Photoshop G'metrix: Project Setup and Interface

How do you quickly create a single guide?

-Choose View > New Guide. In the dialog box, select Horizontal or Vertical orientation, enter a position, and click OK. OR -Click the horizontal ruler and drag to create a horizontal guide; do the same from the vertical ruler to create a vertical guide

Photoshop displays the current zoom level of a document in what two locations?

-In the document tab just above the image -Bottom left-corner of the document window

What are other ways to pan a document?

-Scroll Bar .Sliding the scroll bar on the right side of the window pans vertically, either up or down. Sliding the scroll bar located at the bottom of the window pans horizontally, either left or right. -Mouse Wheel You can pan using the wheel on a mouse. Spin the wheel up to pan upward. Spin the wheel down to pan downward. Press and hold the Ctrl (Win)/Command (Mac) key on your keyboard while spinning the wheel up to pan to the left or spinning the wheel down to pan to the right.

What steps should be taken to ensure an efficient and effective workflow?

-Setting up the Photoshop interface and workspace -Importing available assets -Configuring tools

What are features of the Gradient Editor?

-The Gradient Editor is used to create, edit, and save your own custom gradients. -The Gradient Editor lets you choose from any of the preset gradients, just like the smaller Gradient Picker, but it also lets you edit those gradients by choosing different colors, adding more colors, rearranging the colors, and removing colors. -You can add transparency to a gradient and even adjust how the colors transition from one to the other. You can also save your gradient as a custom preset to use again the next time you need it.

Describe the various changes/preferences you can set in the New Guide Layout?

-To clear away any previous guides and keep only your new guide layout, select the Clear Existing Guides option at the bottom of the dialog box. -To change the number of columns in the layout, simply change the value in the Number field. Photoshop will instantly update the layout, changing the number of columns and spacing them equally from left to right. -If you're not seeing a live preview of your changes, make sure the Preview option in the dialog box is activated (checked). -To add a gutter (spacing) between the guide lines, type a value into the Gutter box. -To add margins to the top, left, bottom, and right of your document, select the Margins option and type values into the boxes. -To center the guides within the document, select the Center Columns option at the bottom left of the dialog box. -To clear away any previous guides and keep only your new guide layout, select the Clear Existing Guides option at the bottom right of the dialog box.

How do you manage your guides?

-To lock all guides so they cannot be bumped out of their location, choose View > Lock Guides from the menu bar. -To hide or show the guides after you've placed them, choose View > Show > Guides. -To remove a single guide, drag the guide outside the image window. -To remove all guides, choose View > Clear Guides.

What are the three steps involved in creating a new swatch?

1. Activate the eyedropper tool. 2. Select a Color. Move your cursor over the color you want to sample and click to sample it. You can verify the color you selected by looking at the Foreground color in the Tool Bar. 3. Add the Color to the Swatches Panel. Once you've sampled your first color, move your mouse cursor into the empty area inside the Swatches palette. You'll see your mouse cursor change into a paint bucket icon. Click anywhere inside the empty area to convert your sampled color into a color swatch. The Color Swatch Name pop-up will appear. Enter a name for your color swatch. Click OK. **To Edit the Swatch Panel, right-click on the color swatch and choose either Rename Swatch or Delete Swatch.

What are the ways you change the zoom level in Photoshop?

1. Click on Zoom level at the bottom of the screen and type a new zoom level into the window. 2.Activate Scrubby Slider (a little hand with an arrow pointing left and right). -To activate the scrubby slider, hover your mouse cursor over the input box, and then press and hold the Ctrl (Win)/Command (Mac) key on your keyboard. -Drag left or right to increase or decrease the value in 1% increments. You can also press Shift+Ctrl (Win)/Shift+Command (Mac) and drag to change the value in increments of 10%. 3. Click View on the top menu and select either Zoom In, Zoom Out, Fit on Screen, 100%, 200%, or Print Size. 4. Keyboard shortcuts: Press CTRL + to Zoom In, or CTRL - to Zoom Out.

What are the ten steps for creating/customizing a gradient?

