The first thing that you need to know about ….doc

The first thing that you need to know about Photoshop, before we begin manipulating images, is simply how to open and view files. Photoshop can open a wide variety of file formats, and you can customize your view of an image in a number of different ways, ranging from window sizes to magnification. This chapter will cover methods of saving your work, because if you dont save, all the changes you make will be lost. And finally in Day 1, we will examine different methods of image acquisition, such as scanning, photo discs, and digital cameras, weighing such factors as price and how the final image will used. Working with Files Photoshop can open a wide variety of images in a wide variety of formats. Formats are different ways that images can be saved for different uses, such as print or the World Wide Web (for more information see Appendix C, File Formats). In the Windows world, file formats are defined by the three-letter extensions to file names, such as .doc for a word processing document. Some common graphic file format extensions are: .pct: PICT files .bmp: Bitmap files .tif: TIFF files Mac users are lucky because they have never had to deal with file formats. Macintosh files have what is called a resource fork and a data fork. The data fork, obviously, contains the files data and the resource fork contains the files information--whether it is a graphic file, a word processing document, or even a sound. Dont let this worry you Windows users. File names are kind of a pain, but they arent that difficult. The most common file format in Photoshop is .psd, which is the native Photoshop file format (Photoshop document). Using this format, you can save an image from any of the modes with which Photoshop works (see Day 4, Color Modes and Models, for more information on color modes). For now, suffice it to say that the modes are how Photoshop deals with color. The native Photoshop format also enables you to save layers. No other format allows this (for more on Layers