Photoshop CS4 Interface Quick Tour

Written By Steve Patterson
Adobe has been making major changes lately to Photoshop's user interface, and Photoshop CS4 brings with it the most streamlined, efficient and user-friendly interface we've seen yet. In this Photoshop Basics tutorial, we'll take a quick, general tour of the new interface to see what's what, what's new and where it all is in this latest and greatest version of the world's most popular image editor!
If you've upgraded to Photoshop CS4 from a previous version, you'll find that even though the overall appearance of the interface may seem quite a bit different from older versions (especially if you've upgraded from Photoshop CS2 or earlier), everything is pretty much where you'd expect to find it in Photoshop CS4, and considering how massive Photoshop has become over the years, it's a definite nod to the talents of Adobe's designers that they've managed to keep the interface so clean and elegant.
The screenshot below is of the Mac version of Photoshop CS4. Generally speaking, both the Mac and Windows versions of Photoshop CS4 are identical, but there are a couple of small differences which we'll look at as we come to them. Also, I'm running Photoshop CS4 Extended here which contains some additional features not found in the standard version of Photoshop CS4. Again, we'll look at these differences when needed:

The new user interface in Photoshop CS4.

The Menu Bar

At the very top of the screen as always is the Menu Bar, a common feature of most programs these days. Clicking on the various menu headings brings up a list of related options and commands. For example, the File menu is where we find options for opening, saving and closing Photoshop documents. The Layer menu contains options for working with layers. Photoshop's many filters can be found under the Filter menu, and so on:

The Menu Bar in Photoshop CS4 (Extended).

We won't bother going through all the menu options here since we'd both die of boredom and most of the important options and commands are covered in our other tutorials. As I mentioned, I'm using the Mac version of Photoshop CS4. The Photoshop menu option on the far left, which is where we find Photoshop's Preferences on the Mac, is not found in the Windows version. You'll find the Preferences under the Edit menu in Windows. Also, the Analysis and 3D menu headings are exclusive to the Extended version of Photoshop CS4 and not found in the Standard version.

The Tools Panel

Along the left side of the screen is Photoshop's Tools panel, formerly known as the Tools palette (palettes are now officially known as panels in Photoshop CS4), and also commonly referred to simply as the Toolbox. This is where we find all of the various tools we need for working on our images. In Photoshop CS4, you'll find the Tools panel displayed in a single column, but I've split it in half here just to make it easier to fit on the page:

The Tools panel in Photoshop CS4.

Again, there's a couple of tools shown here that are exclusive to the Extended version of Photoshop CS4 (the 3D Rotate and 3D Orbit tools directly above the Hand Tool), but the majority of the tools are available in both the Standard and Extended versions and most have been around in Photoshop since forever.
Single Or Double Column Layout
Photoshop CS4, like CS3 before it, gives us a choice of how we want the Tools panel displayed. We can leave it in the default single column, or if you prefer, you can click on the small double-arrow icon at the top of the panel which will switch it to a double column layout, handy if you've upgraded from Photoshop CS2 or earlier and you can't get used to the new single column design. Click again on the icon to switch back to a single column:

You can switch between a single or double column layout in Photoshop CS4.

Accessing The Hidden Tools
Photoshop CS4, like earlier versions, comes with so many tools that if Adobe tried to display them all at once, the Tools panel would need its own scroll bar. So instead, Adobe has grouped many related tools together, with one tool in the group visible in the Tools panel and the others hidden behind it. Whenever you see a tool in the Tools panel with a small arrow to the bottom right of the icon, it means there are additional tools behind it waiting to be selected, and if you click and hold your mouse button down on one of these tools, a fly-out menu will appear showing you the additional tools. For example, by clicking and holding on the Rectangular Marquee Tool at the top of the Tools panel, a fly-out menu appears giving me access to the Elliptical Marquee Tool, the Single Row Marquee Tool and the Single Column Marquee Tool. Simply move your mouse cursor over the name of the tool you want, then release your mouse button to select it:

Click and hold on some tools in the Tools panel to access additional tools behind it.

Click and hold on the other tools in the Tools panel to see all of the tools available to us in Photoshop CS4.

The Options Bar

Directly related to the Tools panel is the Options Bar at the top of the screen. On a Windows system, the Options Bar is located below the Menu Bar. On a Mac, it's located below the Application Bar which is new to Photoshop CS4. We'll look at the Application Bar in a moment.
Your Options Bar may look different from mine, and that's because it always changes to display options for whichever tool you current have selected. Here, the Options Bar is displaying options for the Move Tool:

The Options Bar displays options for the currently selected tool.

If I select the Crop Tool from the Tools panel, the Options Bar changes to display options for the Crop Tool:

The Options Bar now displaying options for the Crop Tool.

And if I select the Type Tool, we see options displayed for the Type Tool:

The Options Bar now displaying options for the Type Tool.

Every tool has its own set of options which will always be available in the Options Bar.