How to undo an action in Photoshop. How to undo the last action in Photoshop if you mess up
Adobe Photoshop editor is a powerful digital image processing tool. This is a tool for solving professional problems. Due to its focus on a professional environment, Photoshop is not known for its simplicity. Therefore, beginners using Photoshop have a lot of questions. One of the first, perhaps, will be about how to undo changes made in Photoshop.
You will need
- Graphic editor Adobe Photoshop.
Instructions
Often, when working with any program and even on any server, you can cancel actions. The fact is that errors or typos are inevitable, as well as accidental key presses, so it is also possible to return everything as it was.
In this article we will talk about how to undo an action in Photoshop CS6. Often, beginners, having done something wrong, believe that nothing can be corrected. But that's not true. Let's see what actions you can take if you need to rollback while working with a program. For clarity, the article presents illustrations.
Basic information about working in Photoshop
"Photoshop" is a very complex graphics program that has many functions for creating various special effects. Any photo can be changed beyond recognition, or you can create a fabulous collage. But in order for everything to turn out beautifully and look flawless, you need to adhere to a certain sequence of actions.
Even a professional can make a mistake; besides, he is constantly studying, experimenting, and comparing. Therefore, in such a program you cannot do without the undo function. Only, unlike the same office programs, the curved arrow, meaning cancel, is hidden in the menu. In addition, there is a function to roll back several recent actions at once.
More on this below. Now let’s briefly look at all the options for undoing an action in Photoshop CS6:
- through the horizontal menu;
- using hot keys;
- through the "History" window.
Perhaps these three options are quite enough, but the last two are the most convenient and in demand.
What are the reasons for canceling actions?
There are many reasons why you might want to cancel an action. For example, you made an inscription on a photo using the Brush tool, but it turned out ugly. And you are thinking about how to undo an action in Photoshop CS6. You can, of course, use the Eraser tool, but this will erase the contents of the entire active layer.
That is, you have the “Photo_1” layer with the image of a flower active. And against its background you made the inscription “Happy March 8!” Thus, by using the virtual eraser, you risk erasing not only the text, but also the background. To prevent this from happening, it is better to cancel the actions.
Another situation: while working with layers, the master realized that the photo was not very successful. You need to undo several actions at once in order to return not to the original drawing, but to the moment when everything worked out beautifully. Even this procedure can be done easily and quickly.
Above we briefly listed how to undo the last action in Photoshop CS6, as well as several at once. It is now worth starting to study the cancellation process in detail.
Cancel via Edit menu
Open Photoshop. Upload the desired image and apply several actions to it, for example: desaturate and apply inscriptions in different colors using a brush. To undo the last brush action, point the cursor at the top of the screen, where the horizontal menu is located. Select the second item “Edit”. Pay attention to the top three commands:
- "Cancel".
- "Step forward."
- "Step back."
These commands were not invented by chance. Let's return to the example with the text written with a brush. You made a mistake or didn't like it when you drew the first letter. We need to go back. You have two options: click either “Cancel” or “Step Back”. But if you have already drawn two letters, but you need to erase both, then you need to press “Undo” twice. If you think that the command was used in vain, then click “Step Forward” and the text will return.
To better understand how to undo an action in Photoshop CS6 using menu commands, we recommend practicing. In addition, if you wish, you can learn the hotkeys that are listed to the right of the command names in the menu. That is, if you press on your keyboard Ctrl+Z, then you will immediately return the image to its previous state.
Cancel via History window
Now let's study a more complex process - how to undo several actions in Photoshop CS6. To do this, you need to open the “History” window (it usually comes in a separate tab with the “Layers” and “Properties” windows). If it is not there, then in the “Window” menu, find the “History” item.
It is there that the sequence of actions and names of operations are indicated. You need to select the lower operations that are unnecessary, or check the unnecessary commands selectively and click “Trash” at the bottom of the window, agreeing with the deletion action.
We hope that you were able to understand how to undo an action in Photoshop CS6. There is nothing complicated, and most importantly, you can choose the most convenient method.
Adobe's graphics editor, Photoshop, has been a favorite among photographers and graphic designers for almost a decade. Here, in the electronic environment, you can correct any of your mistakes and go back several steps, which is difficult to implement on paper. In this article you will learn all the nuances of undoing actions in Photoshop.
How to quickly undo an action in Photoshop
If you need to undo one or three actions, you can do this using Photoshop hotkeys. These are special combinations of buttons that you need to remember, as they significantly reduce the time you spend working with the program and can significantly simplify it.
Completely undo the last action: CTRL + ALT + Z. This will take you one step back in your editing.
