December Photoshop Tip

Photoshop How-to: Using the Type Tool

The Type Tool can do more than just type horizontally across a page. If you go to the tool panel and click and hold down the Type Tool, you will notice you have four options. We will cover the first two options and a few other fun things you can do with the type tool.

Horizontal Type Tool

1. Click on the icon in the tool panel. 
2. You can click anywhere within the canvas and start typing once it is selected. This makes a new layer in your layers panel for this text.
3. When you are done with the text, you can click another tool or click and drag outside of the text box to move it.
4. If you come back to this font layer after you have clicked out of it, then just select the Type tool and click over the text and it will become editable.

Vertical Type Tool

1. Click and hold down the Type Tool and select the second option down which is the Vertical Type Tool.
2. This acts the same way I explained the Horizontal Type Tool above, except when you click and begin typing the text types Vertical like in the example below.

Font Options

Above in the Option Menu are a few options you can use to change the look of your font.

1. To view these options the Type tool needs to be selected.
2. For these options to be applied to your text you have to change the options before you start typing or by highlighting the font then changing the options in the Option Menu.
3. The first option will change the font by holding down the blue arrow and selecting the font you would like.
4. The second option is the size of the font. You can click inside the box and highlight and start typing the exact size you would like. Another option is to hold down the arrow and selecting the size Photoshop gives you.
5. The third option is how you would change the font color. You can either use the mouse and select a color on the canvas or select one of the  colors in the color palette in the Font Color dialogue.

Advanced Tip: