INTRODUCTION TO

ADOBE PHOTOSHOP
■ Adobe Photoshop is a raster graphics editor developed and published by Adobe Systems for
mac OS and Windows. Photoshop is considered one of the leaders in photo editing software. The
software allows users to manipulate, crop, resize, and correct color on digital photos. The
software is particularly popular amongst professional photographers and graphic designers.
Starting from version up till version 6 it has become more versatile and is now a staple for print
designers, web designers, video professionals and more.
History of Photoshop

■ Photoshop was developed in 1987 by the American brothers Thomas and John Knoll, who sold
the distribution license to Adobe Systems Incorporated in 1988.

■ Thomas Knoll, a PhD student at the University of Michigan, began writing a program on his
Macintosh Plus to display grayscale images on a monochrome display. This program, called
Display, caught the attention of his brother John Knoll, an Industrial Light & Magic employee,
who recommended that Thomas turn it into a full-fledged image editing program. Thomas took
a six-month break from his studies in 1988 to collaborate with his brother on the program. Later
that year, Thomas renamed his program Photoshop During this time, John traveled to Silicon
Valley and gave a demonstration of the program to engineers at Apple and Russell Brown, art
director at Adobe. Both showings were successful, and Adobe decided to purchase the license to
distribute in September 1988.
 Applications of Photoshop

■ Editing Photos
■ Digital Painting
■ Graphic Design
■ Web Design
■  Editing Video
 Editing Photos
Editing Photos is Photoshop’s
original use — it’s in the name after
all. Even after a quarter of a century
of competition, Photoshop is the most
powerful image editor out there. You
can modify any pixel in an image
pretty much any way you’d like.
 Digital Painting
Most paintings, cartoons, book covers, and other
art that you see online isn’t created with a
paintbrush, paints, and a canvas. It might not
look like it but most of them are now “painted”
using a computer. Photoshop is one of the most
popular apps for doing just that. Digital painting
uses technology to emulate old school, brush-in-
hand, beret-on-head painting. With a Waccom
graphics tablet you can draw or paint without
having to use a mouse, or god-forbid, a
touchpad.
 Graphic Design
Although Adobe also has graphic design
specific apps like InDesign and Illustrator in
the Creative Cloud, many of their tools have
been incorporated into Photoshop as well.
For example, the Pen Tool is a staple in
almost all Adobe’s apps. While Photoshop
isn’t the best graphic design app out there, it
is entirely competent. Something more
specialized will make your life easier but
there is very little you can’t do. If you’re
going to do regular design work, investing
time in learning one of the other apps is
worth it, but if you just occasionally want to
create a Christmas card, design your t-shirt,
mock up a quick logo for your business, or
even create a business card, Photoshop is
perfect.
 Web Design
■ One of the most
important steps in web
design is creating a mock
up: a finished design
made in an app like
Photoshop. It’s
something that amateurs
often skip.
 Editing Video
The best thing about editing videos in
Photoshop is that you get to use
adjustment layers just as if you were
editing a photo. If you want to convert
a regular video you shot on your
iPhone into a high contrast, black and
white, film noir style clip, you can do it
with just three layers. If you know how
to edit photos but don’t know how to
use apps like Premiere Pro and After
Effects, Photoshop can be a great
alternative. All the tools you’re familiar
with are there. Another awesome
feature of using Photoshop to edit
videos is you can also create GIFs!
WHAT IS
PHOTOSHOP
INTERFACE
Adobe Photoshop is a powerful tool for
editing photographs and graphics. The
first step in learning Photoshop is to
familiarize yourself with the Photoshop
interface, which consists of five basic
components:

 Menu bar

 Tool box

 Options bar

 Palettes

 Image area
WHAT IS
PHOTOSHOP
INTERFACE
1) Menu Bar — contains all of
Photoshop’s available options

2) Toolbox — has various tools for

editing the image

3) Options Bar — set the options for

the currently selected tool

4) Palettes — various panes to control

different aspects of the project.
Includes layers, channels, paths,
history, etc.