1. Pick an Existing Preset to use as the basis for your new gradient. 2. Choose a Gradient Type, either Solid or Noise, from the pop-up menu. A noise gradient contains random colors, so each time you create a noise gradient, the result is different. 3. Choose Options depending on what you chose in the step above. -​​​​​​​If you chose Solid, adjust the Smoothness percentage to determine how smoothly one color blends into another. -If you chose Noise, choose which Color Model to use to set the color range. You can also adjust the Roughness, which affects how smoothly or abruptly the color transitions from one to another. Click Restrict Colors to avoid oversaturated colors. -The Add Transparency option adds transparency to random colors. Click the Randomize button to randomly generate a new gradient. You can then skip to the last step to finish the gradient-making process. 4. Choose the Starting Color by double-clicking the left color stop under the gradient bar. The Color Picker will appear. Select a color using the Color Picker, or you can select from a color swatch or choose Foreground, Background, or User Color from the pop-up menu. If you select the Foreground or Background option, when you change either of those colors, the color in the gradient will change automatically in gradients you create. 5. Select the Ending Color by clicking the right color stop. Repeat step 4 above to define the color. 6. Set the Percentage of one color versus the other by moving the starting or ending point's color stop to the left or right. Drag the midpoint slider (a diamond icon) to where the colors mix equally, 50-50. You can also change the position of the midpoint by typing a value in the Location box. 7. (Optional) Add Another Color by clicking below the gradient bar at the position you want to add the next color. Define the color in the same way you did in the steps above. Repeat to add more colors. 8. (Optional) Add Transparency to your gradient by selecting an opacity stop and adjust the Opacity slider to specify the amount of transparency you desire. By default, a gradient has colors that are 100% opaque. You can fade a gradient to transparency so that the portion of the image under the gradient shows through. You can also add opacity stops in the same way you add color stops. 9. (Optional) Adjust Color and Opacity Stops and their midpoint sliders to vary the percentages of each color. You can also redefine any of the colors. To delete a color stop, drag it up or down off the gradient bar. 10. Save the Gradient by naming it and clicking the New button. The gradient will be added to the Presets menu.

The Eyedropper Tool uses sampling to select a new Foreground or Background color. What are the two ways to activate the Eyedropper Tool:

1.While the Color Picker is displayed, move your cursor out of the Color Picker box. The cursor will automatically change to an eyedropper. You can use the eyedropper to select a color from anywhere on the active document or from the Color or Swatches panels located on the right of the workspace. 2. Select the Eyedropper from the Tool Bar. Then, you can change the sample size of the eyedropper from the Options menu located at the top of the screen below the main menu. The choices from the Sample Size menu are the following: -Point Size: Reads the precise value of the pixel you click. -Average: Creates a color value from an average of the pixels collected in the sample size selected.

Name some of the other Photoshop workspaces.

3D, Graphic and Web, Motion, Painting, and Photography

What is a dock?

A collection of panels, or panel groups, displayed together. They are generally displayed in a vertical orientation.

What does the Snap to feature do?

A feature in which selections automatically snap to a guide or the grid whenever the selection's border is dragged within 8 screen (not image) pixels. When Snap to is active, guides also snap to the grid.

What is a Camera Raw file?

A file that contains unprocessed, uncompressed grayscale picture data from a digital camera's image sensor along with information about how the image was captured (metadata)

What is the brush panel?

A menu that lists all of the currently available brushes, including presets.

What is a Scratch Disk?

A section of your computer's hard drive that Photoshop uses as additional memory if it runs out of system memory. As long as your computer has enough memory, Photoshop won't need to use the scratch disk. If it does need the scratch disk, it will use whatever hard drive(s) you've selected in the Scratch Disks option. If your computer has an SSD (Solid State Drive), choose the SSD as your scratch disk. SSD's are much faster than traditional hard drives and can greatly improve the performance of Photoshop.

What is the function of the grid tool?

A series of horizonal and vertical lines. Similar to guides, the grid is only to lay out elements and is not printed with your project.

What is the Rotate View Tool?

