For Father’s Day, I wanted to create a layout about my dad’s life using lots of pictures and elements. With so many layers in my design, being able to move easily around the page and layers was key. I used a lot of different techniques I have for navigating Photoshop Elements quickly. I wanted to share with you a few of my favorite time-saving tips for navigating quickly around PSE in this tutorial.
Maximize Workspace
First, I maximized the workspace by hiding the project bin. I clicked on the “Hide Project Bin” arrow in the bottom left as shown below.
Maximize Layers Seen
Next, I maximized the number of layers I could see by changing the settings on the Layers Palette. I clicked on the double arrows on the right side of the Layers Palette label, revealing a drop-down menu. From that menu, I selected “Palette Options.”
On the Layers Palette Options screen, I selected the smallest thumbnail under Thumbnail Size so I could see the largest number of layers. Under Thumbnail Contents, I selected “Layer Bounds” so that the thumbnails were the size of the elements, which let me see each element better.
I also shrank the Effects Palette when I didn’t need it by clicking the arrow to the left of the Effects label. You can see on the right below that I could see many more layers.
Zoom In and Out with Scroll Wheel
I reset my preferences so I could zoom in and out using the scroll wheel on the mouse. Choosing from the labels at the very top, I clicked Edit> Preferences> General.
From the choices given, I clicked “Zoom with Scroll Wheel” and then clicked OK. This made zooming in and out much easier.
Navigating Photoshop Elements with Keyboard Shortcuts
I used following keyboard shortcuts to help navigate more easily around the Layers Palette and the page.
- Move to the top: Ctrl+Shift+]This moves the selected layer to the top of the Layers Palette. If you select more than one layer, this will move ALL of the layers to the top, which is very handy.
- Move up: Ctrl+]This moves the selected layer(s) up one layer. Keep hitting [ to move your layer(s) up as far as you wish.
- Move to the bottom: Ctrl+Shift+[This moves the selected layer(s) to the bottom of the Layers Palette.
- Move down: Ctrl+[This moves the selected layer(s) down one layer. Keep hitting [ to move your layer(s) down as far as you wish.
- Adjust the screen view: Space Bar+Left ClickWhen you click space bar and left-click, you will see a little hand appear. Hold down the space bar and left-click button on your mouse, and the view on the screen will move along with the little hand. This is especially helpful when you have zoomed-in on a spot on your layout.
- View the whole page: Ctrl+0 (zero)This is a quick way to change from a zoomed-in view to a full-screen view of your layout.
Try out these tricks for navigating Photoshop Elements and see if they help you. Then post your digital scrapbook layouts in the Scrap Girls Gallery so we can all enjoy them!
Happy Scrapping!
Digital scrapbooking products used:
Industrial Strength Collection Biggie