This lesson covers the Marquee and Move tools — your first two moves in Photoshop: select and move.
2026 note: This lesson was recorded on Photoshop CS6 in 2014. Adobe no longer sells the CS line — Photoshop now ships via Creative Cloud subscription. About 95% of the menus and shortcuts shown in the video still match the modern version; only the iconography is a bit fresher.
Marquee Tool (M)
- Rectangular Marquee — rectangular selection.
- Elliptical Marquee — ellipse/circle. Hold
Shiftfor a perfect circle. - Single Row / Single Column — 1-pixel-wide selection for line effects.
- Set Feather in the top bar for soft selection edges.
Shiftadds,Altsubtracts,Shift + Altintersects.
Move Tool (V)
- Drag the active layer (or pixels inside a selection).
- With Auto-Select on, clicking a pixel selects its layer — speeds up big files.
- Select multiple layers, then use the top-bar Align and Distribute buttons for tidy layouts.
- Arrow keys nudge 1 px,
Shift+ arrow nudges 10 px.
2026 Tip — Free Transform Got Smarter
The companion Ctrl/Cmd + T Free Transform now keeps the aspect ratio by default (the opposite of CS6). Hold Shift for the old behavior.
