Photoshop - CS5

Lesson 6: Zooming and Scrolling (1)

6/94 Lessons 

Scrolling

With the new “OpenGL” technology that was built into Photoshop CS4, and that is still available in CS5, scrolling and zooming is a lot quicker and a lot more fun.

To enjoy the benefits of “OpenGL”, the graphics card in your computer must support this technology and the operating system that runs on your PC must also support this technology.

Which graphics card your computer has, I can not see. But what you can do is, go to the “Performance” tab in the “Preferences” (see lesson 4) and see if this technology is supported by your graphics card. If this is not the case, this option is grayed out.

Regarding the second requirement, the Operating System from Windows Vista or later, this technology is supported.

Now that you know what you need to use this new technology, we continue with the lesson.

To move the image in the image window, we can use the scroll bars on the right side and bottom of the window. That everyone already knows.

What is new since Photoshop CS4 with the OpenGL technology is that, you can “throw away” the picture. How am I supposed to explain that?

Start the “Hand” tool by clicking on the picture, hold the mouse button, move the mouse quickly left, right, top or bottom and release the mouse button.

You will see that the image itself moves.

The faster you move the mouse, the faster the picture will move.

Now you may say, “How is that more fun than what I have here?”

Now if your picture is very large in size, I mean, you can navigate from one side to the other in a fairly simple manner by a simple click and move.


  • TIP 1

    :

    To quickly switch between the tools with which you’re working, hold the spacebar on your keyboard pressed.
    Do not let this go, then the last selected tool gets active again.


  • TIP 1

    :

    To quickly switch between the tools with which you’re working, hold the spacebar on your keyboard pressed.
    Do not let this go, then the last selected tool gets active again.

Another way to scroll in your image is by using your scroll wheel on your mouse.

If you scroll with the wheel upwards, the picture moves up in the window. If you scroll with your scroll wheel down, then the picture moves down.

Hold your Ctrl key on your keyboard while you scroll, it moves the picture left or right.
If you have the Shift key also pressed, it moves by larger distances.

Hold the Alt key on your keyboard pressed, then you can use the mouse wheel to zoom in and out.

The latter can also be changed in the “General” tab of the “Preferences” window.  If you set the option “Zoom with scroll wheel”, the above actions will be reversed.

So just scroll will zoom in and out, scrolling Alt plus the image will move up or down. Ctrl + Alt will move the picture left or right.

 

Zoom

You all know that we have the “Zoom” tool to ‘zoom in’ on our pictures. If this is not the case, select the “Zoom” tool in the tool bar and click on the picture (the cursor changes to a circle with the plus sign).

If you want to zoom out, hold the Alt key on your keyboard pressed while clicking on the picture (the cursor changes into a circle with a minus sign).

When the mouse pointer remains pressed, the picture will continue to zoom. In or out, of course, depending on whether or not you have the Alt key pressed.

When you are zoomed into fill the whole screen, 66.7% as in this example, the picture quality is still good.

A new option in Photoshop CS5 is the option “Zoom by dragging”. When this is checked, you can zoom in by clicking and dragging from left to right and vice versa.

The zoom value is displayed at the bottom left of the photo in the zoom panel and in the top left of the photo tab. If you type a value in this “zoom panel” and press the Enter key on your keyboard, your image is zoomed in to this value.

If you work quickly with shortcuts, click the Ctrl + buttons on your keyboard to zoom in and Ctrl – to zoom out.

If you continue to press these keystrokes, the image will continue to zoom in or out.

If you want to see the full image click the shortcut Ctrl + 0 (zero) on your keyboard.

If you want to see the picture at 100%, click the shortcut Ctrl Alt + 0 (zero).

If you want to zoom in, centered at the point in the image where you click, then select the option “Zoom Clicked Point to Center” under the “General” tab in the window “Preferences”. But I think you had done it by yourself.


  • TIP 1

    :

    double-clicking the “Hand” tool will display the full picture.


  • TIP 2

    :

    double-clicking the “Zoom” tool will show the picture in its actual pixel size.

  • TIP 3: to quickly switch between the tools when you’re working with the “Zoom” tool, hold the z key on your keyboard pressed. ALso hold the Alt key pressed and then zoom out. Press the z key, then the last selected tool is active again.

  • TIP 4

    :

    In Photoshop versions CS3 and earlier, there was a difference between zooming with the keys on your keyboard and the zoom tool, this is not so anymore.
    In the previous versions, it was a fact that when the zoom tool used, only the picture was zoomed, not the window. The window in which the picture is in, is still in its dimensions. And when you press Ctrl + , the photo and the window in which it resides, were adapted.
    From Photoshop CS4, it is no longer the case, it’s either one or the other. You set this in the Preferences window, “General” tab, and that’s it. Both of these methods will carry out the zoom in the same way, ie with or without the adaptation of the window.
    But, there is a way to get around this.
    First requirement is that the “Zoom Resize Windows” in “General” tab is NOT checked.
    If you still want the window to increase or decrease with the zoom in or out, click the Ctrl + Alt or Ctrl Alt –

Awesome!
You've completed Lesson 6
START NEXT LESSON