23 March 2008
Creative Suite: Selecting text
29/03/08 17:55 Filed in: Creative suite
You'll have to excuse me if the following tips are a little too simplistic for you, or you already know them. Not only do they apply to the entire Creative Suite, they also apply to any program out there.
The reason I'm publishing these tips is that I know for a fact that if you don't already know them they will make your life a whole lot easier. Proof of this comes from the reaction I usually get from a good 70% of people that I train in any software, be it InDesign, Illustrator, Quark or whatever. Many people are generally shocked that it’s so easy to select type. You may be too, but if you already know this you'll wonder why I'm wasting everybody’s time.
Selecting type
There are many ways of doing this, of course. The vast majority of people simply insert their cursor into the text and drag, taking care not to pick up any stray spaces at the beginning or end of the selection. Others do the clever thing: they hit Apple-left arrow to select a word, or Apple-down arrow to select a paragraph. All well and good, but here’s the best way of doing it:
Two clicks of the mouse to select a word
Three clicks of the mouse to select a line.
Four clicks of the mouse to select a paragraph
Five clicks of the mouse to select all words (including any over-set type)
Double-click on a word and then drag (keeping the mouse held down) to select a range of type that starts and ends anywhere within a paragraph
(Indesign Only) Position your cursor anywhere within the type and hit Shift-Apple-Home to select all the type from that point upwards. Hit Shift-Apple-End to select all the type from that point downwards
(QuarkXpress Only) Position your cursor anywhere within the type and hit Apple-alt-shift-up arrow to select all the type from that point upwards. Hit Apple-alt-shift-down arrow to select all the type from that point downwards
Apologies once again if all this is old news for you. And double apologies if I've offended any Adobe acolytes by mentioning QuarkXpress. But what the hell... Those guys need help :-)
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Photoshop: Look younger fast
28/03/08 17:47 Filed in: Photoshop
First of all, apologies for not updating this blog for two or three days. I've taken a weekend break with the family and the parents-in-law in rainy old Sussex. Another apology for the shortness of this forthcoming tutorial. I have about twenty minutes before we all sit down to lunch.
This little exercise will be familiar to long-term users of Photoshop but it may perhaps prove to be something of an eye-opener for beginners.
Whenever I train Photoshop, the ability to lose wrinkles and imperfections, etc. is something that trainees always ask for. In Photoshop there is a dazzling array of tools to help you do this. These include the Clone Stamp tool, the Healing Brush tool, the Patch tool, the Red-eye tool and the Spot Healing Brush tool. All of these tools have a time and place but if it's a quick fix that you're after the following will probably help.
1. Duplicate the Background layer of your file. Drag the layer on to the New button to do this.
2. Now go to Filter> Blur> Gaussian Blur and blur the layer so that all the imperfections are gone.
3. Next in the Layers Palette click on the Add Layer Mask button (the grey one with the little circle in it) and make sure the mask is selected (it will have a black rectangle around it).
4. Now select the Brush tool and in the Control Panel lower the opacity, set the brush to airbrush mode and feather the edges of the brush. You're going to begin painting in the main areas of the picture (the eyes, the lips, etc.). Remember that the brush size can be controlled as you paint by using the square bracket keys. The hardness of the brush can be controlled by using Shift-Square Bracket.
As an example, check out the settings I have used below:
5. Use a fairly large brush and don't be too timid with your brushstrokes. Paint in black to reveal detail; if you make a mistake hit the 'X' key to switch foreground and background colours so that you can paint in white to remove your errors.
As you paint you will see the layer mask update in the Layers palette.
Here's the finished article and below is the original, complete with imperfections. At the foot of the page is the actual mask that I created while painting out the imperfections. The whole exercise took about four minutes.
Far better than paying through the nose for plastic surgery.
This little exercise will be familiar to long-term users of Photoshop but it may perhaps prove to be something of an eye-opener for beginners.
Whenever I train Photoshop, the ability to lose wrinkles and imperfections, etc. is something that trainees always ask for. In Photoshop there is a dazzling array of tools to help you do this. These include the Clone Stamp tool, the Healing Brush tool, the Patch tool, the Red-eye tool and the Spot Healing Brush tool. All of these tools have a time and place but if it's a quick fix that you're after the following will probably help.
1. Duplicate the Background layer of your file. Drag the layer on to the New button to do this.
2. Now go to Filter> Blur> Gaussian Blur and blur the layer so that all the imperfections are gone.
3. Next in the Layers Palette click on the Add Layer Mask button (the grey one with the little circle in it) and make sure the mask is selected (it will have a black rectangle around it).
4. Now select the Brush tool and in the Control Panel lower the opacity, set the brush to airbrush mode and feather the edges of the brush. You're going to begin painting in the main areas of the picture (the eyes, the lips, etc.). Remember that the brush size can be controlled as you paint by using the square bracket keys. The hardness of the brush can be controlled by using Shift-Square Bracket.
As an example, check out the settings I have used below:
5. Use a fairly large brush and don't be too timid with your brushstrokes. Paint in black to reveal detail; if you make a mistake hit the 'X' key to switch foreground and background colours so that you can paint in white to remove your errors.
As you paint you will see the layer mask update in the Layers palette.
Here's the finished article and below is the original, complete with imperfections. At the foot of the page is the actual mask that I created while painting out the imperfections. The whole exercise took about four minutes.
Far better than paying through the nose for plastic surgery.
