Introduction to Photoshop Elements

John W. Jacobs Technology Center 450 Exton Square Parkway

Exton, PA 19341 610.280.2666 ccljtc@ccls.org

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Chester County Library

Introduction to Photoshop Elements

What is Photoshop Elements? Photoshop Elements is a basic version of the Photoshop Creative Suite. There are many features found in the Creative Suite that aren’t found in Elements. One of the benefits of Photoshop Elements is that it is designed for beginners. Elements has a feature called “Guided Mode”. Using guided mode even a novice can fix common image problems with relative ease, as it will walk you through the steps to fix them. Photoshop Elements is broken down into two separate parts, the Elements Organizer and the Editor. The Organizer is like a digital photo bin for storing and sorting your images. The Editor is like a digital darkroom for adjusting and manipulating your images. Using a combination of the two you can fix, adjust, or even manipulate your photos.

Loading Photos in the Organizer. When you first open Photoshop Elements you will be prompted to choose between the Organizer and the Editor. For this Section we will be opening the Organizer. If this is the first time you’ve opened your Organizer it will be pretty empty. We need to import some pictures, so we will click on “File” “Get Photos and Videos” “From Files and Folders“. Make sure we’re looking in the “Desktop”. Find the folder marked “PhotoShop”. Don’t open it, just click it once to highlight it. Click “Get Media”. All pictures in that folder will now be added to your Organizer.

Simple edits with the Organizer. Double click on the photo of the tea set to bring it to the front. This will select this photo for you to work on. Click the orange button that says “Fix” in the top right corner to bring up your “Auto Fix” options Next click “Auto Smart Fix”. This lets the program attempt to fix any problems with color, contrast, or sharpness on its own. Click “Auto Contrast” to automatically balance light and dark without making the whole image too dark again.

Note: These options can be hit

and miss. Using these options

enable the program to make all

the adjustment decisions and

the program isn’t always right.

For more control over your

images it’s best to use the editor

in either “Guided”, “Quick”, or

“Full” edit mode.

Remember your little “Undo”

arrows at the top in case

something happens that you

didn’t like.

Guided mode is great, especially for

beginners. You should see along the

right side of the screen all our “Auto”

options have been replaced by a list

asking us “What would you like to

do?” These are simple to use tools that

have tutorials built into them.

Guided edit mode. Select the photo of the man holding a glass of wine. With this picture we could try another “Auto Smart Fix”, but it doesn’t really work. The program makes it way to bright. So we will try “Guided Edit” mode. Make sure to “Undo” any mistakes you’ve made by clicking the undo arrow at the top or by hitting “Ctrl + Z” on the keyboard. To get to “Guided Edit” mode, make sure you have an image selected, click on the small drop-down arrow next to the orange button then click “Guided Photo Edit…” Click on “Lighten or Darken a Photo”. The new box that pops up will give us a lot more options than the previous “Auto Smart Fix” did. Try and use the “Lighten Shadows” and “Midtone Contrast” sliders on your own and see if you can find a good balance of light and dark. Click “Done” down at the bottom to lock in your changes. Go back up to the top and click on “Crop Photo”. This box gives us a few options for using the crop tool. Click on the box marked “Crop Box Size” and choose an 8 x 10 in. ratio. Selecting this will lock our crop box to the chosen ratio. Click and drag from the center of the crop box and try and position it so we can give this guy a nice 8 x 10 portrait. Once we’ve lined it up we can click done down at the bottom to lock in our changes.

Quick edit mode is missing a

few of the capabilities of

guided edit mode, but it works

really well for simple edits to

colors or brightness.

Quick edit mode. Find the picture of the ocean and select it. With the ocean picture selected go up and click on the drop down arrow next to the orange “Fix” button, then click “Quick Photo Edit…”

Click on the box that says “View: After Only” and change it to “Before & After – Horizontal”. This will help you see the major changes that moving the sliders will do. Go over to the “Color” sliders and see if you can come up with a good balance of hue and saturation to make the photo less dreary. The Hue and Saturation sliders allow you to change colors (hue), and enrich or dull colors (saturation). Go up to the “Lighting” sliders and move the “Lighten Shadows” slider up to anywhere between 25 and 50, whatever looks best to you.

You have to be very careful with

saturation. A lot of people tend to

over-saturate their images. The reason

being, increasing the saturation really

makes the colors more vibrant and just

looks prettier. The downside is they

start to look really fake.

Selection tools in full edit mode. Select the picture of the plate with the different foods around it and click on the drop down arrow next to the orange “Fix” button, then click “Full Photo Edit”. You are going to use your selection tools to place these pieces of food on the plate. Go to the tools on the left hand side and select the one that looks like a magnifying glass. That’s the zoom tool. With your zoom tool selected, click and drag a box around that pepper. By creating that box you are telling the program that you want to zoom in on that particular spot so that is all you should see. If you made a mistake or you can’t see all of the pepper you can hold “Ctrl” and press the number “0” on your keyboard. That’s the shortcut to zoom back till you can see the whole image. Go back to your tool bar and find the tool that looks like a lasso, it should be the fifth tool from the top. We want to right click on that tool for more options, and select “Magnetic Lasso Tool”. Once you have the magnetic lasso selected click anywhere along the edge of the pepper and slowly trace the edge all the way around the pepper. The magnetic lasso should help the line stay along the right path. When you get all the way around, click on the small box that marks the place where you started. If done correctly there should be a dashed line surrounding your pepper. Once you have your pepper selected hold “control” and press “0” to zoom back out. Now select the “Move Tool”. With the move tool selected go ahead and click anywhere inside your pepper and drag it onto the plate. When your pepper is positioned on the plate go ahead and hit “control” + “D” on your keyboard to deselect it.