A tool that lets you rotate the canvas to make it easier to edit or retouch certain areas of an image. This tool rotates the canvas the image is sitting on. In other words, it rotates the view but doesn't change the actual orientation of the saved image. To activate this tool, right-click the Hand Tool and select the Rotate View Tool. With the Rotate View Tool activated, click on the image and hold down the mouse button. A compass appears in the center of the image. The red direction marker at the top of the compass always points to the actual top of the image so that even when you've rotated the angle, you'll always know which way is up. To rotate the view, keep your mouse button held down and drag the image. You can drag clockwise or counterclockwise.

Creative Cloud Libraries

A web service that allows you to access your assets across various Adobe desktop and mobile applications. You can add graphics, colors, text styles, brushes, and layer styles to libraries in Photoshop and then access those elements from other Creative Cloud apps, such as Illustrator or InDesign

Application preferences: Units & Rulers

Allows you to configure measurements for display along the top and left side of the active window. For example, pixels would be most common for images displayed on a monitor, and picas or inches would be most common for output to a printer.

What does Performance allow?

Allows you to configure the amount of system memory (RAM) allocated to Photoshop. The more RAM available, the better Photoshop will run. If Photoshop routinely runs out of memory, adding additional RAM to your computer will give you the best results.

Describe the Angle Gradient Style

Angle is the third icon from the left. Much like the Radial style, the Angle style also uses your starting point as the center of the gradient. But rather than transitioning outward in all directions, it wraps itself around the starting point in a counterclockwise fashion

What is Bird's Eye View?

Another way to pan an image in Photoshop. To use the Bird's Eye View, press and hold the letter H on your keyboard. Photoshop will zoom the image out so it fits entirely on the screen. While the image is zoomed out, you'll see a rectangular box that you can move around. Drag the box over the area where you want to zoom in. When you release your mouse button, Photoshop instantly jumps to that area and centers it on the screen.

How do you shoot camera raw images rather than JPEG images?

By setting your camera to save files in its own camera raw file format.

What do you to show of hide rulers?

Choose View > Rulers from the Photoshop menu bar. A checkmark shows the Rulers; clearing the checkmark hides the Rulers.

In what ways can you move a panel?

Click and drag the panel's tab to move a single panel, or click and drag the title bar to move a panel group.

What is the menu bar?

Contains all of the Photoshop commands and elements. It is located across the top of the Photoshop window.

Describe the Diamond Gradient Style

Diamond is the fifth icon from the left. It is very similar to the Radial style, but it radiates out forming a diamond shape. Click in the center of a selected area to set the starting point, then drag outward

What task is the Painting workspace streamlined for?

Digital painting

What are dock locations indicated by?

Dock locations are indicated by a blue-highlighted drop zone that appears when you move a panel into it.

What is Photoshop default workspace?

Essentials

T or F: Gradients are limited to running horizontally, they cannot run in any direction you draw them: vertically, diagonally, etc.

False

T or F: Libraries DO NOT exist for symbols, graphic styles, and patterns.

False; they DO exist for those categories as well.

T or F: The options available DO NOT vary depending on the type of brush tip selected

False; they do vary depending on the type of brush tip selected.

How do you activate the New Guide Layout?

From the menu bar, click View > New Guide Layout.

What do Gradient Styles do?

Gradient Styles define the direction a gradient moves. There are five different gradient styles.

What is a workspace in Photoshop?

Holds all of the elements for a Photoshop project, such as the documents, panels, and tool bars.

What is Place Embedded?

Imports the image into its own layer and makes it part of the document. It increases the project file size by the size of the embedded document. The layer will display a symbol showing that it's embedded. Simple Copy/Paste and Cut/Paste also embeds an image

What is Place Linked?

Imports the image pixels only, not the original file. The symbol on the layer looks like a chain, which denotes the file is linked, not embedded. -The benefit of importing an image as linked is a vastly reduced PSD file size. Therefore, Photoshop will perform more efficiently because it uses much less memory. -The disadvantage occurs when you want to distribute the document to someone else because the linked image is a rasterized version not available for editing. If you want the other person to edit the linked file, then you must first Package the document. If the Package command is not available on your system, it is because this composite document has not yet been saved. Save the document first, then choose File>Package.

