|
|
|
Here are tips and must-have keyboard shortcuts I use every other minute of every day I work in Photoshop.You might have heard some of these tips before, but if there's a single one that you don't use on a daily basis then being reminded of it can really speed up your work. So, in no particular order, here are the old reliables: Working With Painting & Retouching Tools When working with any of the painting or retouching tools, you can use the bracket keys (][) to change the size of your brush. Or, if you'd rather change how soft the edge of the brush is, then add the Shift key and you'll be changing the Hardness setting of your brush in 25% increments. Or, if you'd rather access the brush presets palette, then Ctrl-click (Mac) or Right-click (Win) on your image while any painting or retouching tool is active. Change Opacity Fast To change the opacity of the currently active tool, use the number keys on your keyboard. Pressing 1 will give you 10%, 3 gives you 30%, 23 will give you 23%, 0 will give you 100% and so on. And if you happen to be in the Move tool while using the number keys, you'll be changing the opacity of the currently active layer. You can even add the Shift key to change the Flow setting of your brush or the Fill Opacity setting of the active layer if you're in the Move tool. Swap Foreground & Background To reset your foreground and background colors to their default colors (black and white), type D, and to swap them, type X. I use those all the time when I'm painting on a Layer Mask. Navigate Like A Pro When I need to scroll around my images, I hold the Spacebar, which temporarily gives me the Hand tool. You can also add the Command key (Mac), or Ctrl key (Win) which will temporarily activate the Zoom tool so you can click and drag across the area you'd like to zoom into. To zoom out, just hold down the Command key (Mac) or Ctrl key (Win) and then press the Minus key (-). Trick to Navigate in Layers Palette I don't like to have to constantly look at the Layers palette to change which layer is active, so I instead type V to get to the Move tool and then Command-click (Mac) or Ctrl-click (Win) on my image. That will make Photoshop look for the top-most layer that contains information below your cursor and it will make it active. Or, if I need to dig a little deeper and make a lower layer active, I'll Ctrl-click (Mac), or Right-click (Win) when the Move tool is active and it will present me with a list of all the layers that contain information below my cursor. Quick Fill With Color I often need to fill an area with a color, especially when working on Layer Masks. You can type Option-Delete (Mac), or Alt-Backspace (Win) to fill with your foreground color, or Command-Delete (Mac), or Ctrl-Backspace (Win) to fill with your background color. Or, if you'd rather access the Edit>Fill dialog box, then type Shift-Delete (Mac), or Shift-Backspace (Win). Working With Numbers When working with numbers in Photoshop (type sizes, scaling percentages, adjustment settings, etc.), I often click on the number and then use the up and down arrow keys to increase or decrease the setting. Adding Shift to the arrow keys will change the number in larger increments. Quick Clean-up Your Desktop Photoshop's palettes often get in my way, and when they do I press Tab to hide my palettes. If you ever find that that doesn't work, then first make sure you're not in the middle of something (like an adjustment or filter dialog box) and also make sure you're not working on a number (like in a palette). In both of those cases, you can press Return (Mac) or Enter (Win) to commit to the change (adjustment, number or whatever it was you were working on) and then the Tab key should work to hide your palettes. I also like my image to dominate my screen, so I usually type F once or twice to get to one of the full screen modes where my image can slide behind all the palettes and fill my screen. If you're in the second screen mode, where the menu bar is hidden, try typing Shift-F to toggle the visibility of the menu bar. Quick Hide, and Turning Off Snapping I often type Command-H (Mac), or Ctrl-H (Win) to hide something (selection edges, text highlighting, slices for the web, guides, etc.). And when I'm dragging something that starts to snap to things I don't want it to (like dragging a guide near the edge of an image), I'll hold the Ctrl key after I press the mouse button, which temporarily turns off snapping. They are so ingrained in the way I work that I don't have to think about them, and once you've used them a few times, they should easily become second nature to you. |