Essential Layers Panel Preferences
Learn some simple tips for customizing your Layers panel in Photoshop to keep it free of unwanted clutter and create a cleaner, more efficient workspace.
Welcome to Photoshop Essentials, where everyone can learn Photoshop! We offer fun, exclusive, step-by-step tutorials for all skill levels, and all written with beginners in mind. From Photoshop Basics to Photo Editing and Retouching, Photo Effects, Text Effects and more!
Check out our latest Photoshop tutorials below. Or download our tutorials as PDFs and get exclusive bonus content!
Learn some simple tips for customizing your Layers panel in Photoshop to keep it free of unwanted clutter and create a cleaner, more efficient workspace.
In the previous tutorial, we learned the basics of zooming, panning and navigating around images in Photoshop. This follow-up tutorial offers a complete collection of all the essential tips, tricks and shortcuts you need to navigate your images like the pros!
In this Photoshop Basics tutorial, learn the essential tools and options you need to zoom, scroll and navigate your way around your images quickly and easily!
Learn how to turn any portrait image into either a black and white or color pencil sketch using Photoshop CS6. Now fully updated!
In this photo effects tutorial, learn how to easily create a diptych from two separate images, even images of different sizes and orientations, using a few simple tools in Photoshop CS6!
In this tutorial, learn how the new Camera Raw Filter in Photoshop CC lets us easily apply a sepia tone to an image in a way that’s fully editable and non-destructive!
In this photo effects tutorial, learn how to bring more action and excitement to an image with an easy to create radial blur effect! Now fully updated for Photoshop CS6 and CC (Creative Cloud)!
Can’t get your prints to fit properly in your picture frames because the aspect ratios are different? Learn how to easily resize and reshape images in Photoshop to match any frame size you need!
Learn how to quickly remove pimples and other minor skin blemishes with the Spot Healing Brush in Photoshop. For Photoshop CS5 and earlier.
In this photo effects tutorial, learn how to add a sea of stars to your night time photos! Now fully updated for Photoshop CS6 and compatible with Photoshop CC (Creative Cloud)!
In this first tutorial on resizing images in Photoshop CC (Creative Cloud), we take a quick tour of the features and improvements in the newly redesigned Image Size dialog box!
Whether you’re a fan or horror movies or looking for a fun effect for Halloween, learn how to give your photo a more ghostly, supernatural look with this fully re-written and updated tutorial for Photoshop CS6! Also compatible with Photoshop CC (Creative Cloud)!
Learn how the Straighten Tool and the Crop Tool in Adobe Camera Raw 8 work seamlessly together to both crop and straighten your photos at once!
In the previous tutorial in our Adobe Camera Raw 8 series, we learned the basics of cropping images using the Crop Tool. In this related tutorial, learn how the Crop Tool can be used to easily rotate and straighten an image.
Learn how to easily crop your photos non-destructively, and to any aspect ratio you need, using the Crop Tool in Adobe Camera Raw 8!
In this photo retouch tutorial, learn a little-known trick for selecting pixels in a photo based on their lightness values, then how to use them to boost contrast and color saturation to give your image more visual punch! Now fully updated for Photoshop CS6!
Photoshop CC (Creative Cloud) and its new Camera Raw Filter bring with them lots of new and exciting features, including the amazing Radial Filter. Learn how the Radial Filter can be used to add creative, highly customizable and fully non-destructive vignette effects to your images!
Adobe Camera Raw lets us process and edit not only raw files directly from our digital camera but also JPEG and TIFF images. In this tutorial, learn how to open all three files types in Camera Raw, including a look at some potentially confusing options for JPEG and TIFF images in the Camera Raw Preferences.
Did you know that Camera Raw works in both Photoshop and in Adobe Bridge? In fact, running it in Bridge offers certain advantages. Learn what those advantages are, and how to open images in Camera Raw without opening Photoshop!
With raw files and raw image processing being all the rage these days, many people wonder which application they should be using to edit their photos – Photoshop or Camera Raw. Learn what Camera Raw is, where it fits within your editing workflow, and why the answer to which one you should be using is… both!
Adobe Camera Raw is like a streamlined version of Photoshop built specifically for photo editing and retouching. In this Photoshop CS6 tutorial, take a whirlwind tour of the Camera Raw interface and learn about its tools, panels and other photo editing features!
In this first in a series of tutorials on working with Adobe Camera Raw, we take a look at the big advantage raw files have over JPEGs for capturing and editing our digital photos.