What does Interface allow?

It allows you to configure the size of the text and icons in your workspace as well as the overall color theme of the interface.

What does the Brush Settings Panel allow you to do?

It allows you to edit existing brush tips and also allows you to create new brushes. Options and their settings are displayed below the list of brush tips.

What does switching workspaces change?

It changes the panels that are displayed on your screen. For example, in the Essentials workspace, the Color and Swatches panels are grouped together at the top of the middle column. Yet in the Photography workspace, they've been replaced with the Histogram and Navigator panels, which are two panels more useful for editing and retouching work. **The only thing that hasn't really changed between workspaces is that the Layers, Channels, and Paths panels are still grouped together at the bottom of the main column.

Describe the default Gradient Style: Linear

It draws the gradient from the starting point to the endpoint in a straight line based on the direction in which you drag, from the Foreground color to the Background color. Select Reverse in the Options Bar to swap the order of the colors.

What is Dither in the Gradient Options Bar?

It mixes a bit of noise into your gradients to help smooth out the transitions between colors. This helps to reduce banding (visible lines that form between colors when the transitions are not smooth enough). It is selected by default.

Describe the Radial Gradient Style

It will create a circular gradient outward from your starting point beginning with the Foreground color in the center and radiating outward to the Background color. Click in the center of the area to set the starting point and then drag outward toward the edge.

What is zooming?

Magnifying the view of an image.

What are rulers useful for?

Measuring and aligning images. You should be able to show and hide rulers as well as change the measurement unit on rulers. Rulers appear horizontally along the top of the document window and vertically along the left side.

What does the Photoshop Interface consist of?

Menu bar, Option Bars, Tool Bars, Panels and Palettes

What is Scrubby Zoom?

One of the fastest ways to zoom into an area while allowing fine control of the zoom level. With the Zoom Tool selected, click on the area you want to zoom. While still holding down your mouse button, drag your mouse left or right. Dragging to the right will zoom in. Dragging to the left will zoom out. If you drag quickly, you'll zoom quickly. If you drag slowly, you'll zoom slowly.

Name the most common types of Photoshop Projects.

Photo, Print, Art & Illustration, Web, Mobile, and Film & Video.

What is the Foreground color used for and what is it's default color?

Photoshop uses the active Foreground color to paint, fill, create text, and make stroke selections. The default foreground color is black.

What are the two versions of the Place command?

Place Embedded and Place Linked

How can you quickly switch to the hand tool when another tool is activated?

Press and hold the spacebar on your keyboard. Click and drag the image to move to another location, and then release the spacebar to switch back to your previously active tool.

What is unique about opening a raw file?

Rather than going straight to Photoshop, raw files first open in Adobe Camera Raw, which is a separate plug-in included with Photoshop that launches automatically whenever a raw file is opened. Adobe Camera Raw is often thought of as a digital darkroom because it is used to correct Exposure, Contrast, White Balance, Color, Lens Distortion, and much more before sending it to Photoshop. After making the desired adjustments, click the Done button at the bottom of the Camera Raw panels to save the image and open it in Photoshop. If your image opened in Camera Raw and you want to skip making adjustments, simply click the Open Image button at the bottom of the dialog box to close Camera Raw and open the image in Photoshop.

Describe the Reflected Gradient Style

Reflected is the fourth icon from the left. It is very similar to the Linear style, but it takes everything on one side of your starting point and mirrors it on the other side. Click in the center of a selected area to set the starting point, then drag outward. The gradient starts with the Foreground color at your starting point and ends with the Background color. Then, the gradient is mirrored on the other side of the starting point.

What is another way to change the unit of measurement on the ruler?

Right-click within the ruler area and select the units from the pop-up menu. To show or hide rulers, choose View > Rulers from the Photoshop menu bar.

How do you save a guide layout?

Save the layout as a preset. Click on the Preset box at the top of the dialog box (where it says "Custom"). This will open a menu with a few built-in preset layouts (8 Column, 12 Column, 18 Column, and 24 Column); ignore those and click Save Preset. Enter a descriptive name for your new preset into the Save As field and click Save.