5) Image Area — the currently open

image(s)
The toolbox has various tools for editing an image. The
toolbox is divided into several sections of similar tools:

 Selection Tools

 Enhancement Tools

 Vector Tools

 Navigation Tools

 Color Tools

In addition to the visible tools, the tools with a small black

arrow in the lower-right corner contain fly-out menus with
other related tool choices. In the example to the left, the
Dodge Tool is depressed, displaying the Burn Tool and the
Sponge Tool in the fly-out menu. To select a tool to use: If
the tool is visible on the toolbox, click it once to activate it.

OR

If the tool is hidden, point to the appropriate tool family

icon and hold the mouse button down; the fly-out menu will

What is a
appear. Click on the desired tool in the menu to activate it. 
What are
Selection
tools?
The Selection Tools allow you to use
various techniques to select specific
sections of an image, rather than the
entire graphic. These tools create
“marching-ant” marquees around the
selected areas and fade the unselected
areas so users can determine exactly
which area they have selected. Once
selected, you can edit and manipulate a
section of an image while leaving the
rest untouched.
What are
Enhancement
tools?
The Enhancement Tools allow you
to clone portions of an image, blur
or enhance backgrounds, fill an
area with a selected color, or
further emphasize focal points. 
What are vector
tools?
The Vector Tools allow users to create
vector-based objects in Photoshop. 

What are
Navigation tools?
By using the Navigation Tools, you can
move to different sections of an image, or
change magnification of the image. The
Zoom Tool allows users to magnify and
reduce areas of images. Click the Zoom
Tool to zoom in (magnify); press the Alt
key and click the Zoom Tool to zoom out.
The Hand Tool allows users to slide the
image around the Image Area in order to
view different sections of the image.
What are
Color tools?

The Color Tools control the foreground

and background colors. In this
example, white is the current
foreground color and red is the
background color. When used in
conjunction with the Color Palette and
the Swatches Palette, users can select
from millions of different colors to use
in their images. The Eyedropper Tool
allows you to select a color from an
existing image.
Palettes are areas where extra features or settings
for tools are found. This is where you can fine-
tune the functions of the tools. The Palettes are
located under the Window menu. They include:

Channels Navigator
Paths Info
History Color
Actions Swatches
Character Styles
Paragraph
The Layer
default layout that is displayed when you
first open Photoshop displays 10 out of the 12
available palettes in three floating windows
(shown below). Each one has its own tab:

You can arrange and reposition the available

palettes either individually or in groups. The
floating palette system incorporated into
Photoshop lets you drag each palette away from
the existing cluster to create a separate window
for that palette. The reverse is also true; you can
cluster individual palette tabs into groups of your
preference. 
What are Palettes?
What are Layers?
Layers are like transparencies stacked one on top of
one another. Each layer can have different images and
effects. When the layers are stacked, the images
appear as if they are all a single image. Layers allow
users to work on separate images in order to modify
sections without changing the entire image.

The example below contains three layers: the

background yellow layer, the red square layer and the
green circle layer. If, for example, the circle in this
image were in the wrong place, you could easily
change its location by selecting the circle layer and
moving the circle without affecting the rest of the
image. 
What are the icons in
the layer Palette?
The Layers palette has various icons that control the functions of
the layers in the image. Following is a description of some of the
most useful ones:

Notice the red arrow on the Layers window to the left. It is pointing
to an image that looks like an eye. This image acts as a show/hide
feature for the corresponding layer. When the eye is open, that layer
is visible. When the eye is shut, the layer is not visible.

The green arrow points to an image that looks like a paint brush. It
shows the layer that is active, in other words, the layer which is
currently editable.

The blue arrow points to an image that looks like a vertical chain
link. This links two layers together. For example, since the square
layer and the circle layer are linked together, moving the position of
the circle in the image would also change the position of the square.

The purple arrow points to the new layer icon. A single- click on
this icon will result in the automatic creation of a new layer.