In this tutorial I will explain the various transform commands and how they function. Although I only use them for text in this demonstration, they are extremely versatile and can be used in nearly every area of Photoshop editing. There is also a fair amount of overlap in the function of the different commands, but each acts slightly differently.

Scale and rotate are fairly self explanatory; scale makes things larger or smaller and rotate moves things on a clockwise or counterclockwise axis. The point which something rotates around will be at the center of the transform box, where there is a small circle with 4 lines at ninety degree angles through it.

Skew allows you to grab any edge of the transform box, which there will be four of and move it up or down. Generally it looks as though you can only drag on the flat 2 plan while some of the other commands allow you to move back and forth in space, or at least that is what they appear to do.

Distort is the first of the commands that require you to rasterize your object. So with our text here we were able to leave it as a vector up until now. With distort you start to get some more freedom in what you are capable of, you can grab any of the eight transform box points on the edges of the box, each of which will move your object.

The four corner points can be moved in any direction, and appear to pull your object back or forward in space. The four points that are not on the corners will stretch/shrink or move up/down.

Perspective can do the same thing as distort and warp, but it is more orderly and refined. This is because when you drag one corner it also drags the corresponding corner so it creates the perspective that your object is angled towards a vanishing point on a horizon.

If you are not familiar with a vanishing point, it is when in perspective, the point on the horizon in the distance where two lines seem to converge and visibility ends.

And last but certainly not least is warp. Warp in my perspective is the most versatile of all the transform commands. You can use it to bend objects around other objects, such as a highlight around a circle which will give a much more 3d feeling to the object. The examples I have above are not particularly great, but they give you the basic idea.

In warp your object is divided into 9 boxes, each of which you can manipulate individually, though moving one will effect the boxes around it. You can also move all the edges and points around the edges of the box. There is also four sort of lever points that you can also manipulate the object with.

So there you have it, all the transform commands in a fairly simple explanation. I hope you learned something; remember to experiment and visit www.webflostudios.com.