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USING PHOTOSHOP ELEMENTS 8
Painting
Last updated 7/26/2011
Fills and strokes
Use the Paint Bucket tool
The Paint Bucket tool fills an area that is similar in color value to the pixels you click. You can fill an area with the
foreground color or a pattern.
1 Choose a foreground color.
2 Select the Paint Bucket tool in the toolbox.
3 Set options in the options bar, as desired, and then click the part of the image you want to fill.
If you don’t want to fill transparent areas in a layer, you can lock the layer’s transparency in the Layers panel.
You can specify any of the following Paint Bucket tool options:
Pattern Sets a pattern to use as the fill.
Mode Specifies how the paint that you apply blends with the existing pixels in the image.
Opacity Sets the opacity of the paint you apply. A low opacity setting allows pixels under a paint stroke to show
through. Drag the pop-up slider or enter an opacity value.
Tolerance Defines how similar in color filled pixels must be. A low tolerance fills pixels with color values very similar
to the pixel you click. A high tolerance fills pixels that have a broader range of colors.
Anti-alias Smooths the edges of the filled selection.
Contiguous Fills similarly colored pixels that are next to each other. Deselect this option to fill all similar pixels in the
image, including those that aren’t touching. The Tolerance option defines how similar the colors must be.
All Layers Fills similar pixels on any visible layer that are within the levels set by the Tolerance and Contiguous
options.
More Help topics
“About foreground and background colors” on page 205
“About blending modes” on page 205
“Smooth the edges of a selection by anti-aliasing” on page 93
“Create fill layers” on page 64
Fill a layer with a color or pattern
You can use a Fill Layer to apply a fill or a pattern to your image, instead of using one of the brush tools. The fill layer
gives you the added flexibility of changing the fill and pattern properties and editing the fill layer’s mask to limit the
gradient to a portion of your image.
1 Specify a foreground or background color.
2 Select the area you want to fill. To fill an entire layer, select the layer in the Layers panel.
3 Choose Edit > Fill Selection.
4 Set options in the Fill dialog box, and then click OK.
Contents Choose a color from the Use menu. To select a different color, choose Color, and then select a color from
the Color Picker. Choose Pattern to fill with a pattern.
