Adobe Photoshop text tool questions

Recently, I have discovered the joys of adding text to photos in photoshop. Unfortunately, there seems to be a lower limit on the size of text. I want small type, but choosing size 6 font is still pretty big (it looks like a size 12 or 14 font in Word). The “other” choice in font size is greyed out. How can I get smaller text?

Also, every time I type something with the text tool, it comes out underlined, and I cannot find a way to turn that underline off. Any suggestions?

Thanks!

whew. Ok, this can be a tricky one for a novice.

First of all, what version of PhotoShop are you using. I ask because the text tool has changed dramatically over the years.

2nd, when you say underlined, are you talking about an actual underline that can change with the font color, or is it simply the baseline/guide of the font (should disappear when you select another tool)?

3rd, As far as your OP, my guess is you need to check the resolution and size of your document. The resolution is how many pixels in an inch*, and the size would be how many inches big (height & width) the document is. If you have 6pt type that is coming out huge, than your document size is set pretty small (probably 1 inch across or so?). You can go into Image Size under the Image menu, and change the dimensions of your document (in your case, increase the image width to, say, 8 inches), which will then give you 6pt type relative to your 8 inch document width. But watch your resolution when you do this, because your image might start interpolating, and look rather mushy if you bump up the image size too much. Very important to pay attention to the resolution and document size respectively.

Also, why can’t you just type in the point size you desire in the type size field?

I hope this makes sense to you?

*assuming you’re American, if not, then substitute the next relevant metric unit
:smiley:

The help guide to PS 7 says that is uses vector type (in certain file types) which is different than bitmap/raster type. When you use vector, you are essentially providng the program with information on how to create the text. Raster then would be the individual pixels of the image. We could go on if you’d like.

Messing around with it now, there’s some funky vector to raster thing going on. Basically, when you create the text, you are creating vector text which is displayed as if it were raster (if you save as .psd or .eps, the path information will go with it, if not, it’s converted to raster upon save).

In Illustrator, your text object will have the baseline on it, but I haven’t been able to reproduce it in PS.

As for underlining, double click the text tool on the tools palette. This should bring up the text palette (very helpfully, you apparently can’t access it any other way). Expand it and you’ll see the option to turn off the underline. Alternately, you can use the ctrl+shift+u keyboard shortcut.

I don’t know why the other is greyed out. I suspected that if I opened an eps or ai file it might work, but it didn’t. Just enter a number in the size field and you can size it how you like. Keep in mind what dpi you’ll be working on as if you’re using 72, 6 points is pretty illegible and I can’t imagine going lower.

I think if you highlight the text size number up top and manually change it you can get below 6, I had this problem last week and got down to font size 1 and 2.

When I use text it automatically goes on a new layer.

You can use the (I forget the name of the tool!) but the tool in the upper right of floating tool bar and you can resize the text to any size you want. You can also move it about to be where ever you want.

As far as the underline

When I select the type tool, again this is version 6.0, the same basic text tools you have in word appear in the tool bar section at the top. So bolding, underline, Italics, and justisfy as well as font selection.

On cool thing. You can have a bit of text, then hight the font selection, then use the scroll on your mouse to change the font selection and your text changes as you scroll through your hundred or so fonts.