Adobe CS6 Design Premium All-in-One For Dummies

When you think about manipulating visual media, Adobe CS6 Design Premium automatically comes to mind. The menus in Adobe CS6 applications offer many options and tools to help you edit and install pictures and active graphics. And you can always use shortcuts to work more quickly.

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Adobe CS6 Basic Menu Options

Adobe CS6 gives you menu options to open, close, and save your files. CS6 menu options also enable you to import and export documents and undo changes, in addition to other basic commands. This table shows common Adobe CS6 options and what they do:

Option	What You Can Do with It
New	Create a new document in the native file format.
Open	Open a dialog box where you can choose a (supported) file on your hard drive or a disk to open.
Close	Close the current document; if you have unsaved changes, you're prompted to save those changes first.
Save	Save the changes you've made to the current document.
Save As	Save a new copy of the current document.
Place or Import	Import a file, such as an image file or a sound file, into the current document.
Export	Export the current data to a specified file format. You can sometimes select several different kinds of file formats for saving the current data.
Copy	Copy the selected data to the computer's Clipboard.
Paste	Paste the data from the Clipboard into the current document.
Undo	Undo the most recent operation you did in the program.
Redo	Repeat the steps you applied the Undo command to.
Zoom In	Magnify the document so that you can view and edit the contents closely.
Zoom Out	Scale the view smaller so that you can see more of the document at a time.
Help	Open the Help documentation for the current program.

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Adobe CS6 Common Keyboard Shortcuts

Like most other applications, Adobe CS6 offers keyboard shortcuts so that you can access features quickly and easily with the touch of a key or two. Explore the Adobe CS6 shortcuts that are used the most by both Windows and Mac users:

Command	Windows Shortcut	Mac Shortcut
New	Ctrl+N	Command+N
Open	Ctrl+O	Command+O
Save	Ctrl+S	Command+S
Undo	Ctrl+Z	Command+Z
Redo	Ctrl+Shift+Z	Shift+Command+Z
Copy	Ctrl+C	Command+C
Paste	Ctrl+V	Command+V
Print	Ctrl+P	Command+P
Preferences (General)	Ctrl+K	Command+K
Preferences (Flash and Fireworks)	Ctrl+U	Command+U
Zoom In	Ctrl++ (plus sign)	Command+ + (plus sign)
Zoom Out	Ctrl+– (minus sign)	Command+ – (minus sign)
Help	F1 or sometimes Ctrl+?	F1 or sometimes Command+?

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Adobe CS6 Panels and Their Functions

Knowing how to use the panels in Adobe CS6 can help boost your creativity and make your job easier. Adobe CS6 panels offer information and tools to help you add color, align objects, and generally transform your Adobe files (and yes, there is a Transform panel).

Have some fun by exploring these panels:

• Color: Use the Color panel to select or mix colors for use in the current document. Choose different color modes, such as RGB (Red, Green, Blue) and CMYK (Cyan, Magenta, Yellow, Black), from the panel menu (the arrow in upper-right corner).

  
  



• Info: The Info panel shows you information about the document itself or a particular selection you've made. The Info panel includes information on the size, positioning, and rotation of selected objects. You can't enter data into the Info panel. It only displays (not accepts) information, so use the Transform panel to make modifications.

  
  



• Swatches: You can use the Swatches panel to create a library of color selections, which you can save and import into other documents or other programs. You can store colors and gradients that you use repeatedly in the Swatches panel.

  
  



• Tools: Though the Tools panel (or toolbar) isn't available in all Creative Suite programs, it's an extremely important panel in the programs it's in. A program's toolbar contains the tools used in that program.

  
  



• Layers: The Layers panel is used to display and select layers. You can also use it to change the layer order and to help select items on a particular layer.

  
  



• Align: Use the Align panel to align selected objects to each other or to align them in relation to the document itself. This panel makes it easy to do precise alignment with multiple objects.

  
  



• Stroke: The Stroke panel allows you to select strokes and change stroke attributes, such as color, width/weight, style, and caps (ends). The program you're using determines which attributes you can change.

  
  



• Transform: The Transform panel is used to display and change the shear (skew), rotation, position, and size of a selected object in the document. You can enter new values for each of these transformations.

  
  



• Character: The Character panel is used to select fonts, font size, character spacing, and other settings related to using type in your documents.

  
  

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Adobe CS6 Common Tools

Adobe CS6 is full of tools, most identified with little icons that hint at their functions. For example, use the tool that looks like a brush if you want to create brush marks. (Smart, huh?) Peruse this table that shows the most common Adobe CS6 tools and what each one does.

Tool	What You Can Do with It
Selection	Select elements in the document.
Marquee	Select elements in a document using a rectangular or oval shape.
Lasso	Make freehand selections in a document.
Magic Wand	Select similar adjoining colors in a document.
Pencil	Make freehand solid marks (with a hard edge) in the document.
Pen	Create vector paths in a document.
Brush	Create painterly brush marks in the document; brushes vary in size, shape, and pattern.
Text	Add text to the document.
Shape	Create various shapes in the document.
Scale	Increase or decrease the scale (size) of an element in the document.
Hand	Move the contents of the document for viewing purposes.
Zoom	Change the magnification of the document.

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