Tool Bar

The Tool Bar on PSP 5 can be customized to work the way you work. I have placed many menu items on my toolbar for instant use. To configure your tool bar, choose File|Preferences|Customize Toolbar. The first thing you will probably want to do is to remove from the Toolbar items you don't think you will use often (don't worry, you can always put the item back). I removed the Cut and Copy buttons, since I use hot keys for each of these functions. I also removed the "preview" buttons, since I rarely use them. I then started adding the items I do use frequently. My toolbar is arranged as follows:

New
Open
Save
Save A Copy
Separator
Undo
Paste as a New Image
Paste as a New Selection
Paste as a New Layer
Promote Selection
Separator
Brightness & Contrast
Adjust RGB
Separator
Toggle Control Palette
Toggle Layer Palette
Separator
Display Grid
Add Borders
Canvas Size
Resize
Rotate Image
Separator
Select All
Select None
Invert Selection
Separator
Increase Colors to 16 Million
Decrease Colors to 256
Greyscale Image
Set Transparency
Separator
Acquire Image
Start Capture

This arrangement of the toolbar makes sense to me. Figure out what makes sense to you and customize your toolbar. It will save you a lot of time in the long run.

Menu Items

One of the areas where most people run into trouble with PSP 5 is in understanding the "save" commands. Here's how they work:

Save - When you choose "save" after creating a new graphic, it defaults to the "psp" format. Some people hate this, I think it is a good thing. I rarely save a graphic the first time in any other format than PSP since I work in layers a lot and this is the only format that will preserve the layers and keep the masks and selection information intact in the graphic. When you choose "save" while working on an existing graphic, the program saves in the format the graphic was originally saved in.

Save As - Again, when you choose "save as" after creating a new graphic, the program defaults to "psp". You can use "Save As" to change the format you have saved a graphic in. I.e. you have a JPG open and you want to save it as a transparent gif. You set your transparency, then choose "Save As" and pick the GIF setting.

Save Copy As - This is what you want to use if you want PSP to remember the last settings you used to save a graphic. The program remembers the last setting and the last folder you saved to.

View|Image Information - This is one of my favorite additions to PSP 5. When you go to this menu item, you will open a window that gives you all the specifications of your image and has a tab called "Creator Information". You can store valuable information about your image here. It saves with the image so you can access it any time you want. I use the description box to record the font I used and the colors I used in the image. I love this! I can't count the number of times I have received e-mail from a visitor asking "what font was that you used on "x" graphic? I mostly sit there scratching my head and wondering. Now, I can go to the image and see what font I used quickly and easily.

View|Toolbars - If you are a little cramped for space when working on a graphic, this drop down window allows you to turn on and off the various toolbars.

View|Rulers - Do you need a precise measurement? Turn on the rulers.

View|Grid - Another great new feature. Working with the grid on allows you to easily line things up on your graphic.

Window|Duplicate - You can use this menu item to make an exact duplicate of the image you are working on.

Shortcut Keys

Ctrl N - Create a new Graphic
Ctrl O - Open a graphic
Ctrl B - Browse
Ctrl A - Select All
Ctrl C - Copy selection
Ctrl V - Paste as a new Image
Ctrl L - Paste as a new Layer
Ctrl E - Paste as a new Selection
Ctrl D - Deselect
Shift D - Creates a Duplicate copy of your image

These are the shortcut keys I use the most. There are many more. Take the time to explore the menu and try out some of the shortcut keys.

Custom Color Picker

Both these Color Picker's work essentially the same. You can click on one of the colors in the box, or somewhere in the spectrum to select your color. I prefer the picker on the right, probably since it is the picker I have used since I began working with Paint Shop Pro. The one advantage to the picker on the left is that it will give you the HTML code for the color you have chosen.

A handy feature of this tool is the ability to define your own custom colors. I find this very useful when I come up with a color combination for a graphic. I just add the colors to the "custom colors". Then when I want to create a new graphic, I have the exact color I want available with the click of the mouse. You can overwrite the custom colors by clicking in one of the boxes. Then enter the RGB values for the color you want and click on the "Add to Custom Colors" bar. This will replace the old color with the new color.

Paint Shop Pro can use Netscape's 216 color palette for Windows. If you want to create web graphics with colors you are sure will be viewed the same on most monitors, use this color palette for choosing your colors. To download this palette, shift-left click here to save the palette to your hard drive. If you just click rather than shift-left click you will just see garbage. Save the palette in the subdirectory with Paint Shop Pro. Once you have the palette, you can choose Colors|Load palette and choose "Netscape". The main problem with using this palette is that once you load it, you will no longer be in 16 million color mode and most filters and plugins won't work. What you need to do is to choose your color, then switch back to 16 million colors.

Transparent Gifs

1. Create a graphic on a background color close to the color of your page.
2. Lower the colors to 256 as follows:

   

3. Choose Colors|Set Palette Transparency.
4. When the window pops up, move it off your graphic and place the cursor over the background color of your graphic (the cursor will turn into an eye-dropper tool).
5. Click on the color you want to become transparent.
6. Hit the "proof" button on the Control Panel.
7. You should see a checkerboard pattern replace the color you clicked on. This is what will be transparent. If your background in your graphic is a pattern, you will only see part of the pattern become transparent.
8. Hint: If you are working with a colored background and you see stray pixels around your graphic, you can replace the color with light gray (which will end up with less stray pixels after a transparency). To do this, with PSP's background color set to the background color of your graphic, choose Selections|Select All, Selections|Modify|Transparent Color and choose "Background Color" with Tolerance set to 35, then invert your selection and flood fill with gray. Then set gray as the transparent color.
9. If you like the results of your transparency, choose File|Save a Copy As and choose gif Version 89a as the file type. To make sure your Version is 89a, click on the "Options" button in the Save As control panel.

JPG Compression

Placing a photograph on a web page can be very challenging. There is no reason to place a photo on a web page if the quality is not up to par. I recommend that you always save a photo as a jpg to maintain the quality of the image. But, then, sometimes you have a very large graphic file to deal with. Well, Paint Shop Pro has a way to cut the size of that graphic without cutting down on the quality of the photo. All you have to do is set the preferences for saving a Jpg. When you choose "jpg" as your file type, click on the "Options" button. This will bring up the following window:

I have found that a compression level of 15 results in little noticable difference in the quality of the picture. That is the default I leave my JPG compression at. Following are two copies of the same image. The image on the left was saved at no compression and is 26kb. The copy on the right was saved at Compression Level 15 and is 9kb. I think that there is very little difference in the quality, but there is a huge difference in the size of the graphic.