From the course: Learning Photoshop

Understand layers - Photoshop Tutorial

From the course: Learning Photoshop

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Understand layers

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- [Instructor] Every file that's open in Photoshop has at least one layer and often more. Layers are important because they keep different pieces of content separated so that you can work on some content independently without changing the rest. All the layers in an open file are represented in the Layers panel. Each of these gray bars in my layers panel represents one of the layers in this illustration that I have open in my document window. We'll be working with the Layers panel a lot. So if your layers panel isn't open, go up to your window menu and choose Layers, and I suggest you leave it open throughout the course. If you're trying to picture what layers are, you might think of them like separate panes of glass stacked one on top of the other as in this illustration. Each layer can contain one or more pieces of artwork, like photos, objects, color, text, or shapes. There are also some technical layer types, like layers that contain color adjustments or brightness adjustments for other layers, which we'll use later in this course when we talk about photo editing with adjustment layers. Wherever there is no content on a layer, the layer is transparent, which is why I said that layers are like panes of glass. And wherever a layer is transparent, you can see down through it to artwork on the layers below. In Photoshop, transparency is represented by a gray and white checkerboard that looks like this. For example, in this illustration of three layers in an image, there's part of a photo on the top layer, and it's surrounded by transparency. So you can see that faint gray and white checkerboard there. And we can see down through the transparent areas of this layer to the circles and graphics and the color fill on the layers below. So, now that you can picture what layers are, we'll dive into how to work with layers and the Layers panel in the rest of this chapter so you'll be ready to use layers effectively in your own work.

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