Adobe Photoshop Elements 6

Adobe Photoshop Elements 6: Using Help

Help is available in several ways, each one useful in different circumstances:

Help in the application The complete user documentation for Adobe Photoshop Elements 6 is available as Help in the application, in the form of HTML content that you can access with your default browser. Help in the application provides easy access to summarized information on common tasks and concepts. Help in the application can be especially useful if you are new to Photoshop Elements or if you aren’t connected to the Internet.
LiveDocs Help on the Web This is the most comprehensive and up-to-date version of Photoshop Elements Help. It is the recommended choice if you have an active Internet connection.
Help PDF Help is also available as a PDF that is optimized for printing; just go to http://www.adobe.com/go/learn_pse_printpdf to download the PDF document. The Help PDF file is about 30 MB in size and may take a considerable time to download when using a slow Internet connection.
Links in the application Within the Photoshop Elements 6 application there are links to additional help topics, such as the “Tell me more” link at the bottom of the panel in each guided task.

NOTE: You do not need to be connected to the Internet to view Help in the application. However, with an active Internet connection, clicking the “This page on the Web” link on any page in the application’s Help opens the corresponding page in LiveDocs.

Navigating Help in the application

Choose Help > Photoshop Elements Help, or press the F1 key. Your default Web browser will open and display the starting page of the Adobe Photoshop Help in the application. Do any of the following:

Click the Contents link in the top left corner of the window. Click a topic heading in the table of contents. Click the plus sign (+) to the left of a topic heading to see its sub-topics. Click a topic or sub-topic to display its content.
Click the Index link in the top left corner of the window. Click on a letter to display index entries starting with that letter. Click the plus sign (+) to the left of an index header or click the index header to see its entries. Click the index entry to display its content on the right side of the window.
Select the Search link in the top left corner of the window. Enter a search term, and then click Search. When the search has finished, click a search result in the list on the left side of the window to display its content on the right side of the window.

Search tips

Adobe Help Search works by searching the entire Help text for topics that contain all the words typed in the Search box. These tips can help you improve your search results in Help:

If you search using a phrase, such as “shape tool,” put quotation marks around the phrase. The search returns only those topics containing that specific phrase.
Make sure that the search terms are spelled correctly.
If a search term doesn’t yield results, try using a synonym, such as “photo” instead of “picture.”

Accessing LiveDocs Help on the Web

LiveDocs Help on the Web contains the most up-to-date version of Photoshop Elements Help. In addition, it enables you to search across multiple applications.

To access Photoshop Elements’ LiveDocs Help on the Web, part of the Adobe Help Resource Center, do any of the following:
- Click the “This page on the Web” link, located at the bottom of any topic page in Adobe Help in the application.
- In your Web browser, open the Adobe Help Resource Center at http://www.adobe.com/support/documentation. Select Photoshop Elements from the list of products, and then click Go. On the Photoshop Elements resources page, click the LiveDocs link.
To switch to LiveDocs Help for a different product, select that product from the Browse menu, and then click Go.
To search for a topic, type the search term in the Search box, and then click Search. To search across all products, click Search All Products on the LiveDocs Search Results page, type in the search term, and then click Go.

Links to help in the application

There are some links to additional help within the Photoshop Elements 6 application. Clicking these links will take you to the corresponding topic in either Help in the application or LiveDocs Help on the Web.

Hot-linked tips

Hot-linked tips are available throughout Adobe Photoshop Elements. These tips either display information in the form of a typical tip balloon or link you to the appropriate topic in the help file.

Adobe Photoshop Elements 6: Creating a Photoshop.com account

Another way to share your photos and videos is by creating an online album. You can create your free Photoshop.com account so that you’re ready to take advantage of the exciting new Adobe-hosted Web-based services that extend the capabilities of Photoshop Elements.

NOTE: For Adobe Photoshop Elements 6, these services will be available to users in the United States only. Photoshop Elements users outside the United States will continue to share their Albums to third party sharing services via Photoshop Showcase (www.photoshopshowcase.com).

