Photoshop® Elements 8 All-in-One For Dummies®

Chapter 2. Getting to Know the Tools

In This Chapter

• Looking at the Tools panel

• Understanding the tool groups

• Using automation tools

You edit photos by using menu commands and tools. Elements knows that, so it provides you with a toolshed chock-full of different tools to perform all sorts of different editing tasks.

These tasks include selecting image content area, refining and sharpening photos, drawing and painting applications, adding text, and more.

In addition to using tools for manually changing the characteristics of a photo, you can use a number of different tools to magically automate tasks. In this chapter, you take a look at the Tools panel and all the different tools at your disposal for modifying photos in many different ways.

Examining the Tools Panel

The Tools panel opens by default when you enter Edit Full mode. As you may recall from Chapter 1 of this minibook, you can open Edit Full mode directly from the Welcome screen by clicking the Edit button or by choosing Editor

The tools you see in Figure 2-1 are listed by name and their keyboard shortcuts. If you press the key adjacent to the tools shown in Figure 2-1, you select the respective tool. See Chapter 1 in this minibook for more on keyboard shortcuts.

The tools in the Tools panel include the following, listed (basically) ...