There are many great books and tutorials about Photoshop but I want to talk briefly about a few of the essential elements of the program which make it such a revolutionary and essential part of my creative work.
The newest flashy features are always fun to play with, but the continuing strength of the program has much more to do with the long established tools that have been refined over the years, but in their simplest form remain the core of this magical window on photography. My goal is not to provide detailed tutorials, but to help those unfamiliar with the program to develop an appreciation of its power and to understand why it is worth the effort to incorporate it into their creative process. Full versions of Photoshop come with a substantial sticker shock, but most of what I will be discussing can be done in Photoshop Elements and a variety of other editing programs for a substantially reduced cost.
Adjustment layers work in the same way as Image Layers but they contain processing instructions rather than pixels. An Adjustment
layer may be used to modify the appearance of the underlying image layer(s) in a broad range of ways.
Layer Masks are not actual independent layers but are best thought of as a window placed over an Image or Adjustment Layer to control how it is seen. The basic rule
is, "White reveals, Black conceals".
Everday magic and getting it right. This small sentence has never been completely true. Layers are probably the most important aspect to knowing photoshop.