With your free Photoshop.com membership you get your own personal web page, where you can not only share and showcase your images but also access your photos and videos anytime and anywhere that you can connect to the internet. You can use your Photoshop.com storage space to back up your Photoshop Elements albums and effortlessly safeguard your memories.

You’ll also get access to the Photoshop.com Inspiration Browser, with regularly updated downloadable content such as sharing templates, page layouts, artwork, borders, frames, backgrounds, and more—as well as integrated tutorials offering tips and tricks related to whatever you’re working on, providing a powerful way to advance your skill set with Photoshop Elements.

You can share your Photoshop.com web gallery with the world at large, or privately with friends, family, or clients to whom you chose to give the address.

To sign up for your free Photoshop.com account, do one of the following:
- In the Welcome screen, click the Join Now button.
- In either the Organizer or Editor, click the Join Now link in the menu bar.
Fill out your personal details in the Photoshop.com Membership dialog box (see the illustration on the next page), and then click Create Account. Enjoy!

Adobe Photoshop Elements 6: Sharing photos in e-mail

Have you ever had to wait long time for an incoming e-mail to download, and then found that the e-mail contained only a single photograph in an unnecessarily high resolution? You can avoid imposing this inconvenience on others by using the Organizer e-mail function, which exports a copy of the image that is optimized specifically for sending via e-mail.

In the Photo Browser, select the photo (or photos) you’d like to send by e-mail.
In the Share panel of the Task pane, click the E-mail Attachments button.

NOTE: The first time you access this feature you will be presented with the E-mail dialog box. Choose your e-mail client (such as Outlook Express or Adobe E-mail Service) from the menu, and then click Continue. You can review or change your settings later by choosing Edit > Preferences > Sharing.
(Optional) Drag more photos from the Photo Browser to add to your selection.
Select Very Small (320 × 240 px) from the Maximum Photo Size menu and adjust the image quality using the Quality slider (the higher the quality the larger the file size and the longer the download time). The resulting file size and download time for a typical 56 Kbps dial-up modem are estimated and displayed for your reference. When you’re done, click Next.
Under Message, select and delete the “Here are the photos…” text and type a message of your own.
Next to Select Recipients, click the Edit Contact Book button. In the Contact Book dialog box, click the New Contact button. In the New Contact dialog box, type in the name (or a nickname—our example uses Mom) and e-mail address of the person to whom you want to send the picture. Click OK to close the New Contact dialog box and click OK again to close the Contact Book dialog box.
Under Select Recipients, click the check box next to Mom to select it, and then click Next.

Your default e-mail application immediately creates an e-mail message. You can edit the message and Subject line to say what you want. When you are finished and ready to send the e-mail, either make sure that you are connected to the Internet and click Send if you actually want to send the e-mail, or close the message without saving or sending it.

Adobe Photoshop Elements 6: Reviewing and comparing

Photoshop Elements 6 provides several options to quickly and easily review and compare your images.

Viewing photos at full screen or side-by-side

The Full Screen View and Side by Side View let you review your images without the distraction of other interface items such as windows, menus and palettes.

About keyword tags

Keyword tags are personalized labels, such as “Vacation” or “Beach,” that you attach to photos, video clips, audio clips and other creations in the Photo Browser to make it easier to organize and find them.

When you use keyword tags, there’s no need to manually organize your photos in subject-specific folders or rename files with content-specific names.

In fact, both of the latter solutions confine a given photo to a single group. By contrast, you can assign multiple keyword tags to a photo, allowing it to be included in several different groupings. You can then easily retrieve the selection of images you want by clicking the appropriate keyword tags in the Keyword Tags palette.

For example, you could create a keyword tag called “Beach – Croatia” and attach it to every photo you took at that location. You can then instantly find all the photos with the Beach – Croatia keyword tag by clicking the Find box next to that tag in the Keyword Tags palette, even if the photos are stored in different folders on your hard disk.