In this Photo Effects tutorial, learn how make an image look like it was painted on canvas with this simple painted edges photo border effect. Now fully updated for Photoshop CS6!
In this Photo Effects tutorial, learn how to add a surreal, otherworldly look to a photo with an easy-to-create motionscape effect!
Adobe removed many of the more creative and artistic filters from the Filter menu in Photoshop CS6, but they’re not gone. In this quick tip, learn where to find the missing filters, how this change impacts Smart Filters, and how to restore the Filter menu to the way it looked in CS5 and earlier.
In this Text Effects tutorial, learn how to engulf you text in beams of light and color! Now fully re-written and updated for Photoshop CS6!
In this Photo Effects tutorial, learn how to seamlessly blend two photos together like a Hollywood movie poster! Now fully re-written and updated for Photoshop CS6!
Photoshop’s Print Size view mode is supposed to give us an accurate on-screen preview of how an image will look when printed, but by default, it doesn’t work. In this tutorial, we learn why it’s not working and more importantly, how to easily fix it!
Many Photoshop users believe they need to set the image resolution of their photos to 72 ppi before uploading them to the web or viewing them on screen, but is there really any point to it? We put it to the test and learn why computer screens don’t actually care about image resolution at all!
Workspaces in Photoshop let us easily switch between different panel layouts for different tasks. In this tutorial, learn all about the built-in workspaces that ship with Photoshop, and how to save your own panel layouts as custom workspaces!
Much of what we do in Photoshop involves the use of panels, and with so many panels to work with in Photoshop CS6, things can seem a bit overwhelming. In this tutorial, we learn how to manage and arrange the panels to optimize your work space and keep it all organized!
In this Photo Effects tutorial, learn how to create a smaller, full color version of your photo inside a black and white version of the original full size image! Fully compatible with Photoshop CS6.
Tired of your photos always opening in Windows Photo Viewer when you want to edit them? In this tutorial, learn how to easily set Photoshop as your default image editor on a Windows PC.
In this second tutorial in our series on Photoshop clipping masks, we learn how to use type as a clipping mask to easily place a photo inside your text!
Learn how to create a simple and fun 3D pop up effect in Photoshop where the main subject of your photo appears to be standing up and popping right out of the image!
Learn how to create a quick, non-destructive infrared glow effect using Smart Filters and adjustment layers in Photoshop CS6!
Not all of the great new features in Photoshop CS6 are as easy to find as others, like the hidden Photographic Toning presets that make it easy to apply great looking tinting and split-toning effects to our photos!
Learn how two great new features in Photoshop CS6 – Background Save and Auto Save – will improve your workflow and help minimize annoying interruptions.
Learn how to turn a real life photo into a miniature scene with the new Tilt-Shift blur filter in Photoshop CS6!
Blend modes in Photoshop are a great way to change how a layer interacts, or blends, with the layers below it, but in this tutorial, we get more creative by learning how to apply blend modes to individual color channels using the Apply Image command!
Learn how the new Iris Blur filter in Photoshop CS6, along with its hidden layer mask feature, can help us add a simple blurred vignette effect to a photo!
In this first tutorial on the new features of Photoshop CS6, learn all about the new darker interface and how to control its appearance with color themes!
Learn how to instantly give your photo a whole new look just by choosing one from a list, thanks to the new Color Lookup image adjustment in Photoshop CS6!
Learn how Photoshop’s Content-Aware Scale command can reshape and transform photos from one aspect ratio to another without distorting your main subject or other important areas of the image!
Learn how to create highly customized blur effects with an image using the new Iris Blur filter in Photoshop CS6, which takes everything Field Blur offers and adds even more fine-tune control!
Learn how to easily apply different amounts of blurring to specific areas of an image without the need for layer masks using the new Field Blur filter in Photoshop CS6!
Photoshop CS6 brings with it a completely redesigned and enhanced Crop Tool that makes cropping and straightening images easier than ever! In this tutorial, we learn how it works!
Selecting hair in a photo was once strictly for the pros, but in this tutorial, learn how the improved and powerful Refine Edge command in Photoshop CS5 makes selecting hair easier than ever!
In this Photo Retouch tutorial, learn how to easily replace the original sky in a photo with the sky from a different image using a simple selection, a layer mask, and the power of Photoshop’s Advanced Blending sliders!
It may be called a Black & White image adjustment, but don’t let the name fool you. In this Photo Retouch tutorial, we learn how to combine it with one of Photoshop’s layer blend modes to easily control the brightness and contrast of different areas in a full color photo!