Photoshop

Photoshop Tools at Your Fingertips

By Miranda Gorte, Graphic Artist/Website Specialist, P. I. Engineering.

I use Photoshop every single day, at work and in my personal life.  My X-keys XK-60 keeps the tools and features that I use most ready at the touch of a button. No more remembering keyboard shortcuts, or searching the computer screen to find the needed tool!

I grouped the keys together by category in how frequently I use them in Photoshop. The bottom three groups are my most used keys. One thing that I love about using X-keys, is that I am not stuck using the initial layout I create. You can move, regroup, remove, or add tools you need.

In Photoshop if you click on a couple of the tools (Magic Wand, Eyedropper, and Brush tool to name a few) you can choose a variation of that particular tool to use. I need to do that frequently, so with my X-keys I can separate the up and down keystrokes when programming to be able to accomplish this without ever moving my hand!

Here you can find a list of all the shortcuts for Photoshop. All of the ones I used and some that are useful, but didn't make the cut on my XK-60.

My Photoshop Layout

Top Row

Launch Photoshop, New Document, Open, Close, Close All , Quit, Image Re-size to 1200px; Image Re-size to 200px, Image Re-size to 45, Canvas Size

2nd Row

Photoshop 32 bit version, My Pictures folder, Brushes, Eraser, Pen, Auto Tone, Hue/Saturation Adjustment, Levels, Curves, Create Clipping Mask

Left Bank

New Layer, Shape, Gradient, Dodge, Shift, Zoom In, Zoom Out, Zoom Full Screen, Alt, Shift, Control

I use the Control and Alt keys regularly; having these shortcuts makes it nice to be able to leave my hand at the X-keys instead of going to the keyboard. The most common feature I use the Control and Alt key for is for zooming in and out and scrolling right and left.

Center 20 Keys

Image Size, Save, Save As, Save for Web & Devices; Transform, Refine Edge, Deselect, Select All; Copy, Paste, Select Inverse, X; Tab, Nudge Up, [ Decrease tool size, ] Increase tool size; Nudge Left, Nudge Down, Nudge Right, Undo the last action performed

I use the X to toggle between the background and foreground color when using the Brush tool.

Right Bank

Pointer tool, Magic Wand, Crop tool, Eyedropper tool, Create a Quick Mask, Brush tool, Clone Stamp, Text tool, Delete, Enter

Fair Warning

X-keys are extremely addicting, once you start using an X-keys with Photoshop, you won't want to give it up. I didn't believe it until I started, now I feel lost when I'm working on a different computer without it.

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