Getting started: Selecting photos

You can use this tutorial with Adobe® Photoshop® Elements versions 7 and 8.

Discover a couple of tricks for selecting photos in the Organizer in Adobe® Photoshop® Elements. Learn how to select multiple photos at once or select noncontiguous photos.

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• Photoshop Elements 8 videos

Requirements

To complete this tutorial, install the following software:

Adobe Photoshop Elements 7 or later

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Selecting single photos

In the Organizer, select a photo thumbnail before you can act on that image. For example, if you want to delete a photo from the catalog, first select it.

To select an image in the Organizer:

1. Start Photoshop Elements and open the Organizer workspace.
2. To select a single photo, click its thumbnail in the Photo Browser.

   The blue border, shown in Figure 1, indicates that it is selected. Any action you take, such as deleting, applies to the selected photo.

   

   Figure 1: Selected thumbnail in the Photo Browser

3. Click anywhere away from the thumbnail to deselect the photo.

Selecting every photo in the Photo Browser

Let's say you want to make a photo book using the options on the Create tab in the Task pane. If you want the photo book to include every photo currently displayed in the Photo Browser, select the thumbnails for each photo. Then, add them to the photo book in a single step.

To select all photos:

1. Click the thumbnail for the first photo in the Photo Browser (that is, the thumbnail in the upper left of the Photo Browser).
2. Hold down Shift, and click the last thumbnail you want to select. scroll down to see the last thumbnail, if necessary. The entire range of images is selected, as shown in Figure 2.

   

   Figure 2: Selecting a range of images

3. Click anywhere away from the thumbnails to deselect them.

Selecting non-contiguous photos in the Photo Browser.

If you want to select several non-contiguous images, begin by selecting any image, then hold down the Ctrl key to select additional images.

To select non-contiguous photos:

1. Click to select the first image you want to work with.
2. Hold down Ctrl and click any additional photos you want to select. Each image you click is selected, but not the images in between, as shown in Figure 3.

   

   Figure 3: Non-contiguous images selected

   You can use these techniques to select as many photos as you want in the Photo Browser. Then, you can perform all kinds of tasks on them. For example, any of the options in the Share menu, the Create menu, the Fix menu, or many of the menus at the top of the Organizer.

Where to go from here

If you enjoyed this tutorial, check out these other resources to help get you started using Photoshop Elements.

• Photoshop Elements Essentials for Windows tutorials on lynda.com
• Photoshop Elements shows on Adobe TV
• Photoshop Elements Help and Support
• Rotating photos
• Hiding and deleting photos
• Moving files

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