THE 10 BEST TOOLS & FEATURES IN PHOTOSHOP 2024

Polish your pictures to perfection with these essential editing tools in Photoshop CC. Dan Mold shares his 10 favourite tips and tricks

- Dan Mold

Since its inception in 1988, Adobe Photoshop has seen many changes. From the arrival of layers in 1994 to taking the decision to move to the CC subscription model in 2013, Adobe’s photo-editing software is constantly evolving, and 2023 was no different, as we saw the release of Adobe’s game-changing Generative Fill technology. Generative Fill uses AI to make difficult edits much easier, with text-to-image prompts, and is transforming the landscape yet again for photographers and content creators.

While AI can certainly be used to assist in post-production, let’s not forget that editing is only half of the equation, and we should all strive to master the skills required to take the best photos we can in-camera. That said, even if you’ve taken a brilliant shot, Photoshop 2024 has the tools and features that can make it look even better.

In this feature, we’ll look at 10 key combinations of tools and techniques that you can use to polish your images. These particular tools are used to edit JPEGs in Photoshop itself, rather than raw images in Adobe Camera Raw, so if you shoot raw files you’ll need to process those first in Camera Raw or Lightroom, then open the JPEG in Photoshop’s main editing interface.

1 START WITH THE BASICS: HOW TO CROP IMAGES

With some basic levelling adjustments your images will be top of the crops!

One of the perks of Adobe moving to its Creative Cloud subscription model is that you pay a set monthly fee, but you’ll always have access to the newest version of Adobe’s software.

The Photography Plan gives you Adobe Photoshop CC, Lightroom CC and Lightroom Classic. Head to your Adobe Creative Cloud app to check that you’re using the latest versions and have access to the latest features and tools.