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...

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 ...