You can use the [blank] to Zoom In and Out if you have a mouse wheel. Spin up to zoom in or spin down to zoom out. Spin the wheel quickly or slowly to control the speed of your zoom.

Scroll Wheel Zoom

Preset Setting: Artboard

Select this option if you want your document to have artboards. Photoshop adds an artboard while creating the document.

What is the Brush Stroke Preview?

Shows how the paint strokes look with the current brush settings.

What is the options bar?

Shows the settings available for a specific tool that has been selected. It is located immediately below the Photoshop menu bar.

How can you dock and undock panels?

Simply move them into and out of a dock. You can dock tool bars and panels to the top, bottom, or sides of your workspace, or you can float them in a location that is convenient to you.

How do you change the unit of measurement on the rulers?

Simply right-click within the ruler area and select the units from the pop-up menu.

Describe and explain the various Standard Tip Brush Options: Size, Sample Size, Flip X, Flip Y, Angle, Roundness, Hardness, and Spacing.

Size: controls the size of the brush. Enter a value in pixels or drag the slider. Sample Size: resets the brush to its original diameter. This option is available only if the brush tip shape was created by sampling pixels in an image. Flip X: changes the direction of a brush tip on its x-axis. Flip Y: changes the direction of a brush tip on its y-axis. Angle: specifies the angle by which an elliptical or sampled brush's long axis is rotated from horizontal. Type a value in degrees or drag the horizontal axis in the preview box. Roundness: specifies the ratio between the brush's short and long axes. Enter a percentage value or drag the points in the preview box. A value of 100% indicates a circular brush, a value of 0% indicates a linear brush, and intermediate values indicate elliptical brushes. Hardness: controls the size of the brush's hard center. Type a number or use the slider to enter a value that is a percentage of the brush diameter. You can't change the hardness of sampled brushes. Spacing: controls the distance between the brush marks in a stroke. To change the spacing, type a number or use the slider to enter a value that is a percentage of the brush diameter. When this option is deselected, the speed of the cursor determines the spacing.

What is Camera Raw Software?

Software in photoshop that interprets the camera raw file using information about the camera and the image's metadata to construct and process a color image. Each camera manufacturer has its own version of the raw format, each with its own unique extension. For example. . . -Canon raw files typically have a ".cr2" extension -Nikon uses a ".nef" extension -Fuji uses a ".raf" extension -Adobe also has its own raw format with a ".dng" extension.

Preset Setting: Background Contents

Specify a background color for the document of White, Background Color, or Transparent.

Preset Setting: Color Mode

Specify a color mode for the document of RGB, BitMap, Grayscale, CMYK Color, or Lab Color.

Preset Setting: Orientation

Specify a page orientation for the document of either portrait or landscape.

Preset Setting: Resolution

Specify the fineness of detail in a bitmap image. It is measured in pixels/inch or pixels/centimeter.

Preset Setting: Bit Mode

Specify the number of colors as a logarithmic power of 2 (example 21, 28, 216, or 232) by choosing 1 bit, 8 bit, 16 bit, or 32 bit.

Preset Setting: Width/Height

Specify the size of the document. Select the unit from the pop-up menu (pixels, inches, cm, mm, points, picas, or columns).

Where are the brush libraries located and what type of brush libraries are there?

The Brush Libraries have lists of presets that are accessible in the fly-out menus located in the Brushes Palette and in the Brush dropdown menu in the toolbar. Additional brush libraries include Calligraphic Brushes, Dry Media Brushes, Wet Media Brushes, Natural Brushes, Square Brushes, and others. However, you can also load a custom library by choosing Load Brushes...

Many of the preset brushes have options you can edit. Where are these brush options displayed in?

The Brush Settings Panel

What is the difference between a Gradient Picker and a Gradient Editor?

The Gradient Picker provides ready-made preset gradients, while the Gradient Editor, as its name implies, is for customizing your own gradients. -To open the Gradient Picker, click on the small arrow to the right of the gradient preview bar in the Options Bar. Make sure to click the arrow, not on the preview bar (clicking the preview bar will open the Gradient Editor).

