Hello, welcome to this video! Let's get in a short time all the main
features you need to see to start using Adobe Photoshop Elements 2020!
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Photoshop Elements is a very good photo editing solution for both amateurs
and expert users, including lots of features from the most-known Photoshop
CC and it is available under a perpetual license, without any subscription
plan needed. It is part of the Adobe Elements bundle among Adobe Elements
Organizer, used to manage and organize your own media with metadata,
ratings and locations; and Premiere Elements, a video editing software
dedicated to video adjustments and compositions.
To learn more about Premiere Elements, check out our dedicated video in
this guide!
When opening Photoshop Elements, the basic Home Screen page shows up, with
lots of tips, tutorials and a Search bar you can use to find additional
help and information. At the bottom, you can start from any recent work
in progress or from any Adobe Elements product, such as Photoshop Elements
by going to Photo Editor.
First of all, import your interested photos by either dragging and
dropping these into the workspace or using the Open button in the top left
corner. All these will be listed inside the Photo Bin collection at the
bottom, that you can hide and show with its button below.
At this point, you can use any of the three workspaces on top to modify
and adjust the photos: Quick is the simplest workspace but you can use
Guided to apply basic and advanced corrections explained step-by-step or
the Expert one to get full control of your modifications, very similar to
Photoshop CC.
In this simple video we are going to see the Quick and the Guided
workspaces. You can check out one of our videos to know more about the
Expert workspace.
The Quick workspace comes with a big preview on the center, showing the
appearance of the photo selected from the Photo Bin collection. You can
zoom in by holding down the ALT key and using the mouse wheel or pan with
the Space bar key.
With the photo selected, you can start editing it with all the tools and
features around the preview, such as the toolbox on the left, the basic
buttons at the bottom and the several editing panels on the right.
At the bottom, you can use the Rotate buttons to rotate the image by 90
degrees and the Organizer and the Home Screen buttons to open Adobe
Organizer or come back to the Home Screen page.
The toolbox on the left collects all the tools to modify the image
appearance. For each of these tools, the Tool Options at the bottom shows
all the properties and options available for it.
You can use the Straighten Tool to align photos by defining a segment on
the horizon to make it horizontal. To save the original aspect ratio,
auto-cropping is also applied.
The Crop Tool crops the photo by using a rectangular grid that you can
move and size by using its nodes, holding down the Shift key to save its
aspect ratio. You can also click and drag outside the grid to rotate.
Then use either Cancel or Commit to undo or apply the crop.
In case you make any mistake, you can come back to your previous steps by
using the Undo and the Redo buttons at the bottom.
Use the Eye Tool to remove red eyes by including these into a rectangular
area. You can adjust eye radius and color from the Tool Options.
With Whiten Teeth you can click on the teeth to make these brighter.
The Healing Brush Tool includes two ways to apply precise corrections and
adjustments from the Tool Options. With Spot Healing Brush you can click
on small imperfections to correct these quickly.
Whereas with Healing Brush you can adjust wider parts of the photo by
covering the bad parts with others under a reference point, shown as a
cross. Hold down the ALT key and click on the point to be taken as
reference. Then brush on the interested parts that shall be corrected. You
can set the way to apply corrections from the Tool Options.
Photoshop Elements also includes several Type Tools to add pieces of text
on your photo.
You can use the Horizontal and the Vertical Type Tools to drop horizontal
or vertical text. Just define a text area sufficiently big to contain the
text content and type inside. You can adjust the text properties and color
from the Tool Options, editing the whole text or just the part you have
selected from the Preview. Once you finish editing, apply with Commit.
The Text on Shape and the Text on Custom Path are pieces of text that
follow any closed shape or custom curve placed on the preview.
First of all drop any regular shape or draw freehand and then click on
any point to start typing from that point. Make sure to resize text
properly or you won't be able to cover the path correctly. Always apply
with Commit.
All these pieces of text are independent objects that you can manage with
the Move Tool enabled. You can click and drag on these to move and use
the nodes to scale and rotate. You can also double-click on any text to
re-type. In this case you can still move and resize by holding down the
CTRL key.
Photoshop Elements offers several corrections, adjustments and effects you
can apply by using the panels on the right side, from Adjustments to Frames.
The Adjustments panel collects all the major photo adjustments in several
sections. On each of these you can use the sliders for precise corrections
or take any ready template from the list. You can hover over these to
check the result on the preview, or just click on any to apply it. Use
Auto to pick the correct template automatically and use the revert symbol
to undo.
Use Smart Fix to apply quick fixes on brightness and contrast. Use
Exposure to adjust the exposure level. With Lighting you define the
brightness level on the different parts of the photo, from the darkest
sides with Shadows to the brightest ones with Highlights.
With Color you can adjust the colors of the photo, such as intensity with
Saturation, the colors to use with Hue and color improvement with Vibrance.
Use Balance to apply color filters with Temperature and Tint.
Use Sharpen to reduce blurriness and recover details from the photo.
As you edit the picture, you can change the View in the top left corner
to check the photo appearance Before and After your modifications.
By default all these adjustments are applied on the whole photo, unless
you use the Selection Tools to select specific areas where to add your
adjustments.
From the Tool Options you can use several kinds of Selection Tools. For
example you can use Quick Selection to select parts by brushing on it.
The selected area extends over similar colors, up to the borders it meets.
Selection Brush works the same, with the difference that the region is not
automatically extended.
These selections are cumulative and get added as you brush on. You can
hold down the ALT key to refine the selection by removing any part. To
remove all selections, use the Escape key.
You can also enable the Type Mask Tools to type horizontal or vertical
text in order to create a selection area with the same shape of the typed
text.
The selection tools are also used to put multiple pictures together by
cutting and pasting one on another when using the layers of the Expert
workspace. We won't see this in this beginner tutorial.
Besides the Adjustments, you can also apply Effects, Textures and Frames
to the entire photo by choosing any from the list. Use CTRL+Z to undo.
For other basic and advanced corrections you can switch to the Guided
workspace and choose from the list, from Basics to Photomerge. These are
fully guided and explained in details on a dedicated panel inside the
Quick workspace. Use the buttons at the bottom to proceed, cancel or apply.
Once you finish editing, you can save the current photo by going to File
and then to Save As, saving as .psd to reopen the photo modifications at
any time or render it as .jpg or .png to export it.
You can also use Create and Share to export photos as slideshows, DVD
creations or directly online.
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