I use Photoshop for a lot of reasons, for basic edits, for enlargements, for full scale digital art. There are many tools that I feel I could not live without. Tonight, my big fave is Content Aware Scale.
If you are familiar with Photoshop, but not with this great tool, it can really be a lifesaver. Content Aware Scale is located under the Edit Menu. To enable the tool, simply duplicate your background layer (for new images) or select the layer you want to alter. Then go to Edit - > Content Aware Scale to enable it.
You will now have what looks at first to be the basic tools for resizing layers, but there are a few new additions.
First, we will talk about the Amount Slider. The Amount slider controls the amount of content aware scaling is applied to the image. Bringing it down to 0 would basically make it like a standard layer stretch, pulling it to 100 gives the maximum amount of content aware scaling.
Next, we will talk about the little button that looks like a man. This button will help to protect from things like faces becoming distorted as you stretch or shrink the image.
For more great tips on how to use the Content Aware Scale tools, check out this
link for an excerpt from the great book by Martin Evening entitled
Adobe Photoshop CS4 for Photographers.
