12 Adobe Photoshop Tips and Tricks to Make Your Life Easier
Posted on 12/03/2023 by Niko Venev
Live Adobe Photoshop Instructor-led Courses |
||
| Course Title | Length | Price (USD) |
| Adobe Photoshop | 3 days | $1,360 |
Self-Paced Adobe Photoshop eLearning |
||
| Course Title | Length | Price (USD) |
| Master Adobe eLearning Bundle | 20 courses | $950 |
| Adobe Photoshop eLearning Bundle | 7 courses | $300 |
Adobe Photoshop is a feature-packed piece of software used by scores of photographers, graphic designers, and other types of professionals. But all of those features can make Photoshop a bit hard to use for beginners, and even people with a lot of Photoshop experience might not be doing things as efficiently as they could be. Learning a few Photoshop tricks and tips can help you get your work done faster and more easily, especially if you find yourself constantly repeating complicated and time-consuming tasks with the software. Here are some valuable tips and tricks for Photoshop users to help you make the most of your time:
- Add Guide Lines: There are multiple ways to place guides on your image to help you keep everything lined up where you want it, but the quickest is to just click and drag them in from the ruler bars on the top, bottom, and sides. (If you don't see the ruler bars, use Control+R to show them.)
- Tweak Your Brushes With Your Keyboard: Rather than clicking back and forth whenever you need to change the size or hardness of your brush, you can use quick keyboard shortcuts. Use the bracket keys to make your brush bigger or smaller, or use the same keys while holding down Shift to adjust the brush's hardness. This can end up being one of the biggest time-saving tips for Adobe Photoshop!
- Get Smart With Your Layers: Smart Objects in Photoshop are layers that you can edit without losing any of the image quality of the original. You can make any layer "smart" by right-clicking on it and choosing Convert to Smart Object.
- Focus on One Layer: When you're working with a multi-layered image, you can hide all of the layers but one by holding down the Alt key (or Option if you're on a Mac) and clicking on the little eyeball icon on the layer you want to keep. When you want to see all of the layers again, just repeat this action to un-hide them.
- Copy a Layer Style Onto Multiple Layers: If you've already configured all of the settings for one layer's style but you need to use the same style on other layers, too, just hold down the Alt or Option key, then click on the "fx" icon next to the name of the first layer and drag it onto the other layers.
- Undo, Undo, and Undo Again: If you've ever found yourself wishing that you could Undo more than once, this will be one of the most valuable Adobe Photoshop tips for you. Click Edit, then Preferences, then Performance. Now, over on the right side of this window, set the History States to a higher number. You can actually have hundreds of them if you want, but if you do that, Photoshop is likely to lag, so it's best to stick with a few dozen at most.
- Take Advantage of the Blur Gallery: Using Gaussian blur is a great way to minimize noise in an image, but it's not the only blur option you have. Look under Filter > Blur Gallery to find all sorts of great options to create different effects. For example, Iris blur can help you draw attention to the focal point of an image by mimicking a shallow depth of field, while Tilt-Shift blur gives you a more linear blur effect like you could achieve with a tilt-shift lens.
- Add Automation to Retouching: Fix your subjects' skin fast by creating an Action that uses the power of frequency separation to help you produce a realistic effect. Click the Create New Action button in the Actions panel and give your new action a name. Now, use Control+J to make two copies of your background layer. Name the upper layer "High Frequency" and the lower layer "Low Frequency," then hide the High Frequency layer. While on the Low-Frequency layer, go to Filter > Blur > Gaussian Blur, then increase the radius until most of the detail is removed from the image. Now, you can un-hide the High-Frequency layer. On this layer, change the blend mode to Linear Light, then add a High Pass filter (Filter > Other > High Pass). Lower the radius to restore the detail in the image. Stop recording your action here, then look at the list of actions and check the square buttons next to Gaussian Blur and High Pass. Now, you'll be able to run your Action on any photo, and it will pause on those two steps to allow you to manually adjust them to suit each image.
- Make it Rain: You don't have to stand outside in the rain to get the effect of rain in your images. To amp up the drama, start by creating an all-black layer, then go to Filter > Noise > Add Noise and set it to around 25%. Next, blur the noise with Filter > Blur > Motion Blur, adjusting the angle of the blur to fit the angle of the "rain" you envision. Finally, change the layer's blend mode to Screen.
- Or Make it Snow: You can use the same trick to add snow to a winter scene if nature didn't cooperate with you that day. Make your added noise Gaussian and monochromatic, then add Gaussian blur. Go to Image > Adjustments > Levels and drag the black slider to the right to take out most of the noise, and tinker with the white slider until you like the look of your "snow." Then, change the layer's blend mode to Screen and add a bit of motion blur to soften up the snow a little.
- Tidy Up Your Brushes: If you use lots of different brushes, you don't need to dig through the jumble to find the one you want. Just right-click in the Brush panel and choose Create Group, then organize your brushes any way you'd like.
- Copy Colors From Anywhere Quickly: If you see a color you want to use online, you don't have to take a screenshot of it to be able to get the right color in Photoshop. Instead, just select the eyedropper tool, then tile your Photoshop window with your browser window so that they're side by side. Now, click on your canvas in Photoshop and drag the eyedropper onto the color you want in the other window.
Learn the Best Photoshop Tricks and Tips From an Expert
Whether you need to learn the very basics of Photoshop or cool tricks to speed up your workflow, the professional instructors at Certstaffix Training can help you do it. Our Adobe Photoshop training classes cover everything you need to know about this powerful piece of software, from beginner skills like how to create and work with layers to advanced Photoshop tips and tricks involving automation, AI, and video editing. With live instruction, you'll be able to get hands-on experience with Photoshop and real-time feedback to help you learn more efficiently. Or you can opt for a self-paced course and master the material whenever it's convenient for you. Either way, you'll get a professionally designed course created to maximize your learning. Sign up with Cerstaffix Training to get the skills you need today!
Related Adobe Photoshop Posts:
Software Training
- In Person Microsoft Project Training
- In-Person Microsoft Office Training Near Me
- MS Access Certification
- SQL Training Courses
- Tableau Training Courses
- C Sharp Classes
- Adobe InDesign Classes
- Onsite Customer Service Training
- Classes for Social Media Marketing
- Adobe Certification Courses
- Microsoft SQL Courses Online