6 The Toolbox

In Photoshop the toolbox can be shown at any time with Window>Show Tools.

In this course, many tools are introduced in the context of the lessons to which they are relevant. This page is designed to help you locate those lessons, and to explain the function of some of the other tools. Not all the tools are covered by this introductory course. For more help on the toolbox and the tools that it contains, use the Photoshop help system (Help>Contents>Quick reference>Toolbox Overview).

Recall that some cells of the toolbox (indicated with a small triangle in the corner) give access to more than one tool - hold down the mouse over that cell to switch to a different tool. The choice of tools is almost identical in Photoshop 5 and version 6 but the arrangement of the tools in the toolbox is different - this screenshot is from version 5.

Note that in Photoshop 6 the options for the selected tool are always displayed just under the menu bar while in Photoshop 5 a floating options palette can be displayed by double-clicking the tool.

Rectangular marquee, Elliptical marquee, Single row marquee, Single column marquee, Crop	Move
Lasso, Polygonal lasso, Magnetic lasso	Magic wand
Airbrush	Paintbrush
Rubber stamp, Pattern stamp	History brush
Eraser	Pencil, Line
Blur, Sharpen, Smudge	Dodge, Burn, Sponge
Various pen and anchor point tools	Various type tools
Ruler	Various gradient tools
Paint bucket	Eye dropper, Color sampler
Hand	Zoom (note: I encourage you to use the keyboard shortcuts instead of this tool)

The following tools all use brushes. Display the brushes palette with Window>Show Brushes. Choose a brush according to size and whether you want a hard or soft-edged effect. Brushes with numbers underneath are exceptionally large (the numbers give the brush diameter in pixels). Double-clicking an existing brush allows you to modify it. Clicking the blank area allows you to design and add new brushes.

	the paintbrush tool paints in the foreground colour using the selected brush. The transparency of the paint can be varied.
	the pencil tool is like the paintbrush tool except that it always draws a line that is hard-edged.
	the airbrush tool works like the paintbrush tool except that the speed with which the tool is moved affects the thickness of the paint.
	blur, sharpen and smudge tools are fairly self-explanatory. Try them!
	dodge, burn and sponge tools . The dodge tool is used to lighten an area. The burn tool is used to darken an area. The sponge tool increases or decreases the saturation (intensity) of the colours.

Other tools include

	the hand tool can be used as an alternative to the scroll bars when the window is too small to show the whole of your canvas. To avoid the need to select the hand tool, you can also simply hold down the space bar and drag the image.
	the line tool draws straight lines with a thickness equal to its 'weight'. To force the line to be horizontal, vertical, or at 45 degrees, hold down the Shift key as you use this tool
	the paint bucket tool detects an area of colours that are similar to the pixel clicked (like the magic wand tool) and then fills the area with the foreground colour.