The excitement that comes from downloading your digital photos can dissipate quickly as you discover the shots you took were not so great after all. But then, that’s what Photoshop is for.

But if you haven’t mastered this powerful digital image editing software yet, you’re in for a bumpy, if not totally frustrating ride ahead. With so many options to choose from in Photoshop and procedures that require you to follow “the rules”, it’s easy to get lost. It’s easy to spend hours tweaking and re-tweaking your photo only to find you have to scrap the whole project anyway because you just can’t figure out how to do what you want to do.

So where can you turn for help?

Google

I think at this point in time, Google is everyone’s first choice when they want to find information. Simply type into their search box whatever you are trying to do, for example: “photoshop how to remove red-eye”. I just tried that phrase and got 380,000 possible ways to remove red-eye and it only took .22 seconds. The only problem with that is, I will spend the next hour clicking on and trying different methods. One sure thing about Photoshop, if you ask 10 people HOW to do something, you’ll likely get 10 different answers.

YouTube

The greatest thing about YouTube is you get to see someone actually do what you want to do. They have a search engine there, so again I type in, “photoshop how to remove red-eye”. This time I get 51 possible choices. 51 videos to watch and learn and try for me. Again, the same problem as the original Google search only with fewer options to try. With all the different versions of Photoshop and all the different skill levels displayed on YouTube, I know I can succeed in removing the red-eye, but it could still take quite a while to watch 51, 5-minute videos.

Online Courses

Many online “gurus” are offering programs to teach you Photoshop. You buy their books on PDF, follow along with their videos, or receive their CD or DVD in the mail. While it beats sitting through an adult learning course at your local school, you’ll still be investing a lot of time and money in learning “stuff” you may never use. Why endure the expense and time required to learn a lot, when you can get just what you want more simply? Ultimately, without good notes, you still won’t find the information you need, when you need it, although you know you have it somewhere.

Local Library

Your local library will no doubt contain several books on mastering Photoshop. Only trouble is, you’ll have to read and return the book. Photoshop is one of those things where if you don’t use it, you lose it. It’s hard to remember all the steps and procedures if you only use them infrequently. You could buy the book at the bookstore, but really, how many times do we open a book these days for reference? See #1.

Forums

There are millions of photographers on this planet. One thing for certain is they all want to know what everyone else is doing. We’re constant learners, always looking for that next great tip to make our shots easier or more creative. A quick Google search of “photoshop forums” nets me 494,000 possible forums to look at for answers to previously asked questions. While I might meet a group of photogs I’d like to hang with long-term, it’s likely there are better places for getting my photo fixed before bedtime tonight.

Tip Cards

Tip cards are my favorite resource when it comes to getting fast results. For hundreds of years, folks have used recipe cards to turn a bunch of kitchen ingredients into a delicious finished product. Isn’t that essentially what we’re trying to do with Photoshop? Aren’t we trying to take a bunch of computer commands and turn them into a great finished photograph? Yes, we are! The great thing about these tip cards, or “photoshop recipe cards” is they sit right beside your computer for easy reference. You know what you want to do, you pull that cards from the deck and get to work. In just minutes you’re finished. You can find a lot of TIP CARDS on our website!

Nothing beats the feeling you have when you finally rescue your hum-drum photograph from Dullsville and turn it into something great. Having the right Photoshop tools and tips at your disposal can make all the difference between photographs that proudly hang on your wall, or pictures that never get printed at all.

The photographic camera has brought the globe by storm and thousands of people have gigabytes of images stored on the computers. Just like using normal photographic film, not every photo are perfect however the disposable nature of photography means that it no longer matters when the shot is blurry or taken incorrectly.

With tools like Adobe Photoshop, through could be edited, enhancements made and stray items taken away. The things you can perform in your photos are endless really. If you have several photos, I bet they may not be all perfect where there are improvements you can make for many years include them as better. Let’s discuss a couple of ideas and tips that may assist you to.

Correct light levels.

If your image is simply too dark or too light, you simply must adjust the picture then it looks natural. In the old days of film cameras, this became called under well as overexposure. In Photoshop, simply pick the Edit menu, choose Brightness/Contrast, and after that drag the sliders, and soon you have the right effect. This is also a fantastic location to make moody white and black images too, increasing shadows and blowing out light areas.

Make your photos pop with color.

A little just like the exposure problems we have already mentioned, some photos just look dull and uninteresting. Perhaps it was a grey day as well as your child’s red top didn’t look as bright because it should or perhaps the green grass inside your photo looks boring. The color and tone of the picture could be adjusted while using the Image menu. Click it and after that choose Adjustments and then Match Colour. You can then drag around the intensity and luminance sliders to receive the best image.

Get rid of the background.

This is among the most asked after tutorial for the Internet about Photoshop. People need to remove people or objects quickly and easily from the photo or remove what’s in the setting. There are many methods to do that nevertheless the best method is by using the Pen Tool, which you’ll select through the tools panel about the left-hand side of the screen. Draw around the edge with the part you would like to remove and attempt to have the edge as best you can.

It is a very tricky process, however, the better you are able to get using your line, the higher your image will likely be. You can also zoom directly into the style to acquire finer control over the Pen Tool.  The Pen Tool uses points with a line to define the shape. The closer the points are together, the better quality the queue is going to be. If you need to use the Pen Tool to go throughout the edges of a curve, click some part in the beginning, one at the conclusion then hold CTRL and click on the line that runs involving the 2 points. You can then move it to curve precisely round the area.

Once you might be happy how the item may be selected while using Pen Tool and also the ends are joined up, right-click inside the image and select Make Selection and then click OK. You can then cut, copy or move the choices to an alternative layer. There are many alternative methods of accomplishing this as well as the Pen Tool technique is likely the most accurate, but also the most time-consuming. Google a lot more options if you are able to start this.

Learn the way to email your images.

Now that images are stored on your personal machine, you might desire to upload these phones an online site like Facebook, Flickr, or send them through email to friends. The problem is that the pictures could be very large and cause email programs to freeze and Facebook to reject it. If you do get the photographs to pass through, the individual viewing them with the other end will have to download them, which could be also slow if the images are large.

Luckily, Photoshop has built-in tools to optimize your images for such uses. Open the look you desire to send, choose Save For Web from your File menu and you’ll be able to then adjust the dimensions and quality as you like. There are sliders and preset which will allow you to choose predefined settings, therefore it is feasible for the novice to make use of too.

1. Adjust brush size. With the Brush Tool activated, rather than accessing the dropdown menu on top of the screen, press the best bracket key, ], to increase how big the brush along with the left bracket key, [, to decrease.
2. Adjust brush hardness. Along with size, brush hardness frequently has to be adjusted. Holding shift + ] (right bracket key) increases the hardness with the brush while holding shift + [ (left bracket key) will reduce the hardness. Now you can maintain the brush tip where it belongs, in the heart of your image, instead of making frequent trips up to the properties bar.
3. Copy to a new layer. Again, keep the pointer around the artboard. Duplicating a layer is actually pressing CTRL + J (PC) or Cmd + J (Mac). This will build a copy with the active layer within the layers palette. It will also copy an engaged selection onto a brand new layer, leaving the existing layer intact. Also, pressing CTRL+ Shift + J (PC) or Cmd + Shift + J (Mac) will cut the actual active selection from the active layer and paste it onto a brand new layer. If you name your entire layers, simply adding the ALT (PC) or Option (Mac) critical for either of such combinations will open the New Layer dialog box so you can name the new layer for the fly. You can also adjust the opacity and blend mode of the new layer right within the New Layer dialog box, saving you an additional vacation to the Layers Palette.
4. Fill the layer or selection with color. Press CTRL + Backspace (PC) or Cmd + delete (Mac) to fill the layer with the present foreground color. Press ALT + Backspace (PC) or Option + delete (Mac) to fill the layer with the present background color. These same commands may also be used to fill some. Bonus: To change the foreground and background colors time for the default colors (black for your foreground and white for the background) simply press the D key.
5. Undo. No need to look at the History palette. CTRL + Z (PC) or Cmd + Z (Mac) will undo a stride. Pressing this combination again will redo (or rather, enable you to get time prior to undoing). Need to go back further than the last step? Simply hold CTRL + Alt (PC) or Cmd + Option (Mac) and press Z. Every time you press the Z key, you are going to move backward one more step.
6. The Hand Tool. Forget the scroll bars with the edges with the document window. To quickly navigate across the image, hold around the spacebar to temporarily activate the Hand Tool. Click and drag with all the Hand Tool to advance the document. To deactivate the Hand Tool, release the area bar.
7. Favorite Tools. Learn the keyboard shortcuts to your favorite tools. For example B = Brush Tool, V = Move, J = Spot Healing Brush. As you become familiar with these, you may notice that teams of tools all share a similar shortcut key. For example, the Spot Healing Brush, the Healing Brush, the Patch Tool as well as the Red Eye Tool all share the identical shortcut key – the letter J. By pressing J, you’ll activate the last used tool in the group. To cycle, although other tools inside the group, hold Shift + the letter for that group of tools, along with the active tool will cycle to another tool within the group.

If you’re continually using a command that does not possess a keyboard shortcut, you can easily assign one. Go to Edit > Keyboard Shortcuts. Find the command on the list and assign the true secret combination you desire to use. If you try to assign a previously used combination, Photoshop asks if you want to reassign that key combination. This dialog box is also a good spot to learn what keyboard shortcuts are allotted to all commands.

8. Layer Opacity. To quickly change the opacity in the current layer, simply press a number key. Pressing 5 = 50% opacity, press 3 = 30%, etc. To narrow the opacity to some percentage more specific when compared to a multiple of 10, press both numbers quickly. For example, pressing 5, 5 in quick succession set the opacity to 55%. (To get returning to 100%, quickly press 1, 0, 0.) Please note, this shortcut won’t work if one with the tools inside the second group is active.
9. Zoom in and out. To zoom into a graphic, press CTRL and + or Cmd and +, and also to zoom out press CTRL and – (PC) or Cmd and – (Mac).
10. Scrubby sliders. Most settings in Photoshop give you a slider to adjust to your liking.

Click and drag on the name of the setting to activate the Scrubby Slider. Sliding to the left or right will adjust the setting value up or down without needing to open the slider. You will know that a Scrubby Slider can be acquired whenever your cursor turns into a little pointing finger with arrows left and right.

Unfortunately, there is not any shortcut once and for all, old fashioned practice, but once you’ve memorized these shortcuts, you will be on the right path to finishing projects in record time! As anybody who sells their stock photos knows, you need to get the maximum revenue in each and every way possible.