With adjustment layers the glass is always half full. You’d be crazy not to use them. Especially when you consider that they add almost no weight to the file size. Each adjustment layer is a simple instruction to move a slider, adjust a curve, or change a histogram. Because the adjustments are stored on their own layers, you have total fl...

Here are some tips that are equally applicable whatever kind of mask you are working on: a Quick Mask, alpha channel, or a layer mask Ask yourself why. Be sure to ask yourself what you are making that mask for. Depending on your intent, it may not even be necessary to make a mask. Can you select the areas of the image you want by color, by to...

In this next example we’ll see how painting in shades of gray allows you to introduce transparency effects: Darker grays conceal more, lighter grays reveal more of the layer. Or put another way, the closer you move towards black, the greater the masking effect; the closer you move towards white, the more the revealing effect. 1. O...

Let’s take a look at layer mask conventions and terminology, beginning with a couple of housekeeping points: The Background layerthat layer that most Photoshop images start out withdoesn’t support transparency and thus can’t support layer masks. It sounds worse than it is: to add a layer mask to a Background layer, take the ...

Smart Objects are the latest development in the evolution of Photoshop layers. Working with pixel-based media, we are inhibited by the rules of resolution. Photoshop allows us to stretch and scale our images as if they were Silly Putty, but if we take too many liberties, we irrevocably damage our images. Not anymore. Smart Objects let us scale...

Layer Comps is a great productivity tool. A snapshot of the state of your Layers palette, a layer comp lets you experiment with multiple versions of a layout in a single document, saving time and disk space, but most importantly freeing you from worrying about what layer went with what on which version, and what its exact opacity and blending ...

With blending modes you commonly arrive at fantastic results that are unexpected and unintentional. One of the great things about using layer blending modes and opacity sliders is that there’s no penalty for experimentation. Blending mode and opacity changes are nondestructive so you can experiment to your heart’s content without ha...

Layer styles are effects like drop shadows, bevels, and glows that you can add to a layer with a single click. These effects change with the content of the layer and can be updated at any time. Layer styles fit in with our approach of nondestructive editing because while the effects are attached to a specific layer, they do not actually change ...

Layers are easy to manage, but a little housekeeping will maximize your productivity. Layers and File Size When working with layers the news is nearly all good, but there are a few things to keep in mind. As you work on an image keep an eye on its file size at the bottom of the application window. The first number indicates the flattened docum...

Mission Control is the Layers palette, where you can show and hide layers, create new layers, and work with groups of layers. The Layers palette menu contains additional commands and options. Choose Palette Options to change the size of the layer thumbnail as well as how that thumbnail is displayed. If you have lots of layers, you might consid...