5. Quick Edits

As you’ll discover in the rest of the book, Photoshop Elements is a sophisticated image editor, enabling anyone to make photo corrections that would have been absurdly difficult years ago. But sometimes you don’t want to be an image expert. Let the computer do the work for you, analyzing photos and correcting them automatically.

When you don’t want to mess with the particulars, or when you know that a photo needs just a bit of tweaking but you want a bit more control over the adjustments, turn to the Quick edit features. You can experiment on your photo—ranging from slight tonal changes to radical tints and lighting adjustments—and then undo those changes if they seemed better in your mind’s eye than they look on the screen.

The concepts behind the tools in the Quick edit mode, such as adjusting levels and sharpening, are dealt with later in the book. Use this chapter as a jumping-off point.

Making Quick Edits

When you want Elements to take over and make corrections according to its analysis of a photo, the speediest method is directly in the Quick edit pane.

Using the Quick editor

The Quick edit component of the workspace gives you a bit more control than the buttons in the Organizer’s Instant Fix pane.

To edit photos in the Quick editor

Open a file in Elements and then click the Quick button. The Quick edit workspace opens .

The Quick edit workspace includes your image and a set of common photo manipulations.

To set view options

• From the View menu located below the photo, choose whether you want to see the end result (After Only), the original (Before Only), or a comparison layout (both the Before & After options) .

The Before & After options offer split-screen views of how fixes are affecting the photo.

• Use the Zoom field and slider to specify how zoomed-in you want to be . In the Before and After views, the zoom level applies to both versions.

Use the Zoom field or slider to view the photo close-up.

When the Zoom or Hand tool is active, you can also click the Actual Pixels, Fit Screen, or Print Size buttons in the Tool Options bar to switch to those zoom levels.

• If Elements did not rotate your image correctly during import, click the Rotate buttons to turn it clockwise or counter-clockwise in 90-degree increments.

Applying Quick edits

The following tools perform common image correction tasks, but we want to start with the most important command first: Reset.

To reset and undo changes

• After making an adjustment, click the Reset button that appears in the tool’s thumbnails .

Clicking the Cancel button restores the image to the state before you made the adjustment(s).

• Click the Undo button, or choose Edit > Undo to undo the previous command.

• If you’ve made several edits and want to revert to the original image, click the Reset button above the pane. This removes any Quick edit adjustments.

To select areas for applying edits

1. Select the Quick Selection tool from the toolbar.

2. Draw within the area that you want to select. Elements makes a selection based on the colors of the pixels you drew upon .

Drawing with the Quick Selection tool creates a selection based on that area.

To apply edits

1. To apply fixes to a specific area of the image, use the Quick Selection tool to select an active area. Otherwise, skip to the next step.

2. Click a type of edit (Smart Fix, Exposure, Levels, etc.) to reveal its controls.

3. If an Auto button is available, click that to first see what Elements suggests.

4. Drag the sliders for specific adjustments to fine-tune the settings .

Use the sliders associated with each type of fix to adjust the After image.

To apply fixes using previews

1. Click the triangle icon to the right of an adjustment slider to reveal thumbnails of the range of that fix’s settings.

2. Move your pointer over a thumbnail to preview the edit .

The preview grid gives you an immediate sense of how the adjustment will appear.

The slider is still available for fine-tuning, but there’s a better way. Click and drag left or right within the thumbnail to make smaller adjustments.

3. Click the thumbnail to apply the setting.

To crop the image

1. Select the Crop tool from the toolbar.

2. In the image’s After version, drag to select the area you wish to keep .

Drag a selection using the Crop tool to keep only that area and discard the rest of the image.

3. Click the Commit button (the check mark) that appears outside the selection to apply the crop.

To apply all edits

1. Choose File > Close, or click the close button in the upper-right corner of the workspace.

2. When prompted, save your changes.

Walking Through Adjustments Using Guided Edit Mode

If you want to start with a little more hand-holding than what’s offered by the Quick edits, try the Guided edit mode; access it by clicking the Guided button.

Clicking a task in this mode provides step-by-step instruction on performing editing tasks .

The Guided Edit interface.

When you’ve accomplished each step, click the Done button to apply the changes, or click Cancel to discard them. You can also click the Reset button that appears in each category to go back to the state before you applied those particular edits if you want to try a different setting.

Some Guided Edit options include:

• Basic adjustments such as Brightness and Contrast and Enhance Colors.

• Photomerge tools such as Scene Cleaner and Style Match (see Chapter 8 for more information).

• Photographic effects such as Depth Of Field , Old Fashioned Photo, and Tilt-Shift.

The Depth Of Field guided edit separates the foreground from background using a blur effect.

• Fun Edits such as adding a reflection or making part of the photo pop out from the rest of the image.

• Effects that replicate cameras or lenses, such as Lomo Camera Effect or Orton Effect.