Inside Photoshop® CS

Using the Tool Presets Palette

Of the scores of innovations Adobe Systems has brought to Photoshop, the one we're most impressed with is the Tool Presets palette. The Presets palette is always up there on the Options bar, and it's a good, quick way to save a configuration for any tool. And to add the icing on the cake, you can sort saved presets so the palette presents only the tool you want to use and the permutations you've created and saved. This means, for example, that if you want the orange-tipped square 43-pixel brush tip, you don't have to wallow through presets that refer to Lasso customizations or Eraser tools.

In the steps to come, you'll create a brush, specify a color for it, work on a design, and then pretend you take four months ...