You can create keyword tags to group your images any way you want. For example, you could create keyword tags for individual people, places and events in your life.

You can attach multiple keyword tags to your photos and easily run a search based on a combination of keyword tags to find a particular person at a particular place or event.

For example, you can search for all “Christine” keyword tags and all “John” keyword tags to find all pictures of Christine with her husband, John.

Or search for all “Christine” keyword tags and all “Beach – Croatia” keyword tags to find all the pictures of Christine vacationing at the beach in Croatia.

Use keyword tags to organize and find photos by their content or any other association. See Lessons 2 and 3 for more information on keyword tags.

Click the Display button near the upper right corner of the Organizer window, and then choose View Photos In Full Screen from the menu.In the Full Screen View Options dialog box, you can customize the slide show—for example, you can play an audio file as you view the images. You can also choose to display thumbnails of the selected files in a filmstrip along the right side of the screen, or add a fade between pictures.
Disable the Include Captions option and activate the Start Playing Automatically option; then click OK to start the slide show.

Your photos are displayed as a full-screen slide show—an enjoyable and efficient way to view a set of photos.

The control bar, which contains buttons for playing, rotating, and zooming disappears from view when you don’t move the mouse for a couple of seconds.

TIP: When you view images in full screen, you can quickly assign a rating. On the right end of the control bar, click a star to apply a rating. You can also apply the rating using the shortcut keys, 1 (for 1 star) through 5 (for 5 stars).

To make the control bar reappear, move the mouse.
Press the Esc key on your keyboard to return to the Organizer.
Click the Display button, and then choose Compare Photos Side By Side to display two photos simultaneously. Side by Side View is useful when you need to focus on details and differences between photos. You can select two or more photos to compare. When you click the Next Photo button in the control bar, the selected image changes to the next image in your selection. By default, image # 1 (on the left or top) is selected. To select image #2 instead, click it.

You can switch between views by clicking the Full Screen View button or the Side by Side View button in the control bar. While in either view, you can right-click an image and access further options from the context menu. For example, you can mark an image for printing, fix red eye, add a photo to an album, and delete or apply keyword tags.

Press the Esc key on your keyboard to return to the Organizer.

NOTE: The selected image has a blue border. If you have the filmstrip showing, you can click any image in the filmstrip to view it in place of the selected image.

TIP: Choose the photos to be compared in the Organizer by holding the Ctrl key and selecting the images. Then, choose View > Compare Photos Side By Side.

Adobe Photoshop Elements 6: Getting photos from files and folders

Digital images stored on your computer can also be imported into Photoshop Elements.

Choose File > Get Photos And Videos > From Files And Folders.
In the Get Photos dialog box, navigate to the Lesson01 folder and click once to select the Photos folder that contains sample images.
Select the Get Photos From Subfolders check box. If selected, deselect the Automatically Fix Red Eyes and the Automatically Suggest Photo Stacks check boxes, and then click Get Photos.

The Getting Photos dialog box appears and the photos are imported into Photoshop Elements. Since the imported photos contain keyword metadata, the Import Attached Keyword Tags dialog box appears.

In the Import Attached Keyword Tags dialog box, click Select All, and then click OK. Click OK to close any other alert dialog box.

The imported photos appear in the Organizer.

Adobe Photoshop Elements 6: Getting photos from a digital camera or card reader

You can import image files from your camera directly into Photoshop Elements 6.

Connect your camera or card reader to your computer. For instructions on connecting your device, refer to the manufacturer’s documentation that came with it.
Once your camera or card reader is connected to your computer, you’re ready for the next step:
- If the Windows Auto Play dialog box appears, click Cancel.
- If the Photo Downloader dialog box appears automatically, continue with step 3.
- If the Photo Downloader dialog box does not appear automatically, choose File > Get Photos And Videos > From Camera Or Card Reader.
Under Source in the Photo Downloader dialog box, open the Get Photos From menu and choose the name of the connected camera or card reader.
Under Import Settings, accept the folder location listed next to Location, or click Browse to choose a new location for the files.
Next to Create Subfolder(s), choose one of the date formats if you want the photos to be stored in subfolders named by capture or import date. You can also choose Custom Name to create a folder using a name you type in the text box, or choose None if you don’t want to create any subfolders at all. Your selection is reflected in the pathname Location pathname.
From the Rename Files menu, choose Do Not Rename Files and from the Delete Options menu choose After Copying, Do Not Delete Originals. If the Automatic Download option is activated, click the check box to disable it.

