Photoshop Basics: The Basics Of Layers In Photoshop
By Steve Patterson, Photoshop Essentials.com
THE BASICS OF LAYERS IN PHOTOSHOP It’s hard to believe there was ever a time when layers didn’t exist inside Photoshop. Yet prior to Photoshop 3, they didn’t. Hard to believe, you say? Wait, didn’t I just say that? Are you even paying attention? Well, you should be, because this is important stuff. Layers are, without a doubt, the single most important aspect of Photoshop. Nothing worth doing in Photoshop can or should be done without the use of layers. Layers are so important that they have their own Layers palette as well as their own Layer category in the Menu Bar at the top of the screen. You can add layers, delete layers, name layers, rename layers, move layers, adjust layers, mask layers, show and hide layers, blend layers, lock and unlock layers, add effects to layers, group and ungroup layers, and even change the opacity of layers. Layers are the heart and soul of Photoshop. Best of all, layers are easy to understand, once you wrap your mind around them, that is. “That’s great!”, you say. “But that doesn’t tell me what they are”. Good point. Let’s examine then what exactly layers are.
Understanding Layers
We can spent a lot of time discussing the theory of what layers are in Photoshop, just like we could try to learn how to ride a bike by reading a lot of theory about it. Problem is, you could read every book and website there is on the theory of bike riding and still fall on your head the first time you try to ride one. The better way to learn would be to simply hop on that bike and start peddling, and that’s exactly how we’re going to learn about layers. Fortunately, we run much less of a risk of falling on our heads while learning about layers, but feel free to put on a helmet if it will make you feel safer.
Life Without Layers
Before we look at what layers are and how to use them, let’s first see what working in Photoshop would be like without layers. First, let’s open a new document inside Photoshop. Go up to the Menu Bar at the top of the screen and click on the word File to bring up the File menu options. The first one at the top of the list is New. Go ahead and click the word “New”, which brings up the New Document dialog box as shown below:
Don’t worry about naming the document since we won’t be keeping anything we’re doing here. The second option from the top though is Preset, and this is where we can choose from a variety of ready-to-go document sizes. If it doesn’t say 640x480 as the document size beside the word “Preset”, simply click on the down-pointing arrow to the right of the Preset option box, which brings up a list of all the available preset document sizes, and choose 640x480. It’s not vital that you use 640x480 as the document size here, it simply helps to keep us both on the same page. Once you’ve chosen your document size, the only other option we need to look at for this example is near the bottom of the dialog box, Background Contents. Make sure it says White as the background contents, again so we’re both on the same page while working. If it doesn’t say “White”, click the down-pointing arrow to the right of that option box and select This Photoshop Tutorial © 2008 Steve Patterson, Photoshop Essentials.com. Not To Be Reproduced Or Redistributed Without Permission.
1