Complete Guide To Learning The Photoshop Interface

Complete Guide To Learning The Photoshop Interface

Chapter 3 of our Photoshop Basics training series. Get up to speed quickly with the interface in Photoshop. You'll learn about the Toolbar, Panels, the Document Window, Workspaces, Screen Modes, and more! For Photoshop CC and CS6.

In this third chapter in our Photoshop Basics series, you'll learn all about the Photoshop interface. You'll exploxre the Toolbar and its many tools, and learn how to manage and work with panels. You'll also learn about the document window and the difference between tabbed documents and floating windows. From there, you'll discover how multi-document layouts let you view two or more images at once, and even how to move images between documents! You'll learn how to streamline and customize Photoshop's interface using workspaces, and how to maximize your work area with Screen Modes.

Use the 10 tutorials below, in the order they're presented, to get up to speed with Photoshop's interface quickly. If you're learning Photoshop from the beginning, you'll want to make sure you've read through Chapter 1, Getting Started With Photoshop, and Chapter 2, Opening Images Into Photoshop, before you continue.

Need print versions of our tutorials? All of our Photoshop tutorials are now available as print-ready PDFs! If you're ready, let's get started learning the Photoshop interface!

01. Getting To Know The Photoshop Interface

In this first tutorial in the series, we take our first look at Photoshop's interface with a general tour of its layout and features. You'll learn about the document window, the panels, the Toolbar, Options Bar, and more!

View tutorial

02. Photoshop Tools And Toolbar Overview

Now that we've had an overview of the Photoshop interface, let's look at its features in more detail. In this second tutorial, you'll learn all about the Toolbar. The Toolbar holds each and every one of Photoshop's tools. You'll learn how to use the Toolbar, and how to find Photoshop's many hidden tools. This tutorial includes a complete summary of each of Photoshop's 66 tools!

View tutorial

03. How To Reset The Tools And Toolbar In Photoshop CC

Knowing how to select Photoshop's tools from the Toolbar is important. But so is knowing how to reset the Toolbar back to its default layout. In this third tutorial in the series, you'll learn how to reset the Toolbar, and how to instantly reset every tool in Photoshop back to its default settings.

View tutorial

04. How To Customize The Toolbar In Photoshop CC

New in Photoshop CC is the ability to customize the Toolbar. In this fourth tutorial, you'll learn how to hide the tools you don't use, change which tools are grouped together, rearrange the order of the tools, and more! And, you'll learn how to save your custom Toolbar layout as a preset!

View tutorial

05. Managing Panels In Photoshop CC

Now that we know all about the Toolbar, it's time to look at Photoshop's panels. Most of what we do in Photoshop is done using panels, and most of the interface is made up of panels. There are panels for working with layers, for choosing brushes and colors, working with text, and many more. In this tutorial, you'll learn everything you need to know to work with panels efficiently!

View tutorial

06. Working With Tabbed Documents And Floating Windows In Photoshop

The document window is the part of Photoshop interface where we view our image. In earlier versions of Photoshop, our images appeared in floating windows. But in more recent versions, we can now view them as tabbed documents. In this tutorial, we learn the difference between tabbed and floating document windows, and how to easily switch between them!

View tutorial

07. How To View Multiple Images At Once In Photoshop

Photoshop has no problem letting us open two or more images at once. But by default, it only lets us view one of those images at a time. There is a way to view all of your images, and that's by using Photoshop's multi-document layouts. In this tutorial, you'll learn how they work!

View tutorial

08. 5 Ways To Move Images Between Photoshop Documents

One of Photoshop's greatest strengths is its ability to blend and composite multiple images. But to do that, you first need to know how to move images from one document to another. By default, Photoshop opens each new image in its own separate document. In this tutorial, you'll learn five easy ways to move your images from separate documents into the same document!

View tutorial

09. How To Use Workspaces In Photoshop CC

A workspace in Photoshop is a preset layout for the interface. Workspaces control which of Photoshop's panels are displayed on your screen, and how those panels are arranged. A workspace can include a custom Toolbar layout, and even custom Menu items and keyboard shortcuts. In this tutorial, you'll how to use Photoshop's workspaces, and even how to create your own!

View tutorial

10. Photoshop Screen Modes And Interface Tricks

Screen Modes in Photoshop let you maximize the amount of room you have for viewing your image by hiding different parts of the interface. A Screen Mode can even hide the interface completely, letting your image take up the entire screen! You'll learn how to use Photoshop's three different Screen Modes, along with some keyboard tricks to quickly give your image more room when you need it!

View tutorial