1. Use of shortcut keys:
This is the basis of Photoshop, but it is also the best way to improve work efficiency. With shortcut keys, you can concentrate on your work better than the tool panel. Once you can skillfully use shortcut keys, you can use full-screen working mode, saving unnecessary panel positions, broadening your horizons and maximizing the use of screen space; Some simple commands can be completed by keyboard, so we don't have to be distracted by the choice of tools. Even if it only takes a little time, we don't want to be disturbed at work.
Note: You should use shortcut keys as much as possible. The following shortcut keys are a good helper to improve efficiency, but I don't know why many books pass by or even mention them. Please remember them firmly.
Ctrl+J: copy the current layer to the new layer;
J: switch to the spray gun tool;
M: Switch to the marquee tool;
【】: When the current tool is in brush mode (including airbrush, brush, pencil, history brush imitating stamp, eraser, blur and deepen tool), increase or decrease the pen tip size in turn;
Shift+BackSpace: bring up the fill dialog box.
At first, you may not remember all the shortcut keys. You can use Photoshop tooltips to help you. By opening Edit >; Presets > General, and select Show Tooltips. In this way, when you move the mouse to the tool panel, the tool name and its shortcut keys will be displayed until you move the mouse.
2. Seamless mapping:
Seamless mapping is very important for making 3D images or web pages, which we can easily do in Photoshop. After customizing your image, run Filter > Other > Displacement, horizontal and vertical displacement. Generally, the displacement is set to half the image size, and the most important thing is to set the undefined area to fold back. After the displacement is completed, use the rubber stamp tool to smear the stitching of the image, eliminate the seams, and then define the image as a pattern. Through this pattern filling, a seamless background image can be obtained.
3. Customize the actions of common combination commands:
When processing images, we often use combination commands. For example, you need to move a document with multiple images to another document. The quickest and safest way is to create a new layer of Shift+Ctrl+N; Flatten all the following visible layers shift+alt+ctrl+e; Select all images ctrl+a; Copy ctrl+c; Deselect ctrl+d; Delete the current layer. This set of commands is to create an image for the image, which contains all visible layer images under the current layer. At this point, the content of the image has been left on your clipboard, just paste it into the required document. This is a typical example. Although you can use a series of shortcut keys to complete this set of commands, it is recommended to save it as an operation. In the action options panel, you can set a convenient function key for this action, such as Shift+F2, which is very convenient for you to call at any time, especially when importing pictures from Photoshop to other applications, which saves a lot of time! Different combinations of Shift, Control and F2 to F 12 can define many actions, which greatly improves the efficiency.
4. Automatically select layers:
This is a small action, but it is very useful, especially in some large files with multiple layers. Even if you sort each layer and stack them in order, it is more troublesome to choose-you may not remember which layer they belong to, and the consequences of wrong operation are sometimes terrible. At this point, you can first select the move tool and select "Automatically select layers" in the tool options. In this way, when other tools in the toolbox except slicing tool, path component selection tool, pen tool and gripper tool are currently selected, while holding down the Ctrl key, the current tool will temporarily become a mobile tool. Click on any object on the canvas, and Photoshop will automatically go to its layer, so you can operate it. In the current mobile tool, even if you don't choose to automatically select layers, you can freely select image contents belonging to different layers as long as you hold down the Ctrl key.
5. Create a custom brush:
There is a very useful resource in Photoshop that is not fully utilized by most people, that is, creating custom brushes. Create a new document, the size is the size of the brush to be made, and draw your brush image in black (it can also be color or different gray levels, but the color of the brush will be lighter), such as a small flower, a few small trees and so on. Then select it with a rectangular marquee and define it as a new brush. If there is no selection, Photoshop will define all the images on the canvas as brushes. In this way, you can use these custom brushes to create various unique images, especially some decorative patterns, such as borders.
6. Lens Halo Effect:
In primary image processing, lens halo is one of the most commonly used cosmetic effects. Generally speaking, you can use filters directly in image >. Rendering > lens halo adds atmosphere to the image. Then, if you are very satisfied with the halo effect of a shot and want to save it, we can use the feature of layer blending. Create a new layer on the image in advance, fill it with black, then realize the lens halo filter, and then set the layer blending mode of this layer to "screen", so that the black is hidden and you will get a separate halo effect layer. However, the only drawback of this method is that it cannot be displayed on a white image.
7. Light effect filter:
The biggest surprise of this filter is that it can create various realistic texture effects. The simplest usage is: put a simple texture in a channel and then apply a filter on a layer >; Rendering > lighting effect, select the texture channel just stored in the texture channel, and adjust various corresponding lighting settings to get a three-dimensional texture effect.
8. Use the adjustment layer:
No one is sure that the image can be adjusted perfectly at once. Therefore, in addition to developing good backup habits, it is best to use the adjustment layer as much as possible when it can be used. You may feel trouble, but this trouble is very small compared with the loss of image damage. And more importantly, you can make new adjustments at any time in the creative process without worrying about image damage.
9. Quick copy skills:
In the same document, make sure it is currently a mobile tool (or a temporary mobile tool). While holding down the Alt key, drag the object to be copied, and hold down the Shift key to ensure that it can move in multiples of 45 degrees. Hold down the Shift key when moving between different documents. If two documents have the same size, the object will be copied to the same location in the new document. If the document size is different, the object will be copied to the center of the new document. This copying is not only convenient, but also can reduce the use of clipboard and further save system resources.
10. Accumulation of achievements:
When you use Photoshop for a period of time, you will certainly save a lot of good things. For example, gradient, outline, style, etc. You took great pains to prepare, including some color swatches that are convenient for work. These are only temporarily stored in Photoshop. Once reinstalled, Photoshop will return to its default state, become clean and smooth, and these customized things will disappear without a trace. This is not only a pity, but also affects your work (such as defining the loss of color swatches). Therefore, every time you have a favorite work, it is best to save it with the preset manager and store it in a special folder. The default manager can save brushes, swatches, gradients, styles, patterns, outlines and custom shapes so that your work will not be lost. After reinstallation, you can return to the familiar working environment by overwriting it with the corresponding file.