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Adobe Photoshop CC - Essentials Training

How to crop an image for a frame in Adobe Photoshop CC

Daniel Walter Scott

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Hey there, in this Cropping video we're going to crop to a specific size. Let's say we've got a photo frame, and it needs it in an exact size, or say, it's for a magazine, and it needs to be A4 or US Letter. So we're going to show you how to do that, get it into perfect dimensions, but what we're also going to do is, I'm going to show you how to-- no background there, no background there, ready? Magic, have more background. Cool, huh? Let's do all of that now in Photoshop. 

To get started open up 'Cropping 02' from our 'Exercise Files'. Now we want to get this into, say a photo frame or into that US Letter document, or an A4 document, something that's a really specific size. I'm going to show you how to do that now in Photoshop. Now just so you know, like we did with the postcard earlier, I find it easier to go to 'File', 'New', create the size that you want. So let's say it's 5x7. You create that document in here. Then just drag this image into it. So, my 'Move Tool', drag, drag, drag, move it in. That has to be rotated around. I can see, it's not quite big enough, so I going to have to resize it using my Transform Tool. I find this is an easier process. Don't worry, if you don’t like that way, let's do it the official way. 

So I've got this image open, I'm going to grab the 'Crop Tool' and up the top here, instead of Ratio, we're going to go to-- we're going to pick one of the defaults. This one here is a real traditional kind of photo frame size, 5"x7". By default it's going this way, so I want to flip these across. You can see, just needs to be trimmed a little bit, either side. When you're ready, hit 'Return’ there you go, it's cropped to the specific dimensions. I'm going to go to 'Edit', 'Step Backward'. Just so you know, up here, we've picked 7x5 but let's say you've got a different photo frame, or anything else, it is 6x4. You can just type it in there, just tucked them in, flip them around. It's up to you. 

You can type-- instead of one of these default ones you can go to the top here, and go to 'Width Height Resolution' to say, actually I want this to be-- I'm set to centimeters in my Preferences because I'm based in Europe. You can change yours in your Preferences to inches, but let's say I want mine to be 297 millimeters by, up to here. Millimeters. I'm going to flip mine around, that's kind of an A4 size. If you don't find the preset in here, you can just go and type it. The only thing you need to be careful of, let's say we're on 5x7 and you finished it, you love it, you move it around, and you're like, it's perfect, hit 'Return' on your keyboard. Then later on, you're just working on a different document, you're just going to run into them, it's going to be, "I got you." Is that, you're like, "Okay," I'm just going to grab my Column Tool, just kind of stretch yourself, and you're like, "Hey, whoa" 

It's kind of locked in this resolution so if you leave it like that, it's going to remember it. And it might be months before you get back to the Cropping Tool, and just write me an email, "Dan, my Cropping Tool doesn't work." And it's, just got to go back to the top here, and go to 'Ratio'. Not Ratio, go to 'Width, Height, Resolution' and go to 'Clear'. Now, I've got that kind of full control again. I'm going to 'Esc', I'm going to close that one down, that's not what I wanted to do. What I want to show you now is some amazing magic. I hinted it at the beginning we magic-ed our background, and that's super useful. 

So I'm going to go 'Edit', 'Step Backward' till this thing here. Let's say I'm not using it in this traditional kind of landscape. I want it for something a little bit more social media type. I'm going to zoom out a little bit. Let's say I need like a banner ad, I need to be like, you know, it's the Header in my Facebook page, or it's a Leader Board in a banner ad I'm making for a website, or that big slider Hero Box that appears on lots of Home pages on websites. Whatever it is, you just need more background, right? Maybe not that much. 

So when I do this, it's just going to leave a big gap there. Hit 'Return', got a big gap unless you're ready? I'm going to click it again. I've got '02' open, I've got my 'Crop Tool', just going to turn that magic button on. This is the magic. I'm going to drag it out a bit, got a big gap but now when I hit return, you're ready? Holy Molly magic, just made more beach and sky. Cool, huh? I love that thing. Remember to turn it off when you're finished with it if you don't want to do it anymore, but yes, it's just super helpful. 

Now a little, I guess, asterisk here, for you is that I've picked a really good example for this, to impress you and me, and everybody. It doesn't work on all images. I picked this one mainly because it has a consistent background, there's a lot of background. If this originally started like this, without all of this background, and it was all of this, it's going to look horrible. Let's give it an example of, something that kind of half works. So let's go to 'File', 'Open'. Let's go to 'Cropping 03'. This one here, we're going to do the same thing. I'll loosen him out a little bit, I need some extra width. So I need to go this way. I need some width that way as well, I'm going to go both ways. Perfect. Get ready, steady, 'Enter'. And wait for your computer. 

You can see, it's average. So small changes, like these, watch this, it's our little baby one. Hit 'Return'. Fudgeable. There's some noticeable bits, depends what it's for, this is the front cover of your magazine, no way, but if this is a mean that you're making then probably it will work enough. Later on in this course I'll show you different techniques to tidy up some of these things but that will be in the retouching part, it will be a little bit later on. 

So, for some images, it's magic, and some images, I find probably about, maybe 40% of images, maybe even 30% actually work without a hitch. The rest of them need some retouching, and lots of them just don't work. It's just a wrong kind of format. Regardless, it's a super cool extra trick. Just remember Content Aware. 

That is the end of this video, let's get in to do some more cropping. You thought there was only a little bit of cropping but there's quite a few bits of cropping. Trust me, they're all useful, let's jump into another one now.