Another method: CTRL + Z. It works completely differently. You roll back the action, but if you press this key combination again, the last step will take effect again. This is very convenient when you are not sure whether you want to undo the last action. By pressing CTRL and Z several times you can see both options and choose the best one.
If you roll back changes in this way and do not return them by clicking on the combination again, then the rollback will remain in effect.
How to undo an action in Photoshop through the “History” tab
If you have to roll back your editing changes many steps back, it is better to immediately go to the “History” tab. Setting up its display is quite simple.
Go to the “Window” or “Window” section. Select “History” or “History”.
A small window with the same name will immediately appear on the screen.
As soon as you start editing photos, new lines with the names of the tools will begin to appear in “History”. For example, if you took a brush and painted some area, the “Brush” item will appear in the history.
To undo several actions at once, simply click on the editing period to which you want to roll back the changes. This way you can navigate through history and select any point.
There is also a settings tab available in the history, where you can slightly change the appearance of this window. Click on the three stripes in the upper right corner. Then select the “History Options” section.
How to increase the size of a story in Photoshop
It often happens that a story suddenly ends at the right place. You need to undo the changes, but these lines are no longer there. To do this, you need to increase the memory cache for consumption by history.
Open the “Edit” or “Editing” tab, then go to “Preferences”. Another window pops up in which you need to click on “General” or “General”. It all depends on the language of your program.
In the window that appears, go to the “Perfomance” tab, in which you will find the section labeled “History States”. By default, it is set to “50”; change it to the maximum available “1000” by simply pulling the slider to the right.
Now your history is difficult to fill: it will store your every action, and you can undo any step.
Try to remember the hotkeys and this method to make it easier to navigate the editor.
When working in Photoshop, you often need to take a step back. And often not alone. But ? Is it possible to undo actions only for part of the image? It turns out that it is possible! Let's figure it out.
Key combination
Like any text editor, Adobe Photoshop uses the standard Ctrl+Z key combination, which undoes the last action. (Analog: Main menu → Edit → Undo). But the problem is that this combination only cancels one action. When you press it again, the cancellation is canceled, i.e. everything returns as it was. If you need to undo several actions, you should use Ctrl+Alt+Z (Analog: Main menu → Edit → Step Backward). You can cancel the cancellation, i.e. step forward: Ctrl+Shift+Z (Analog: Main menu → Edit → Step Forward).
By default, you can only undo the last 20 actions. If necessary, this number can be increased to 1000. You just need to understand that if you do not have the most powerful computer, and it somehow copes with Photoshop, then such an action will lead to slowdown. It is necessary to find a balance in which a sufficient number of steps would be maintained, and the program would not “hang”! To change this number, follow the path: Main menu → Edit → Preferences → Performance. In the “History States” line, enter the required number. Ok.
Palette History
You can more clearly undo an action in the History palette. By default, palettes are on the right. 
If you don’t have the “History” palette, then go to: Main menu → Window and put a “bird” in the “History” line.
Palettes can also be rolled up.
In this case, we find the icon of the “History” palette (arrow 1) (If you hover the cursor over the icon and wait a while, the name of the palettes will pop up). Clicking on it will open a smaller version of the palette. Or you can expand all the palettes by clicking on the double arrows in the corner (arrow 2). The History palette can be anywhere in the palettes area. You can move it wherever it is convenient for you. Or even unhook it from the rest of the palettes and move it to a place convenient for you. I will tell you more about working with palettes in the next lesson.
The “History” palette sequentially records all the actions that you performed after opening the document. The number of actions remembered is the same as when canceling using a key combination. If you specified 50 in the settings, then there will also be 50 of them in the palette (How to change the number of memorized actions is written above). Moving up the line, you cancel one action at a time.
Each line contains the name of the instrument and its icon. To the left of the icon there is an empty window, which we will talk about a little later, in the next method of canceling an action. As you move up the list, the bottom lines turn gray. This means that they were canceled, but remained in memory. You can return to them again. But if, after undoing several actions, you use some tool or perform some other action, then these steps (gray lines) will be lost. On the palette you can take pictures of successful options. The image of the camera is at the bottom of the palette (arrow 1). With further changes, the image will remain at the very top of the palette list (arrow 2).
Archive brush
In this method we will look at how to get part of an image back. The “History Brush” tool, which is located on the toolbar, or the Y key (Shift + Y) will help us with this.
Next to the name of the tool, if you noticed, there is a letter Y. This means that by pressing Y, we go to the cell we need. And the keyboard shortcut Shift+Y cycles through all the tools marked Y. Using hotkeys greatly improves productivity!