You will learn more about customizing import settings and the advanced features of the Adobe Photo Downloader in Lessons 2 and 3.

Click the Get Photos button.

The photos are copied from the camera to the specified folder location.

If the Files Successfully Copied dialog box appears, click OK.The Getting Photos dialog box appears as the photos are imported into Photoshop Elements 6.

If the imported photos contain keyword metadata, the Import Attached Keyword Tags dialog box will appear. Select the keyword tags you wish to import. The keyword tags you selected are added to the Keyword Tags palette when the photos are imported. If a keyword tag has an asterisk (*), you already have a keyword tag of the same name in your catalog and that keyword tag is attached to the photos.

Click OK to close any other alert dialog box.

The imported photos appear in the Photo Browser pane.

Adobe Photoshop Elements 6: Creating a new catalog

Photoshop Elements 6 stores information about your images in catalog files, which manage the photos on your computer but are independent of the image files themselves. As well as digital photographs, a catalog can include video and audio files, scans, PDF documents, and any presentations and layouts you might create in Photoshop Elements such as slide shows, photo collages, and CD jacket designs. When you sort and group your media in Photoshop Elements, all your work is recorded in the catalog. A single catalog can efficiently handle thousands of files, but you can also create separate catalogs for different types of work.

NOTE: Before you start working on this lesson, make sure that you’ve installed the software on your computer from the application CD (see the Photoshop Elements 6 documentation) and that you have correctly copied the Lessons folder from the CD in the back of this book onto your computer’s hard disk.

Start Photoshop Elements, either by double-clicking the shortcut on your desktop or by choosing Start > All Programs > Adobe Photoshop Elements 6.
Do one of the following:
- If the Welcome Screen appears, click Organize in the row of shortcut buttons across the top of the Welcome Screen, and then wait until the Organizer has finished opening.
- If the Photoshop Elements Editor window opens without first displaying the Welcome Screen, click the Welcome Screen button located at the left in the menu bar to display the Welcome Screen, and then click Organize. Or, click the Organizer button located at the right in the menu bar. Wait until the Organizer has finished opening.
- If the Photoshop Elements Organizer window opens without first displaying the Welcome Screen you are ready to continue with step 3.
In the Organizer window, choose File > Catalog.
In the Catalog Manager dialog box, click New.
In the Enter A Name For The New Catalog dialog box, type Lesson1 for the catalog name, disable the option Import Free Music Into This Catalog, and then click OK.Now you have a special catalog that you’ll use just for this lesson. All you need is some pictures to put in it.

Adobe Photoshop Elements 6: Importing media – Getting photos

To view and organize your photos in Photoshop Elements 6, you first need to import them into your catalog. You can bring photos into Photoshop Elements from a variety of sources and in several different ways:

Bring images from your camera or card reader directly into the Photoshop Elements Organizer using the Adobe Photo Downloader. Getting photos directly in this way will save you time and enable you to start working with them sooner.
Download pictures to your hard disk using the software that came with your digital camera, and then bring them into Photoshop Elements using the Get Photos And Videos > From Files And Folders command. If you prefer to work with other software to import your files to your computer, you’ll first need to disable Adobe Photo Downloader. To disable the Adobe Photo Downloader, click its icon in the task bar, and then choose Disable. Do this only if you plan to use other software to import images to your computer.
If your camera or card reader is displayed as a drive in Windows Explorer, you can drag the files to a folder on your hard disk, and then bring them into Photoshop Elements using the Get Photos And Videos > From Files And Folders command.

