- Cropping Photos
- Cropping Using the Rule of Thirds
- Auto-Cropping to Standard Sizes
- Cropping to an Exact Custom Size
- Cropping into a Shape
- Cropping without the Crop Tool
- Using the Crop Tool to Add More Canvas Area
- Auto-Cropping Gang-Scanned Photos
- Straightening Photos with the Straighten Tool
- Straightening Crooked Photos
- Resizing Digital Camera Photos
- Resizing and How to Reach Those Hidden Free Transform Handles
- Making Your Photos Smaller (Downsizing)
- Rule-Breaking Resizing for Poster-Sized Prints
- Automated Saving and Resizing
This chapter is from the book
This chapter is from the book
This chapter is from the book
Cropping without the Crop Tool
Sometimes it's quicker to crop your photo using some of Elements' other tools and features than it is to reach for the Crop tool every time you need a simple crop. This is the method I probably use the most for cropping images of all kinds (primarily when I'm not trying to make a perfect 5×7", 8×10", etc.—I'm basically just “eyeing” it).
Step One
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Start by opening a photo in the Elements Editor that you need to crop, and press M to get the Rectangular Marquee tool from the Toolbox. (I use this tool so much that I usually don't have to switch to it—maybe that's why I use this method all the time.) Drag out a selection around the area you want to keep (leaving all the other areas outside the selection that you want cropped away).
Step Two
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Choose Crop from the Image menu. When you choose Crop, the image is immediately cropped. There are no crop handles, no dialogs—bang—it just gets cropped—down and dirty, and that's why I like it. Just press Control-D to deselect.
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