20 Handy Photoshop Tips For a Faster Workflow
We all use Photoshop on a daily basis, but I bet there’s at least one tip in this post that will give you the old ‘Why didn’t I know of this before’ moment! It’s tips like these that make the most common of tasks quicker and easier than ever to help speed up your Photoshop workflow.
Hold Spacebar to move a selection
Drag a selection with the Marquee tool, but before releasing the mouse button, press and hold the Spacebar to relocate the selection.
Display larger font previews
Go to Photoshop’s preferences and head down to the Type section. Change the Font Preview Size option to Extra Large to display legible preview on the font drop down menu.
Change values with the cursor keys
Rather than typing in an exact figure, simply nudge the numeric value up and down sequentially with the cursor keys.
Quickly zoom back to 100%
Double click the Zoom icon’s magnifying glass to jump back to 100%.
Toggle visibility of multiply layers
Click the ‘eye’ icon next to a layer to toggle the visibility on or off, then drag the selection down the palette to repeat the command on multiple layers.
Hide or show all other layers
Press the ALT key while clicking the ‘eye’ icon next to a layer to toggle the visibility of all other layers.
Load the selection of a layer
Press CMD while clicking the layer thumbnail to load a selection of the layer contents.
Quickly toggle between blending modes
Windows users can simply toggle using the cursor keys, Mac users however can use the Shift key along with the plus and minus keys while the direct selection tool is active. Using this command while another tool is selected will change the blending mode option for that specific tool.
Toggle palette visibility
Increase the size of your work area by toggling off the palettes using the Tab key. Hover over the edges of the screen to bring back palettes, which will then disappear again when the mouse is moved away.
Fit to full screen
Another handy tip for Mac users. Cycle through various full screen modes by pressing the F key.
Switch to precision cursor mode
Press Caps Lock to turn on the precision cursor, useful for creating accurate selections. This also toggles off the brush outline, which can be handy for some occasions.
Increase and decrease brush size
With the Brush tool selected, press the [ and ] keys to increase or decrease the brush size.
Rotate a Photoshop brush
Head into the Brush setting, under Brush Tip Shape adjust the circular icon to rotate the angle of the brush.
Quickly adjust layer opacity
Select a preset opacity value by pressing the numeric keys from 1-10. Number one equals 10%, five equals 50% and so on.
Auto select layers or groups
Select and adjust the selection settings to automatically select a layer, or a group. Or turn the option off to avoid accidental layer selection.
Automatically load files into layers
Go to File > Scripts > Load files into stack to open up a bunch of images and automatically place them onto individual layers.
Easily create new guides
Click and drag a guide from the document rulers, or go to View > New Guide to drop a guide at a specific placement.
Change layer palette thumbnail sizes
Click the small options arrow in the corner of the Layers Palette, then change the Layers Panel Options to alter the thumbnail size.
Copy multiple layers
Draw a selection, then use the shortcut Shift+CMD+C to Copy Merged. This takes every layer into the clipping, rather than just the current layer selection.
Move items with super nudge
The cursor keys will nudge an object by 1px by default. Hold Shift while nudging to increase this to 10px. Especially handy when designing web layouts for consistent spacing.
Thanks for all the great tips, there were some that I didn’t know and will definitely be using.
Tnx for ‘load into stack’, how I didn’t see it before I don’t know :)
Huge font previews! I love you.
great tip on Copy multiple layers – wow so useful – never knew that one
Omg the huge font previews are awesome! Thanks :)
Also worth mentioning: Space Bar for hand tool, and ctrl+, ctrl-, and ctrl0 to zoom in, out, and 100%.
For sizing type, there’s another great feature (on macs..I don’t know the PC equivalent):
With your type layer selected, simply hover over the font size box and hold down “Command” and drag left or right with the mouse. This increases (drag right) and decreases (drag left) the font in increments of 1. If you hold the “Option” + “Command” the increments are +/- .1 pt (1/10 of a point). And if you hold down “Shift” + “Command” the increment is +/- 10.
Great tips, mastering shortcuts like this can save you many hours over time! Thanks
The font preview is cool and awesome!
huh, thought i know all the shortcuts. these are gonna save me some time! thanks
awesome post! at least 3 of them I didn’t know and will come in handy! thx :D
You can also adjust brush size in CS4 by pressing Option + Control and dragging the mouse right to increase brush size and left to decrease brush size.
(Make sure brush tool is selected first)
Thanks for all the short cuts, I didn’t about half of them.
thanks for this post it was very helpful. This shortcut is also helpful to me: Apple+Alt+Shift+E makes a stamp of your work.
Thanks again
Brush size and layer opacity – awesome tips I didn’t know, real time savers. Great list.
Thnx for tips. It’s always useful to run through such articles.
Wow… feel lucky to find out that there was nothing new for me… am I Pro or its just that I know…?
Great tips Chris!
Some are new for me and will definitely improve my workflow
Thanks
Great tips! I’ve never been able to increase/decrease brush sizes with the bracket keys, though. I’ve tried every bracket, and it just doesn’t work on my Swedish keyboard layout. It’s annoying because I would *love* to use this keyboard shortcut — using the mouse to change brush sizes is a major pain. Has anyone heard of this before or know how to fix it?
Oh…I love them all, but most especially, the super large font previews…thank you!
OMG! Now I know how that precision cursor happens to keep appearing when I’m working, I now know how to turn it off :D
Thank you for the ‘load into stack’ command, very useful and sometimes save a lot of time;)
A great set, might be the most useful thing I read all day.
Some very helpful tips. Thanks a lot!
You’re the man!
This has been one of the most useful posts I’ve read in a long time. Great work.
9/20, not too bad for me ;)
Thanks for the tips. They are going to be timesavers for sure!
O MY GOD! I have been using photoshop for 3 years and would consider my self preficient…But I have not know about half of these until now! Thanks so much, Im sure this will increase my work flow!
Great set, some things that I could have used forever now, but light they always say better late than never.
Huge font previews! I love you.
Thank you A LOT! It’s very very useful!