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            <div class="Photoshop"><table><tr><td class="banner">Adobe Photoshop CS4</td><td class="pod"><img src="images/PDF.gif" width="16" height="16" hspace="15" valign="50%" />&#160;&#160;
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<ul class="navigation"><li class="prev"><a accesskey="p" class="prev" href="WSfd1234e1c4b69f30ea53e41001031ab64-78e3a.html" title="Layer Basics"><img src="images/blank.gif" alt="Previous" width="17" height="17" /></a></li><li class="next"><a accesskey="n" class="next" href="WSfd1234e1c4b69f30ea53e41001031ab64-78e1a.html" title="Layers panel overview"><img src="images/blank.gif" alt="Next" width="17" height="17" /></a></li></ul><div class="hierarchy" id="hierarchy"><a href="WSfd1234e1c4b69f30ea53e41001031ab64-78e4a.html">Layers</a> /
     <a href="WSfd1234e1c4b69f30ea53e41001031ab64-78e3a.html"><b>Layer Basics</b></a> 
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                <h1>
                    About layers
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                <div><p>Photoshop layers are like sheets of stacked acetate.
You can see through transparent areas of a layer to the layers below.
You move a layer to position the content on the layer, like sliding
a sheet of acetate in a stack. You can also change the opacity of
a layer to make content partially transparent.</p>
<div class="fignone"><img alt="" id="la_01" src="images/la_01.png" /><div class="figdesc">Transparent areas on a layer let you see layers below.</div><br /></div><p>You use layers to perform tasks such as compositing multiple
images, adding text to an image, or adding vector graphic shapes.
You can apply a layer style to add a special effect such as a drop
shadow or a glow. </p>
<div class="section"><h4 class="sectiontitle">Work nondestructively</h4><p>Sometimes layers
don’t contain any apparent content. For example, an <dfn class="term">adjustment</dfn> layer
holds color or tonal adjustments that affect the layers below it. Rather
than edit image pixels directly, you can edit an adjustment layer
and leave the underlying pixels unchanged.</p>
<p>A special type
of layer, called a <dfn class="term">Smart Object</dfn>, contains one or more
layers of content. You can transform (scale, skew, or reshape) a
Smart Object without directly editing image pixels. Or, you can
edit the Smart Object as a separate image even after placing it
in a Photoshop image. Smart Objects can also contain smart filter
effects, which allow you to apply filters nondestructively to images
so that you can later tweak or remove the filter effect. See <a href="WSB3154840-1191-47b7-BA5B-2BD8371C31D8a.html">Nondestructive editing</a>.</p>
</div>
<div class="section"><h4 class="sectiontitle">Organize layers</h4><p>A new image has a single
layer. The number of additional layers, layer effects, and layer
sets you can add to an image is limited only by your computer’s
memory. </p>
<p>You work with layers in the Layers panel. <dfn class="term">Layer
groups</dfn> help you organize and manage layers. You can use groups
to arrange your layers in a logical order and to reduce clutter
in the Layers panel. You can nest groups within other groups. You
can also use groups to apply attributes and masks to multiple layers
simultaneously.</p>
</div>
<div class="section"><h4 class="sectiontitle">Video layers</h4><p>You
can use video layers to add video to an image. After importing a
video clip into an image as a video layer, you can mask the layer,
transform it, apply layer effects, paint on individual frames, or
rasterize an individual frame and convert it to a standard layer.
Use the Timeline panel to play the video within the image or to
access individual frames. See <a href="http://help.adobe.com/en_US/Photoshop/11.0/WS6C89A1C8-206D-4688-A85B-9681964F5C47a.html" target="_blank">Supported
video and image sequence formats (Photoshop Extended)</a>.</p>
<p>For
a video on using layers, see <a href="http://www.adobe.com/go/vid0001" target="_blank">www.adobe.com/go/vid0001.</a></p>
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                    <p><a href="http://www.adobe.com/go/vid0001" title="http://www.adobe.com/go/vid0001">Using layers video (adobe.com)</a></p>
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