Photoshop Layer AlignmentWritten by: Haily | This tutorial will teach you the basics of a simple technique that can have outstanding effects in your images -- layer alignment.

This tutorial will briefly cover how to more accurately achieve layer alignment in Photoshop using the following buttons which appear only in the options menu when you have the move tool selected.


Although you need to have the move tool selected to use this option of Photoshop, it's a bit deceptive. This option works directly and only with selections. As you can see, these buttons obviously show the actions of aligning up, middle, down, left, center, and right. These options will align your selected layer(s) in respect to the selection.

Now, let's test it out. I want to make my text layer centered both vertically and horizontally in my image. I press Ctrl/Command + A to select the dimensions of my image. Then, I switch to the Move Tool (V) and hit the respective buttons to align my text layer.


Feel free to explore with this feature. You can use this to align your text with the border or even having it 10px from the border by nudging it those 10 extra pixels with your arrow keys. ;) Also, this isn't limited to text. As long as it's a layer selected in the layers palette, you can align it in this way.

Now, what if you have two separate layers, with a certain distance apart from each other, and you want to align them both centered. You can use the same technique, but this is what you'll get.


To counter this, we'll group the layers. Individually move each layer to how you want them to be with respect to each other. I want my button to be above my text, so I'll nudge my button up a few pixels. Now, have both layers selected in the layers palette and press Ctrl/Command + G to group the layers. Now, press Ctrl/Command + A and align the group to the center of the image.


Perfectly centered! You have now learned how to flawlessly align layers in your images. To perfect this skill, you must learn the various ways of making selections. Here are a few for you to experiment with:

• The Marquee Tools - manually make a geometric selection.


• The Lasso Tools - same as marquee tools, but more dynamic selections.


• Magic Wand - works like the paint bucket but produces selections.


• Selecting a Layer - very useful when moving layers with respect to each other. Hold Ctrl/Command when selecting a layer's thumbnail in the layers palette

Good luck! I find that I use this technique in my images practically all the time when working with text.
You have now completed this tutorial! Thank you for using our tutorials service. If you have any questions or comments, then please post your thoughts below.

   

| Written by: Haily | Added: Sep 20 2008 | Last Modified: Dec 21 2009 | Views: 3,039 | (Log in to rate) |

User Comments