Photoshop CS5: The Missing Manual

Creating and Editing Text

You can create all kinds of text in Photoshop: from plain ol' horizontal to up-and-down vertical. You can even lay down text that flows around or inside a shape. No matter what kind of text you create, it lives on a special layer called a Type layer. You can do anything to a Type layer that you can with any other layer (see Chapter 3): adjust its opacity, change its blend mode, apply layer styles, and so on. (Type layers are labeled with a big fat T in the Layers panel so they're easy to spot.) Photoshop automatically names each new Type layer with the first few words you type, though like any other layer, you can double-click its name in the Layers panel to give it a more meaningful name.

Tip

You can change the orientation of your text—whether it flows from left to right or top to bottom—anytime. Just click the Text Orientation button in the Options bar—it looks like a capital T with tiny downward and right-facing arrows—to switch from one direction to the other (see Orienting text). To create text that flows backwards (from right to left or bottom to top), see Creating a Hollow Text Selection.

To create a new Type layer, select either the Horizontal or Vertical Type tool from the Tools panel as shown in Figure 14-5. Click once in the document where you want your text to start and let the hunting and pecking begin. When you're finished typing, press Enter on your computer's numeric keypad (not Return!) or click the black checkmark at the far right of the ...