contain the different modes and options that you can choose, but the toolbar changes depending on context.
An updated status of your image is provided by the palettes. This includes a history of all of the actions and changes you have made along with a thumbnail image of the current results.
As an example of how the interface changes as you use it, select the type tool from the toolbox (looks like a capital T). Note how the toolbar changes completely to permit changes to the font name, size etc.
Now notice the updates in your palettes. The type tool modification will be added to your history in the history palette, and a new layer will be generated for your text and displayed in the layers palette.
Whatever you're trying to do in Photoshop, then, the chances are that your starting point will be either the toolbox or the menus. While the toolbox contains everyday tools such as selecting, filling and making shapes, the menus have more complicated functions like blurring, sharpening, and all the other effects Photoshop can achieve (mostly to be found under the Filter menu).
Once you have chosen a tool from the toolbox, you can adjust its settings through the toolbar. In this, options from the menu will typically open a dialog box. Should you want to go back and make a change to something you have done to your image, use your palette history for the quickest fix. Experiment with the palettes as they have other uses also such as changing colors, naturally under the colors palette.
Photoshop is basically made up of four areas: the menu bar, at the top, the toolbar just below it, the toolbox on the left and the palettes on the right. The menu bar and toolbox always stay the same, as they contain the different modes and options that you can choose, but the toolbar changes depending on context.
An updated status of your image is provided by the palettes. This includes a history of all of the actions and changes you have made along with a thumbnail image of the current results.
As an example of how the interface changes as you use it, select the type tool from the toolbox (looks like a capital T). Note how the toolbar changes completely to permit changes to the font name, size etc.
Now notice the updates in your palettes. The type tool modification will be added to your history in the history palette, and a new layer will be generated for your text and displayed in the layers palette.
Whatever you're trying to do in Photoshop, then, the chances are that your starting point will be either the toolbox or the menus. While the toolbox contains everyday tools such as selecting, filling and making shapes, the menus have more complicated functions like blurring, sharpening, and all the other effects Photoshop can achieve (mostly to be found under the Filter menu).
Once you have chosen a tool from the toolbox, you can adjust its settings through the toolbar. In this, options from the menu will typically open a dialog box. Should you want to go back and make a change to something you have done to your image, use your palette history for the quickest fix. Experiment with the palettes as they have other uses also such as changing colors, naturally under the colors palette.
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