Let's say, for example, I send a cloud of leaves along the arrow.
Moreover, first I will draw yellow and green leaves, and the next step will add red ones. In this case, in the “History” palette I will have two lines with the “Brush” tool.
Now I want to remove the red leaves that were drawn second. But we will not remove them everywhere, but only along the arrow. To do this, on the “History” palette to the left of the first brush icon, click on the empty window. An image of the archive brush appears (look at the arrow).
Now select the History Brush tool. Its parameters are the same as those of a regular brush. Set the desired opacity and hardness and remove everything unnecessary from the image. To do this, move the Archive brush over the place where you want to remove the changes. In my case, it is in the direction of the arrow. As a result, the red leaves were safely removed from the arrow, but the green ones remained.
In this way you can, for example, blur the background in a photo. First, use a filter to blur the entire photo (don’t overdo it!), and then use the History Brush to return the figure to its previous sharpness.
Restore History (Archive Eraser)
The “Erase to History” function works in a similar way, operating through the “Eraser” tool.
If something unnecessary was removed while working with the eraser, then you can try to return the intermediate option. For my example, I will again send leaves of different colors along the arrow. I will have three brushes on my History palette.
This is what my drawing looks like now.
Let's say now I need to remove the leaves going along the arrow. To do this, select a regular eraser (E key), select the desired brush size ([ and ] keys) and move it along the arrow.
Now we will return the leaves of the same color back to the arrow. To do this, go to the “History” palette. We find the required line (on which we applied leaves of the desired color). Click on it. Place the archive brush icon (arrow 1). We now have the “Erase to History” window active. Now we can check the box (arrow 2).
We go to the very end of the “History” palette, where we erased the leaves, and move the archival eraser along the arrow.
Leaves began to appear. If we move this eraser past the arrow, the leaves drawn after our selected rollback point will be erased.
Another condition for the archive eraser to work is to check the box next to “Automatically Create First Snapshot” in the “History” palette parameters.
The parameters can be found in the “History” palette at the top right in the line with the name of the palette, four horizontal lines.
This tool can come in handy if you accidentally erased something with a regular eraser and you need to get it back.
It’s a rather tricky method, but you can master it if necessary.
Restore command
If for some reason the image can no longer be restored using the History palette or other actions, you can use the Revert command. The program will restore the last saved state.
To restore, follow the path: Main menu → File → Revert or press F12.
Conclusion
We looked at five ways how to undo an action in photoshop, which will help you not be afraid to try something new and interesting in your work. If something goes wrong, you can always restore partially or completely the original version.
See you on the pages of the next lessons!
Sincerely, Marina Rubl.
How to undo an action in Photoshop?
There are some interesting keys on the keyboard that cancel the last action in Photoshop.
These are two keys, you need to press them simultaneously CTRL+Z. They are located next to each other on the left side of the keyboard. I think it won’t be possible to press these two keys at the same time.
Fast, easy, convenient and affordable)
Usually, to undo an action in Photoshop, I use history, but in history I can undo 20 steps. I think it’s the same in your Photoshop. In order not to lose information, I usually use smart objects when editing, for example, when my work requires applying several filters to an image, this way in the word palette you can always return to these filters and change the filter settings.
You can undo an action in Adobe Photoshop using a keyboard shortcut Ctrl+Z. This program also has a window in which the latest operations are displayed; in it you can also cancel extreme actions if necessary.
You can cancel the action through the top Edit menu or use the Ctrl+Z hotkeys. If you need to undo several actions, you can use the keyboard shortcut Ctrl+Alt+Z (cancels the action step by step). It is very convenient to use the additional History window (to enable it, you need to go to the top Window menu and select History from the list). In the settings of Photoshop itself, you can set the number of actions that are stored in the History Window, but keep in mind that this will load the RAM.
On the right there is a small window where all actions are shown. If you select an action performed earlier, for example, by 5 steps and delete it to the trash, then all subsequent actions will be deleted
You can undo an action in Photoshop using hotkeys CTRL+Z- after using these key combinations you will go back one step. But you can also go back one step or more steps back if you use a window Story, which can be activated using the menu Window. Typically, this window is already programmed to remember 16-20 steps. The number of steps is set using the command Editing-Settings.
1.In the event that you need to go back, then open Editing and here we select an option such as Cancel or Step Back.
2.Hotkey help:
Ctrl+Z to cancel the last action;
Alt+Ctrl+Z to take a step back.
3.To cancel changes made, open Story, find the desired operation and return to it by clicking on it with the left mouse button. You will return to the step you clicked on.
