Understanding: Adobe Photoshop

1. Digital Imaging Fundamentals Many people mistake fundamentals for basics. They are not the same. Understanding how computers represent your digital image data is essential to your career. Being a tech head will not m...

2. Photoshop's Interface Photoshop's interface can be pretty intimidating. Among all those windows, tools, and menu commands it's pretty easy to get lost. However, you know it's worth it to master these components. Adob...

3. Acquiring Digital Images While Photoshop is a great tool for a lot of tasks, most of them center around the sizing, manipulation, and processing of digital images. While their contents may vary, all digital images ar...

4. Sizing Digital Images Once you've acquired your digital images, you will need to size them for your project (as well as ultimate output). For many Photoshop users, such as photographers, this may be as straightforwar...

5. Selection Tools and Techniques If you want to really get things done in Photoshop, you have to be good at making selections. Perhaps you want to remove an object from a picture or maybe change the sky to the right sh...

6. Painting and Drawing Tools Photoshop has a very rich set of painting and drawing tools. These tools have been in Photoshop since its first release, yet they have evolved greatly over time. The painting and drawing to...

7. Layer Masking When working in Photoshop, you'll often need to combine multiple images together into a new composite image. Those original images, however, may have backgrounds or objects that you no longer want. This...

8. Compositing with Layers When Photoshop debuted, it did not have layers. In fact, its original purpose was to touch up frames of motion picture and photography film. It was, as its name implied, a photo shop. The purp...

9. Using Blending Modes Blending modes are both a mystery and a source of great design power. Each blending mode controls how the pixels in one layer are affected by those in another layer or by a tool from the Toolbox....

10. Color Correction and Enhancement The primary purpose of Photoshop is to act as a digital darkroom, where images can be corrected, enhanced, and refined. How do you know an image needs touch-up? You can pretty much a...

11. Repairing and Improving Photos Damage, like fashion, is often very subjective. If you show the same set of photos to five people and ask them to comment on mistakes or damage, you'll likely get five very different a...

12. Using the Type Tool As more people start and finish their designs right inside of Photoshop, the need for better type tools has grown. While Photoshop initially had very primitive type tools, it has now grown signif...

13. Layer Styles Photoshop comes with several built-in effects: shadows, glows, bevels, textures, and strokes. These effects allow for quick changes to a layer's appearance. Layer Styles are quot;livequot; effects, whic...

14. Maximizing Filters Filters are among Photoshop's most popular features. These specialized add-ons can be used to boost productivity or add special effects. Photoshop ships with over 100 built-in plug-ins, and there...

15. Actions and Automation While Photoshop is an extremely efficient program, you're truly missing out if you don't learn how to harness actions and automation. Photoshop has three categories of technology that can stre...

16. Printing and PDF Essentials At some point, you will need to send your images to an output device. Several different devices are available including paper and film printers, plates, or a digital printing press. Wheth...

17. Outputting Specialized File Types While Photoshop is a feature-rich and truly enjoyable program, it is frequently not the end of the road for a designer or artist. Most often, professionals (and even hobbyists) will...

18. Building a Portfolio If you want a job, you need a portfolio. Sure, a good-looking resume with excellent credentials and references will seal the deal, but employers want proof. How do I know? Well, I've been on bot...