Step 8: Select The Move Tool

Select Photoshop's Move Tool from the Tools panel, or press the letter V on your keyboard to quickly select it with the shortcut:

Step 9: Drag A Copy Of The Shape Into The Center Of The Document

Press Shift+Alt (Win) / Shift+Option (Mac) and, while holding both keys down, click on your gray shape inside the document and drag it towards the right. The Alt / Option key tells Photoshop that we want to create a copy of the shape as we drag instead of moving the original shape, while the Shift key limits the direction that we can drag in, making it easy to drag in a straight line towards the right.

Drag the copy into the center of the image, which creates the placeholder for the middle photo that we'll be adding. Notice that the white stroke is also copied along with the shape:

Step 10: Rename The New Layer "Placeholder Middle"

If we look in the Layers panel, we can see that the second shape has appeared on its own layer above the original shape. Photoshop has named the new layer "placeholder left copy". Double-click directly on the new layer's name and change it to placeholder middle. Press Enter (Win) / Return (Mac) when you're done to accept the change:

Step 11: Drag Another Copy Of The Shape Into The Right Side Of The Document

Once again hold down Shift+Alt (Win) / Shift+Option (Mac), click on the middle shape and drag a copy of it into the right side of the document. This will become the placeholder for the image that appears on the right. Again, the white stroke is copied along with the shape. Try to leave the same amount of room between the new shape and the right edge of the document as there is between the left shape and the left edge of the document. Don't worry for now if the shapes themselves are not evenly spaced apart, as mine clearly are not:

Step 12: Rename The New Layer "Placeholder Right"

If we look again in the Layers panel, we can see that the third shape appears on its own layer above the other two shapes, and Photoshop has automatically named the new layer "placeholder middle copy". Double-click directly on the layer's name and change it to placeholder right. Press Enter (Win) / Return (Mac) to accept the change when you're done:

Step 13: Select All Three Placeholder Layers At Once

Let's align the three shapes so they're spaced evenly apart. With the top layer ("placeholder right") already selected, hold down your Shift key and click on the original shape's layer ("placeholder left") in the Layers panel. This will select all three placeholder layers at once (you'll see them all highlighted in blue which tells us they're selected):

Step 14: Click The "Distribute Horizontal Centers" Icon

With all three layers selected and the Move Tool still selected, you'll see a series of icons in the Options Bar at the top of the screen which give us various ways to align and distribute the layers. Click on the Distribute Horizontal Centers icon, which will space the shapes out horizontally:

All three placeholder shapes should now be evenly spaced in the document:

We're ready to add some photos to the document. We'll do that next!

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