What are Mode and Opacity in the Gradient Options Bar?

The Mode option is used for setting the Blend Mode, and the Opacity option affects how the gradient will blend in with the original contents of a layer. In most cases, both of these options should be left to their default settings.

What does the Zoom tool allow you to do?

The Zoom Tool allows you to control the precise area of the document to magnify.

What navigation tools in Photoshop help you edit more precisely or move to different areas of the image?

The Zoom tool and the Hand Tool

What is the active Background color used for and what is it's default color?

The active Background color is used to make gradient fills and fill in erased areas of an image. The default background color is white.

What are smart guides?

They are special guides that appear temporarily when you draw a shape or create a selection. They help you align shapes, slices, and selections, then the Smart Guide disappears. To enable Smart Guides, choose View > Show > Smart Guides.

Tool Bars, Panels, and Palettes are used interchangeably and contain what?

They contain the commands and tools of Photoshop. -Tools that are related are grouped together on tool bars or panels. -Colors are grouped on palettes or color panels. -The various "panels" are organized into "panel groups" with other related panels. To activate any panel, simply click on its tab.

What are Guides, Grids, & Slices

They make it possible to position everything perfectly in your project because you can configure Photoshop to snap your images and text right to the guide. Guides appear as nonprinting lines that float over the image.

What is Transparency in the Gradient Options Bar?

This option must be selected for any of the transparency gradient to work. These include the Foreground to Transparency, Transparency Stripes, and Transparent Rainbow gradients. It is selected by default.

How can you find Photoshop's different workspaces?

To find these workspaces go to the menu bar along the top of the screen. Choose Window > Workspace. To choose a different workspace, simply click on its name to select it. The checkmark next to Essentials means that it is currently active.

How do you temporarily switch to Zoom In and Zoom Out mode?

To temporarily switch to Zoom In mode, hold Ctrl+spacebar (Win)/Command+spacebar (Mac) on your keyboard and click on the area where you want to zoom. Once you've zoomed in, release the keys to automatically switch back to the previously active tool. To temporarily switch to Zoom Out mode, press and hold Ctrl+Alt+spacebar (Win)/Option+spacebar (Mac) on your keyboard and click on the image. Release the keys to switch back to the previously active tool.

T or F: If you've created a brush that you would like to save as your own custom preset, you can do so by clicking the Create New Brush button at the bottom of the panel. This will add the brush to your preset menu.

True

T or F: In most workspaces, the Library Panel is displayed in the panel groups on the right side. If the Library panel is not displayed by default, open it from the menu bar by selecting Window > Libraries.

True

T or F: Photoshop supports all image formats.

True

T or F: You can reverse the colors in your gradient by selecting the Reverse option in the Options Bar.

True

How do you know when a document is docked or undocked?

When a document is docked, it displays a tab. When a document is undocked (floating), it displays a title bar.

What is Continuous Zoom?

When you click on the spot you want to zoom while holding down your mouse button. Photoshop will zoom continuously inward towards that spot until you release your mouse button.

What is panning?

When you move your view to a different area within a document. To pan in Photoshop, you must first be zoomed in. Click to activate the Hand Tool located near the bottom of the Tool Bar.

How can you change the foreground or background color?

You can change them with the Color Picker, Eyedropper Tool, or Swatches Panel. -To switch the Foreground and Background colors, click the Inverse Switch icon in the toolbox. -To restore the default foreground and background colors, click the Default Colors icon in the toolbox.

How can you create a special setting for specific project needs?

You can create a new preset by adjusting the specific settings your project requires for width, height, orientation, artboard, resolution, color mode, bit depth, and background. After adjusting the settings, type a name for the preset and click the Save Preset button located in the upper-right corner of the preset details menu.

How can you customize and save a workspace?

You can customize a workspace by rearranging the panels and tool bars. If you want to reuse your customized workspace, save it. -To save a workspace, choose Window > Workspace > New Workspace. Assign the workspace a name and select the elements to include. -To reset a workspace or load another workspace, choose Windows > Workspace from the menu bar as discussed above or use the Workspace Switcher located on the right side of the menu bar.