5 Tips for Photoshop Efficiency

By Corrie Haffly
2008-03-27


2. Learn more keyboard commands to make your life easier

Photoshop is chock full of other keyboard shortcuts for commands. You’re probably already familiar with some of the basics – Ctrl-S to save, Ctrl-O to open a file, Ctrl-C to copy, Ctrl-C to Paste – which are common to other types of software. Many of these shortcuts can be found listed next to the command when you click an option from the top menu:

But there are many, many other “hidden” keyboard commands for performing a variety of actions. Here are some that I’ve found to be indispensible in my daily Photoshop workflow:

• Holding the Shift key generally constrains movements to straight horizontal, vertical, or 45-degree angles. For example, if you’re using the Move tool to move a layer, holding the Shift key will allow you to move it perfectly horizontally (or vertically, or at a 45-degree angle) so that you don’t have to guesstimate your placement.
• The Alt key will often allow you to copy things, depending on the context. When you have the Move tool selected, holding the Alt key and then using the Move tool will allow you to copy the selected layer to a new layer. Or, if you’re working in the Layers palette, holding the Alt key down, clicking on a layer, and dragging it to another spot in the Layers palette will create a copy of that layer. The same thing works with the Path Selection tool when you’re working with paths.
• Holding the Ctrl key and then clicking on a thumbnail in the Layers palette makes a selection based on the pixels in that layer.
• Ctrl-D will clear all selections, such as selections you’ve made with the Marquee or Lasso tools.
• Holding the space bar temporarily switches you to the Hand tool so that you can easily move your canvas around.
• Change the layer opacity by simply typing in a number.

There are also more obscure keyboard shortcuts that you may or may not find useful. For example, here is a very small sampling of commands that you can use just for navigating around the Layers palette:

• Alt-[ and Alt-] allow you to select different layers in the Layers palette by moving up and down the layers
• Ctrl-[ and Ctrl-] allow you to move the selected layer up and down the Layers palette, thus changing the layer order
• Shift-Ctrl-[ and Shift-Ctrl-] move the selected layer to the very bottom or the very top of the layer order, respectively.
• Holding Shift-Alt and then using the [ or ] keys allow you to select multiple adjacent layers.

It’s pretty fun to try finding these hidden shortcuts by holding the Shift, Ctrl, and Alt keys while clicking away at the screen. You can also scour blogs and web sites for “photoshop shortcuts” or “photoshop keyboard commands” to find more. One resource you might find helpful are the PDFs at http://morris-photographics.com/photoshop/shortcuts/. However, even these extensive PDFs don’t include tricks like double-clicking in the grey Photoshop work area to bring up the “Open” dialog box if for some reason you’re not fond of the Ctrl-O keyboard shortcut! There is a lot to discover in Photoshop; while you may not find some of the “shortcuts” to be worth retaining in your memory, you’ll inevitably find some that you will use every time you open Photoshop.

Tutorial Pages:
» 1. Learn to use keyboard shortcuts for accessing tools
» 2. Learn more keyboard commands to make your life easier
» 3. Create Actions
» 4. Learn non-destructive editing techniques
» 5. Get organized

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