Fun With Photoshop Elements

Photoshop Elements is great for making pictures look better, but there are a number of tools within Photoshop Elements that you may not know about. Some are practical, others are just fun.

Give layers beveled or glowing edges:

This is especially fun with text, but it can also be a handy skill for scrapbook pages or photo collages.

This technique works especially well with text - but you can do it to any layer (besides the background layer).

1. Select the text tool.

2. Place the text tool over the area of the photo that you want to type.

3. Type out a word of phrase on the photo. Keep in mind that Elements will use the foreground color as the text color (in the illustration, purple would be the text color.

4. Select the Styles & Effect tab at the side. If it isn't there, go to the Window menu at the top of the screen and check Styles & Effects.

5. In the Layers & Effects Palette, click on the effect you want to apply to the selected layer. Notice at the top of the palette there are two drop down menus. The one on the right allows you to display filters, effects or layer styles.
The drop down menu on the right allows you to choose they type of effect you want to work with - you can apply more than one type of effect, but only one effect from each category, such as bevels, drop shadows or glows.

Adding captions: To add a caption to white space below the photo do follow the procedure below:

1. Go to the Image menu at the top and choose Resize -> Canvas Size.

2. Make sure to choose the top center anchor point as seen above.

3. Type in an extended amount to the height. In the example above, you would want to change the height to 3.5 or greater to allow enough room for the caption.

4. Click OK to apply the change.

Panoramas: To create a panorama go to File->New->Photomerge™ Panorama. Browse to your photos and select the ones you want to merge into a panorama. Follow the wizard through the steps.

Don't forget the question box: If there is a particular tool or skill that you want to learn about in Photoshop, don't forget the question box.

At the top of Photoshop Elements, you can type a question in (in plain English) and the program will guide you to a list of topics and step-by-step tutorials. This is the most underused feature of Elements, but it should be the just the opposite.

Don't forget, I have a Adobe Photoshop Elements tutorial CD that you can purchase in our shopping section or follow this link.