Resizing Images

When resizing images/photos in Photoshop always remember these three things:

  1. Hold the SHIFT key while dragging from the corners to resize. (unless you're in Photoshop CC)

  2. NEVER enlarge your images in Photoshop! They will get blurry.

  3. When finished double-click your image or press enter to apply your changes. You can't do anything else in Photoshop until you apply your transformation!

To quickly resize an image make sure you are on the correct layer. The press Ctrl+T to enter the Free Transform mode.

If done correctly you will see a box around your image.

At each corner, and each side of this box you will see little squares. These are like little handles you can grab to resize your image.

To rotate your image move the mouse cursor just outside of any corner. You should see a curved arrow.

In the middle of the image is the alignment anchor. Don't move this.

This picture was just resized, does it look okay? What is wrong with it?

Two things were done wrong when resizing this image. The first mistake was that it was enlarged, and is now blurry. NEVER enlarge images in Photoshop. The second mistake was that the SHIFT key was not held down when resizing, and now the girls head is stretched.

There are other options when resizing, or transforming an image. When in Transform mode right-click anywhere inside your image to view the Transform menu.

Experiment with these different options to see what they do.

For Graphic Design - Resize the images you downloaded and placed into your Photoshop file. When done resizing go to the next step. If you need help figuring out the layer menu in Photoshop click here.