Selection tools in full edit mode continued. Let’s go back to the zoom tool and use it to draw a box around our cookies this time. Go to the “Quick Selection Tool” it should be the 8th tool from the top and looks like a wand and a selection circle. Right click on the quick selection tool and pick the “Selection Brush Tool”.

You can use this tool to paint a selection on your image. Go ahead and use the brush to select all the cookies. You may want to use the tool options above your image to change the brush size and make it a little bigger. It’s ok to go over the lines a little bit, you can fix that next. If you have gone out of the lines you’ll have to trim it back a little bit. You might want to decrease your brush size first. If you hold down the “Alt” key while using the selection brush tool you can erase some of your selection lines. So go back around the outside of your cookies using a smaller brush and the Alt key you can get rid of all the excess selection you made. Once you are content with your selection go ahead and hit “control” + “0” to zoom back out and use your move tool to drag your cookies onto the plate. When they are in position hit “control” + “D” to deselect them.

The selection brush tool is great for selecting areas that

don’t have a clearly defined border. If you were trying to

select a person out of a larger group of people, or with a

complicated background behind them for example. These

examples would be harder to use some of the other selection

tools as they rely on being able to see a clear dividing line

between your selection and the background.

Selection tools in full edit mode continued. Now for the bananas you are going to use the best selection tool you have at your disposal, the “Quick Selection Tool”. Go back to your selection brush tool and right click on it to switch it back to the quick selection tool. You don’t even need to zoom in for this one. With the quick selection tool selected, just click and drag inside the bananas from one side to the other. If it doesn’t select it all the first time try it again. If you got to close to the white background it might have selected everything, if that’s the case go ahead and hit “Control” + “D” to deselect everything and try again. When your banana selecting is complete go ahead and use your move tool to drag them onto your plate and use “Control” + “D” to deselect them.

The quick selection tool is one of the best

tools at your disposal. Anything with a

plain background or nice contrasting

colors can be selected in just a few

seconds. It’s not as helpful on selections

that have to be more precise or detailed.

Spot Healing Brush. Go ahead and close out of the plate and go back to organizer. This time let’s select the photo of the girl in the orange dress. Once you have her selected, go up to the little drop down arrow next to the orange fix button and select “full photo edit”. Use your zoom tool to zoom in to her neck and shoulder area. We are going to make some of her moles disappear. Select the “Spot Healing Brush Tool”, it’s the one that looks like a band-aid on some dotted lines. With this tool selected, you want to pick a target mole and position your brush over it. You want your brush to be just big enough to cover the whole mole. Remember you can adjust the brush size in the tool options above your image. If your brush size is too small or too large it won’t work. Once you have your brush the right size and you are positioned overtop a mole, go ahead and click just once. If done correctly, the brush should pull her skin color over top of the mole and do it’s best to blend the surrounding colors together so you shouldn’t be able to see that the area was altered at all. Go ahead and try to get rid of a few more moles using the same technique.

This same method can also be used

to remove other small blemishes

or scars. It can also be used to

remove scratches, tears, or other

small imperfections from physical

photos that you’ve scanned into

the computer.

Helpful Shortcuts

Zooming Shortcuts:

Hold “Ctrl” and press any of the following keys for a zoom shortcut.

+ :Zooms in slightly.

- :Zooms out slightly.

0 :Zooms the image in or out until it fits the entire image on screen

1 :Zooms the image to 100% actual image size.

Brush Size Shortcut:

You can quickly change the brush size while using any brush tool by

using the square brackets on the keyboard.

[ :decreases brush size

] :increases brush size

Selection Shortcuts:

Hold down “Shift” while using a selection tool to add to the current

selection.

Hold down “Alt” while using a selection tool to subtract from the

current selection.

List of Tools in Full Edit Mode Note: All tools that have the small black triangle next to it can be right-clicked for more tool options.

Move Tool: move the selected layer around. Zoom Tool: zoom in or out for precise edits. Hand Tool: change the view around while zoomed in. Eyedropper Tool: pick a color from an image. Marquee Tool: select a portion of the image for editing. Lasso Tool: make precise selections of an image for editing. Magic Wand Tool: select a contiguous region of pixels roughly the same color. Quick Selection Tool: make quick selections based on color and contrasting lines. Type Tool: add text to an image. Crop Tool: crop an image to a specific area. Cookie Cutter Tool: cut a shape out of an image. Straighten Tool: straighten any crooked or misaligned images. Red Eye Removal Tool: remove the red eye effect caused by camera flashes. Spot Healing Brush Tool: remove small blemishes or imperfections from an image. Clone Stamp Tool: clone and draw with a specific part of an image. Eraser Tool: erase part of the selected layer or background. Brush Tool: paint colors onto the image.

Smart Brush Tool: brush on special effects to an image. Paint Bucket Tool: fill an area with a chosen color. Gradient Tool: add a gradient effect to an image. Shape Tool: add a shape of chosen color to an image.

Blur Tool: add a blurry out of focus effect to part of an image. Sponge Tool: desaturate or saturate part of an image. Currently Selected Colors: The two big squares represent the current foreground and background colors. Clicking on the two small squares on the left will reset your colors back to the default black & white.