LESSON 1
Welcome To PhotoShop CS 3 Into Class!! Chances are that if you have purchased Photoshop CS 3 then you likely know that Photoshop is the "Industry Standard" for just about any graphics work. Photoshop enables you to create, modify, combine, and optimize digital images. You can then save the images to print later or use online on your website or on a hand-held device such as an iPod, Blackberry or BlueTooth etc.
Photoshop's tools let you move, color, stylize and even add text to your images. You can optimize photographs or turn into interesting works of art with just a couple mouse clicks!
For this Intro class we will be covering the very basic functions of Photoshop CS 3. The focus is on the workspace, tools, palettes and a general overview of the entire program including some of the newest features! Let's look at just a few of the things that Photoshop is capable of doing for us to simplify our work loads!
Exploring the Workspace
Along with Adobes other software, Photoshop's workspace is arranged to help you focus on creating and editing images. Time is money, and money is time, and we need (want) the best of both worlds! HEY! Why not? Familiarizing yourself with the interface is essential for a productive workflow. Adobe has been aggressively improving and adding many ways to help us with our productive workflow. CS3 has taken one of the biggest leaps since CS2 in the workspace improvements.
Let's take a brief run through the interface and familiarize ourselves with the palettes, tools and options that we have to work with. After that, each week, we will build on some of the most important areas of the workspace. Most importantly this week, we will learn how to open images, create new images from scratch, and use one or two of the basic tools from the Tools palette.
Menu Bar - Contains menus organized by tasks. For example, the Layers menu contains commands or functions that you are likely to use when making adjustments to layers. In Photoshop, you can customize the menu bar by hiding, showing, or even adding colors to certain commands.
Options Bar - Provides options for using tools. Allows for customized settings for each tool.
Tool Palette - Displays a variety of icons, each one representing an image-editing tool. You click and drag inside your image to apply most of the tools. Also displays the current foreground and background colors. (Pink and Black are shown here)
Palettes - Small windows that give you access to common commands and resources to use while editing. You can customize them in the workspace. In Photoshop, you can also hide, show, or add color to the items in the palette.
Bridge Access - This icon will launch Adobe Bridge file browser. Bridge gives you a visual method of browsing your files.
Additional Workspace Options - Click the arrow will give you more options for customizing and resetting your workspace back to the default workspace.
As you can see, when you first open CS3, you are presented with an amazing array of tools, menus, palettes and other options, which at first might seem a bit intimidating. We have barely scratched the surfaced of what Photoshop has to offer at this point. We don't want you to throw your hands up in frustration from information overload so let's learn a little bit about images and how we access images we already have on our hard drives. We will also take a look at creating a new, blank canvas so that we have something to paint and play around on.
Saving Your Images in the appropriate format
Now that we have the file created, we want to be sure and save it. There is nothing more frustrating than working on something for several hours only to lose it in a crash.
Saving a new image is a bit different than saving an existing image since you will need to tell Photoshop where to store the file. You will also need to select a format. There are several formats to choose from. The most valuable to you with this type of image is the native format of Photoshop, which is PSD. This format will allow you retain all your layered information and editing information that you have applied to the image. The drawback to this format is (1) the format is not viewable in any browser and (2) that these files are always very large in file size. Any image that you are working on should ALWAYS be saved in the PSD format (or any other format that retains layered information such as TIFF. There are literally thousands of file formats which you can read more about by Googling "file formats") Always work on a COPY of your image if at all possible so that you don't risk losing the original image.
1- Choose File then Save As.
The Save As dialog box opens.
2- Select the folder where you want to store the image. Since this is all for homework, I suggest making a folder for just your homework and put everything in there to keep things simple for you.
3- Enter a name for your image. Be descriptive but orderly. Like Blankcanvas01, that way you can get started on the right foot with the organizing.
4- Select a file format if you want something other than what is shown. Only the native Photoshop, TIF, and Photoshop PDF formats can save files that contain multiple layers and editable type layers. Click Save to apply the settings and save the image.
If you are going to be sending files via email or using them on the web you would not want to use any of the above aforementioned file types as they will have large file (kb) size. You will learn how to save in other formats, but you should always keep a working copy of your image in PSD format with the layers retained just in case you need to make changes at a later date. :)
Congratulations, you have just saved your first image!
Continued...
