Foreground & Background Colours (X) - (D)

The two colour swatches near the bottom of the Tool palette are the foreground and background colours. The foreground colour is the active colour when using any painting tool, the background colour is the colour that's left when erasing part of an image (but not when erasing layers). To select a new colour, click on a swatch and the Colour Picker palette opens. Click anywhere in the colour palette area to select a new colour, or enter the values in the HSB, RGB, LAB, or CMYK boxes. You can also select a new colour from an open image by pressing the ALT key whilst using any painting tool, the brush temporarily becomes an eyedropper. Click any part of the picture to make this the new foreground colour. This last method is a quick way to change colours whilst retouching or painting pictures.

The foreground colour is the swatch that sits on top. To switch between foreground and background colours, press the X key on your keyboard or click the twin headed arrows. To reset the colours to the default (black & white) press the letter D or click the two small b&w swatches.

Click either colour swatch to open the Colour Picker palette and select a new colour. Colours that are out of Gamut (not printable) have a Warning symbol, click the symbol and Photoshop selects the nearest in Gamut colour. If you want only Web-safe colours then click the cube below. Photoshop will again select the best match.

Normal Picker with Hue selected	Picker with Web colours selected
Picker Saturation selected	Picker Lab selected
Picker RGB Web colours selected	Picker Pantone Pastel selected
Click the Foreground (or Background) swatch and the colour picker palette opens. Select a colour mode to work in; HSB, RGB, LAB, CMYK, or Custom modes. The Hue (HSB) picker opens by default, choose a colour from the centre gradient and then fine tune the colour in the central area. Click the Saturation button and select a colour in the central area and move the gradient slider up or down to increase/decrease the saturation. The third option Brightness, increases/decreases the colours brightness. The RGB and LAB modes are perhaps a little more complex to use, but using your eyes you should be able to find your desired colour quickly. In RGB picker mode, with the Only Web Colours box checked, finding the right colour is a lot easier than using HSB or LAB modes. For CMYK colours you have to enter a value of up to 100% in each of the boxes. Clicking on Custom opens another palette which has 15 colour sets in a drop down list - these include Pantones, Focoltone, Toyo etc. These colours are mainly for designers who need to match company logos etc., (photographers needn't worry too much about these). If you do need to use them, then choose the colour set you require and just type in the colour reference number (type quickly and Photoshop will find the right colour). Check that the Adobe picker is selected in your preferences Edit > Preferences > General (or press Ctrl+K) and select Adobe in the Colour Picker drop down list - the Windows Picker leaves a lot to be desired.