#4 Tools and Layers

Hey.

How's your day been?

Why aren't you talking? It's okay to talk to a computer.

...

Yeah, if you talked, you're crazy.
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Anyway, sadly, I think I haven't explored more than twenty-five percent of the tools and layers part of PS. That's why this post is going to be all about that.

Just to be clear, I just talk about what caught my attention. This blog probably wouldn't be the best for beginners on the program, even though I only know about brushes and making new layers

SO.

Tools

The stuff that everyone is supposed to know how to use.

Note tool- This tool is to place small 'notes' on the document. I imagine it'll help to remind myself to fix anything or something like that.

Dodge/Burn/Sponge tool- If I want to add a simple shadow, highlight, or if I want to take away color, these tools would help. The dodge tool is to brighten areas up. The burn tool is to darken them. And the Sponge tool takes away the color. What's cool about these brushes is that the edges of the brush are blurred out, so the brush blends with the other colors.

Mixer Brush tool- This is one of the most useful tools I found just now. It's like the Dodge/Burn/Sponge tools, but I can choose the color and change the properties of the brush. I can't find these types of properties in the normal brush tool.

Pencil tool- It hasn't relatively been that long since I learned about this. I like this tool, because the bucket tool works with it. With a brush, if I fill in an area, it leaves a little white line between the border line and the color I tried to fill in. I hate that about the brush. But I think that the pencil is exclusive to line art. The pencil tool doesn't have an opacity property you can change, so you're stuck with the opaque versions of the colors you choose. This is unlike the brush tool, which has properties that help it blend with other colors.


Layers

Blending Modes-

I was looking at the blending modes for the layers (since I've barely touched them. Ever.), and I was a bit overwhelmed. So I visited this website I found:

http://www.photoshopessentials.com/photo-editing/layer-blend-modes/intro/

I'm just going to copy and paste the most important piece of information I thought helped me understand the blending modes:

"...there’s really only five main types of blend modes. There’s ones that darken the image, ones that lighten the image, ones that both lighten and darken at the same time to boost contrast, ones that compare pixels between different layers, and finally, ones that affect either the color or luminosity values of an image."


It all clicked for me when I read that. The five blending modes are even separated between one another with small lines in PS itself. If it's still confusing, look at the article on the website. It's a little boring but helpful, nevertheless.


Blending Options-

I just stumbled upon this by double clicking a layer... I don't even...

A window popped up which shows you a lot of options to change the layer you selected. I don't think I'm going to have time to thoroughly go through this window. A quick pass through everything in the window made me realize this can be very helpful in creating shadows and highlights on the object of the layer. That's all.

Adjustment Layers-

I don't think I have to go through this. They're mostly used to change the color/tone of the layer. I think most of it is just for color correction.

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I think that's it for now.  The only other thing I want to focus on is brush properties. Maybe in here I can get the brush to have the same properties as the mixer brush tool.

12fps. Did this with the pencil tool. The color fills were really easy to use. It reminded me of the good old times in Flash. The blending options of the layers helped me make the shadow. It was so easy, I'm beginning to love what I happened to stumble upon!