Using the tools

Together, Photoshop and ImageReady provide a consistent and integrated set of tools for producing sophisticated graphics for print and online viewing. ImageReady includes many tools that will already be familiar to users of Photoshop.

Finding tools in the work area

The default work areas of Photoshop and ImageReady consist of a menu bar at the top of the work area, a floating toolbox on the left, a tool options bar below the menu bar, floating palettes, and one or more image windows, which you open separately. In Photoshop, the four default palette groups appear along the right of the work area. In ImageReady, additional palettes appear in the lower left part of the work area.

The tools are located in the toolbox but are also controlled by options you select in the tool options bar and, in some cases, in the various palettes.

A. Menu bar B. Tool options bar C. Toolbox D. Info bar E. Image window F. Palette well G. Palettes

Selecting tools in the toolbox

The toolbox contains selection tools, painting and editing tools, foreground- and background-color selection boxes, and viewing tools. This section introduces the toolbox and shows you how to select tools. As you work through the lessons, you’ll learn more about each tool’s specific function.

1.

To select a tool, click the tool in the toolbox, or you can press the tool’s keyboard shortcut. For example, to use the keyboard shortcut to select the zoom tool, press Z. Then, you can press M to switch back to the marquee tool. Selected tools remain active until you select a different tool. If you don’t know the keyboard shortcut for a tool, position the pointer over the tool until a tooltip appears, displaying the tool name and shortcut. All keyboard shortcuts are also listed in the Quick Reference section of online Help. You’ll learn how to use online Help later in this lesson. Photoshop and ImageReady use the same keyboard shortcut keys for corresponding keys, with the exceptions of A, P, Q, and Y: In Photoshop, press A for the selection tools; in ImageReady, press A to show or hide image maps. In Photoshop, press P for the pen tools; in ImageReady, press P for the image map tools. In Photoshop, press Q to switch between Quick Mask mode and Standard mode; in ImageReady, press Q to show or hide slices. In Photoshop, press Y for the history brush tools; in ImageReady, press Y for rollover preview. Some of the tool buttons in the toolbox include a small triangle at the bottom right corner, indicating the presence of additional tools hidden behind the selected tool.

2.

Select hidden tools in any of the following ways: Hold down the mouse button on a tool with a small triangle symbol (such as the rectangular marquee tool, which is the default tool selection) to open a pop-up menu of the additional hidden tools. Drag the pointer to the tool you want to use, and release the mouse button. Hold down Alt (Windows) or Option (Mac OS), and click the tool in the toolbox to toggle through the hidden tools in sequence until the tool you want to use is selected. Press Shift + the tool’s keyboard shortcut repeatedly until the tool you want is selected.

For an overview of the tools that describes their functions, see figure 1-1 in the color section.

Using the tool options bar

Most tools have options that are displayed in the tool options bar. The tool options bar is context-sensitive and changes as different tools are selected. Some settings in the tool options bar are common to several tools (such as painting modes and opacity), and some are specific to one tool (such as the Auto Erase setting for the pencil tool).

You can move the tool options bar anywhere in the work area. In Photoshop, you can also dock it at the top or bottom of the screen.

The Photoshop tool options bar includes a palette well for storing palettes without closing them entirely. The palette well is available only when the work area is greater than 800 pixels × 600 pixels (a setting of at least 1024 × 768 is recommended).

The following steps demonstrate the interactions between the tools and the tool options bar.

1.	To see options for a tool, select the tool (such as the rectangular marquee tool (), which is selected by default) in the toolbox and then notice the display in the tool options bar. Note If the tool options bar does not appear, open the Window menu and make sure that the Options command has a check mark, or select it now to display the tool options bar.
2.	Select a different tool in the toolbox, and notice how the tool option bar changes.
3.	To move the tool options bar, drag the left edge of the tool options bar to a new location. In Photoshop, the left edge appears as a gripper bar when the tool options bar is docked under the menu bar or at the bottom of the work area. Note In Photoshop (Windows, Mac OS 10) and ImageReady (all platforms), you can double-click the gripper bar at the left end of the tool options bar to collapse it, so that only the tool icon appears.
4.	To dock the Photoshop tool options bar again under the menu bar or at the bottom of your screen, drag the tool options bar by its left edge until it snaps into position. After you select options for a tool, those options remain selected until you change them again, even if you select other tools and work with them. You can easily reset your tool options back to the default settings.
5.	To reapply default settings for a tool, click the tool in the tool options bar to open a pop-up palette, and then open the palette menu and choose Reset Tool. (Then click anywhere outside the pop-up palette to close it.) Notice that you can also choose Reset All Tools from that same palette menu to restore the default settings for all tools.