Adobe Photoshop CS5 for Photographers - Martin Evening [26]
Blending modes
Layers can be made to blend with the layers below them using any of the 27 different blending modes that are in Photoshop. Layer effects/styles allow you to add effects such as drop shadows, gradient/pattern fills or glows to any layer, plus custom layer styles can be loaded from and saved to the Styles panel.
Layers can be organized into layer group folders, which makes the layer organization easier to manage, and you can also apply a mask to the layer content using either a pixel or vector layer mask. You will find there are plenty of examples throughout this book in which I show you how to work with layers and layer masks.
Drag and drop layers
New to Photoshop CS5 is the ability to drag and drop a file to a Photoshop document and place it as a new layer.
Automating Photoshop
Why spend any more time than you have to performing repetitive tasks, when Photoshop is able to automate these processes for you? For example, the Actions panel will let you load and save Photoshop actions, which are basically recorded Photoshop steps. Figure 1.67 shows a screen shot of the Actions panel, where it is shown displaying an expanded view of the Default Actions set. As you can see from the descriptions, these actions can perform automated tasks such as add a vignette to a photo or create a wood frame edge effect. OK, these are not exactly the sort of actions you would use every day, but if you go to the panel fly-out menu and select Load Actions… you will be taken to the Photoshop CS5/ Presets/Photoshop Actions folder. Here you will find lots of useful actions that are worth installing. By saving and loading actions it is easy to share favorite Photoshop recipes with other users - all you have to do is to double-click an action icon to automatically install it in the Actions panel, and if Photoshop is not running at the time, this also launches the program.
Figure 1.67 The Actions panel.
To run an action, you will usually need to have a document already open in Photoshop and press the Play button. It is also quite easy to record your own custom actions, and once you get the hang of how to do this you can progress to using the File Automate Batch… function to apply recorded actions to batches of images. You can also go to the File Automate menu and choose ‘Create Droplet…’. Droplets are like self-contained batch action operations located in the Finder/Explorer. All you have to do is drag an image file to a droplet to initiate a Photoshop action process (see Figure 1.68). I will be explaining later in Chapter 15 how to automate Photoshop and make efficient use of actions.
Figure 1.68 With Photoshop droplets you can apply a batch action operation by simply dragging and dropping an image file or a folder of images onto a droplet that has been saved to the Finder/Explorer.
Move tool
The move tool can perform many functions such as move the contents of a layer, directly move layers from one document to another, copy layers, apply transforms, plus select and align multiple layers. In this respect the move tool might be more accurately described as a move/transform/alignment tool. The move tool can also be activated any time another tool is selected simply by holding down the key (except for when the slice tools, hand tool, pen or path selection tools are selected). If you hold down the key while the move tool is selected, this lets you copy a layer or selection contents. It is also useful to know that using plus (the move tool shortcut) lets you make a copy of a layer or selection contents when any other tool is selected (apart from the ones I just listed). If the Show Transform Controls box is checked in the move tool Options bar (Figure 1.69), a bounding box will appear around the bounds of the selected layer, and when you mouse down on the bounding box handles to transform the layer, the Options bar switches modes to display the numeric transform controls.
Nudging layers and selections