In most cases, you’ll need to install the software drivers that came with your camera before you can download pictures to your computer. You may also need to set up the Photoshop Elements Camera or Card Reader Preferences.

Adobe Photoshop Elements 6: The Editor workspace

In the Editor you’ll focus on editing, adjusting, and correcting your images and creating projects and presentations to showcase them. You can choose between the Full Edit mode—with tools for color correction, special effects, and image enhancement—the Quick Fix mode with simple tools and commands to quickly fix common image problems, and the Guided Edit mode, which provides step-by-step instructions for editing tasks.

If you are new to digital imaging, the Quick Fix and Guided Edit modes make a good starting point for adjusting and correcting your photos.

If you’ve worked with image editing software before, you’ll find that the Full Edit mode provides a more powerful and versatile image editing environment, with commands for correcting exposure and color and tools to help you make precise selections and fix image imperfections. The Full Edit tool bar also includes painting and text editing tools. You can arrange the Full Edit workspace to suit the way you prefer to work by moving, hiding, and showing palettes or arranging them in the Palette Bin. You can zoom in or out of a photo and set up multiple windows and views.

Using the Palette Bin

In the Full Edit workspace, the Palette Bin of provides a convenient location to store and manage the palettes you use for image editing tasks. By default, only the Effects and Layers palettes are placed in the Palette Bin. Other palettes that you choose from the Window menu are opened in the work area. These are known as floating palettes. You can decide which palettes float and which will be stored in the Palette Bin.

To add floating palettes to the Palette Bin

Choose Window > [palette name] to open the palette you wish to place in the Palette Bin.
Drag the palette to the Palette Bin by its name tab. Dragging the palette by the bar across the top of the palette window simply repositions the palette without placing it in the Palette Bin.

Another way to add a floating palette to the Palette Bin is to choose Place In Palette Bin When Closed from the palette menu (accessed by clicking the triangle circled in the illustration below}, and then close the palette window.

To remove palettes from the Palette Bin or close palettes

Remove a palette from the Palette Bin by dragging the it into the main work area by its title bar.
Open the palette menu and disable the option Place In Palette Bin When Closed.
To close a palette, choose Window > [palette name], or click the close box in the top right corner of a floating palette. When a palette is visible, a check mark is displayed adjacent to the palette’s name in the Window menu; selecting a palette name that shows a check mark causes the palette window to be closed.

Adjusting the size of palettes in the Palette Bin

Adjust the size of palettes in the Palette Bin by doing either or both of the following:

Drag the triangle in the left border of the Palette Bin to adjust its width.
Drag the separator bars between palettes up or down to adjust the height of a palette.

Adobe Photoshop Elements 6: The Organizer workspace

In the Organizer workspace, the main work area is the Photo Browser pane where you can find, sort, and organize your photos and media files and preview the presentations you create to share them. At the right of the Organizer window is the Task pane, including the Organize, Fix, Create, and Share panels.

The Photo Browser pane can display a single photo or media file or show thumbnails of all the files in your catalog arranged in a variety of ways. Display your files sorted by import batch, folder location, or keywords—or if you prefer viewing your photos and media files by date, the Organizer includes a Date View workspace that lets you work with your files in a calendar format.

The Photo Browser makes it easy to browse through all the photos and assets in your catalog in one comprehensive window. It can even show previews of files that you keep stored remotely—on a CD or other removable media.

In the Organize panel of the Task pane you can sort and manage your photos by applying keyword tags and arranging them in albums. The Fix panel offers tools for the most common photographic editing tasks, such as color correction and red eye removal. (For more complex editing tasks, you’ll switch to the Editor workspace by choosing Quick Fix, Full Edit, or Guided Edit from the Editor menu.) Use the Create panel to put together projects and presentations—from greeting cards to slide shows—and the Share panel to share your files with friends, family, clients or the world at large by burning a CD or DVD, sending your photos as e-mail attachments or photo mail layouts, or creating an online album.