Adobe Photoshop CS5 One-on-One

• When you have the marquee where you want it, choose
  Image→Crop.
  The final cropped image is shown in Figure 2-12. You can save
  this skewed monument by pressing Ctrl+Shift+S (�-Shift-S)
  and naming it “Not So Leaning Pisa.psd.”

Using Rotate View with the Crop Tool

If you need to selectively cut away unwanted parts of your image,

nothing beats the crop tool. With it, you can also rotate the bound-

ary to accommodate a crooked image. And paired with the rotate

view tool, you can preview the angle of rotation.

Introduced in Photoshop CS4, the rotate view tool lets you rotate

your view of the image without affecting its real orientation or how

it prints. (For a demonstration, see Video Lesson 2, “Navigation,”

introduced on page 40.) The tool is designed for angling an image so

that you can better paint or edit it, but it’s also great for preview-

ing the angle of rotation required to straighten a crooked image.

1. Open an image that needs cropping. Open the image
   called Woman smiling.jpg, located in the Lesson 02
   folder inside Lesson Files-PsCS5 1on1. Pictured in
   Figure 2-13, on the facing page, this photograph comes to us
   from Jordan Chesbrough of iStockphoto and features a lovely
   young woman leaning slightly to the left. Although lively and
   cheerful, the model might benefit from a more perpendicular
   aspect. Plus, I think we could increase the effect of the photo
   by closing in on her face, with a bit of shoulder and collarbone
   for context.

PeaRl Of WISDOm

The crop tool—which we’ll use in just a moment—lets you rotate and crop

an image in one operation, but it doesn’t permit you to preview the rotation.

Crazy as it may sound, you have to tilt your head to gauge how the image

will look when straightened. (Which is a pain in the neck, literally of course,

but also because if you get it wrong you have to undo and start over again.)

To the rescue: the rotate view tool. Which would be great if Photoshop let

you switch back and forth between the tools. Only it doesn’t. The crop tool

locks you into a claustrophobic “mode” that blocks you from using the rotate

view tool, not to mention 99 percent of the rest of the program (see Step 5).

The upshot: You have to rotate the view first and crop second, just as we’ll

do in these steps.

Figure 2-12.

46 Lesson 2: Straighten, Crop, and Size