If you are a complete novice or looking to brush up your skills, this will be a useful blog for you. Understanding how to work with images in Photoshop is fundamentally important, so let's get started.
Let's start with an empty document.
Click on New or go to File>New
Now you will have some presets to select from - click the drop-down menu to see the options available. Click on 'Photo'
Now from the 'Size' drop-down menu let's select the standard Landscape 5 x 7 size
You'll notice that you can change the 'size' to whatever you'll like. You can also change the 'Resolution'. This is, in a nutshell, the 'print quality' so the higher the resolution is, the better the print quality will be - but the actual size of the printed image will be smaller. You can also choose from different colour modes- the default is RGB.
Let's open this into a new document by clicking 'ok.'
Let's save this as a Photoshop document by going to: File>Save As - now name your File whatever you would like.
You'll notice that the file name ends with '.psd' which means this will be saved as a Photoshop Document; however, you can change the format to a variety of different options by clicking on the 'Format' drop-down list. The best options are 'Photoshop' and 'TIFF' files because these can record layer information. These are extremely important in photoshop, so it is highly recommended to save in either of these formats. Now, click 'Save.'
Now you have a blank canvas you can do lots of different things. You can bring in images, bringing them together, retouch, paint, layer them.
Let's bring in an image, go to file and choose 'Place Embedded'. Now select a file of your choice. Once you have click 'Place'. Now you'll notice that Photoshop will try to fill the canvas with your image. Now you can make this smaller or larger by holding 'Shift' and 'Drag' your image- this will resize your image without distorting it. Then click on the image to move it anywhere you would like. If you don't hold down 'shift' on your keyboard when dragging it is you don't stretch the image. Once you're happy with the, resize just hit return on your keyboard or click the 'tick' icon.
Now you will have this image as a 'layer' inside the 'layers' panel.
Now repeat those steps and bring in another file. Now once again holding 'Shift' and 'Drag' your image down- this will resize your image without distorting it. Then move the image to the desired place.
You don't have to create a new document. You can open an image directly, and it will open up as a layer inside Photoshop. So, for example, go to File>Open - then open and image.
You'll notice the image is opened as a 'Background' layer. Each time you open up an image directly, it will be opened like this, and it will be opened separately in the tab area. You can easily switch between these tabs. By going to 'Window' > 'Arrange' you can find lots of different tile options, and Photoshop will automatically lay them out depending on which option you choose. You can always go back to the normal tab view by going to 'Window' > 'Arrange' > 'Consolidate to tab.'
Another way to import images is view 'Adobe Bridge' which comes within the Adobe CC package. This application will give you a much broader view of all the images on your computer rather than picking out one image at a time. If you double click on an image, it will automatically open in Photoshop. Always make sure you save any changes to your work. An * sign will appear next to your file name if it is an unsaved document in your tab so make sure you go to File> Save.