Understanding the Photoshop Toolbox

Selection Tools

   The first section contains the six kinds of selection tools, which you use to isolate part of an image you want to work with. It holds the rectangular, elliptical and single pixel row marquee tools, the move tool, the freehand, polygonal and magnetic lasso tools, the magic wand, the cropping tool and the slicing tool. The arrow in the lower right corner of each tool indicates the similar tools hidden beneath it.

Illustration/Drawing Tools

   Below the selection tools are the illustration or drawing tools. There are numerous tools here to draw, alter or change the appearance of your photo. Any tool with a small arrow in the lower right corner has at least one other tool hidden beneath it. To access the hidden tools, click and hold the mouse on the tool until a menu of all the tools appears.

The smudge tool , located behind the blur tool , allows for streaking pixels in similar fashion to finger painting, as shown on the left.

Text Tools

   The next section of the toolbox contains the text tools. The four text tools can type text horizontally or vertically, as well as create selection areas shaped as text, known as the type mask tools. As with other hidden tools, all are available by clicking and holding the icon.

The horizontal and vertical type tools work identically to a word processor. The type masks, however, do not type letters but rather define letter-shaped areas in the image that can be modified to look like text in a variety of ways, such as the example of filling in with another image on the left.

Another method of modifying text is by using layer styles. Layer styles can be accessed from the Layer menu. While the layer containing the text is active, choose from one or more of the layer styles to enhance the text's appearance. At left is an example of bevel and emboss to create the 3-dimensional look, and inner glow for the subtle green highlights.