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History Brush Tool

History palette

The History Brush works with the History palette, so we'll have a look at that first.
Previous actions are stored temporarily and can be viewed in the History palette.

• Go to Windows > Show History.

photoshop cs4 tutorial • By selecting a past action in the History palette, the image is taken back to that state. You can move backwards and forwards through the history states to make comparisons.
It's a great way to correct mistakes or change one's mind.

• The palettes can be placed anywhere on the screen or they can be docked in the small Palette Well on the right of the options bar. Palettes can also be docked with each other by dragging them by the name tab.
Put the cursor on the History name and drag it into the grey Well.

• To extend a palette, click once on the palette's name in the Well.
Any action with the mouse or the keyboard contracts the list.

The Layers palette is used more than any other, so it is usually best to leave that one on the screen and permanently open, with some of the other common palettes in the Well.


History Brush Tool

Now for the History Brush tool which is used in conjunction with the History palette.

Make a mistake or change your mind and through the list of past actions in the History palette, you can move back to a previous position.

By default, the number of actions retained is 20.
This can be changed through Preferences:
Edit > Preferences > General – History States, or
Photoshop > Preferences > General – History States.

A snag is history uses memory. If the Clone Stamp is in use, each action does not use up much additional memory, but substantial changes to an image will increase the memory count considerably.
On many occasions, 20 states of history is unnecessary and too much. If you have got tons of RAM, retaining 100 history states can be useful. With a shortage of RAM, it is better to reduce this to about 10 and use another facility in the History palette to safeguard the different stages in producing an image.

When a file is first opened, a small snapshot of the image is placed at the top of the History palette. The powerful thing about this palette is that any number of extra snapshots can be made as one works on an image and makes changes to it. These snapshots can be used in a number of ways.


Snapshots

A snapshot is a temporary copy. Working on an image, it is possible to make such a temporary copy or snapshot of the image at any stage. More actions on the image can be made and the snapshot is retained for later use or comparison.

• Open any image.
When experimenting with an image, it is useful to make snapshots when a good layout is found. After making a number of snapshots, they can be compared and the best version kept. Without it, it would be impossible to remember which combination looked so good some 12 moves ago.

• Open up the Layers palette and the History palette.
If either of them is parked in the Palette Well, move it on to the screen so that they both stay open. There is already a snapshot of the original image at the top of the History palette.

• Copy the Background by dragging it on to the Create a new layer icon at the bottom of the Layers palette.
Sets its mode to Overlay.

• Click on the Background in the Layers palette and invert it with Image > Adjustments > Invert, Ctrl + I / Cmd + I.

free photoshop downloads • In the History palette we can see all these stages laid out in order.
At the bottom of the palette is the Create a new snapshot icon. Click on this icon and Snapshot 1 is placed at the top of the palette.

• In the History palette, click on the state called Duplicate Layer.
This leaves us with the original Background and the duplicate layer, but before we set the blending mode.

• With the Background copy layer active, change its mode from Normal to Exclusive.

• Go to Filter > Blur > Motion Blur. Put in some modest blur settings.

• Create a new snapshot as before.
A snapshot can also be created via the History menu arrow in the top right corner.

photoshop free tutorials • There are now three snapshots at the top of the History palette.
By clicking on the top thumbnail for the original image, then on Snapshot 1 and Snapshot 2 and by toggling between them, we can see the image in its different stages and make comparisons. Experiments with different techniques can be made and compared.

• Double-click on the snapshot title in order to change its name.

• When a suitable result is found, its Snapshot can be made active and the image saved in that state.

• Snapshots remain for the whole session even when individual states become deleted from the history list.
• Snapshots and history stages cannot be saved when the image is saved.
• The second icon at the bottom of the History palette (Create new document from current state) will create a complete copy of the current state, including its layers.
• A snapshot can also be dragged on to this icon to turn it into a document. Such a document can be saved like any other file.






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