USE LAYER FILTERS to quickly find the layer you need

Photoshop CS6 includes a new feature that enables you to filter the layers in the Layers panel based on specific criteria to help you more easily find, select, and organize layers. This is especially important in documents that contain a large number of layers or for workgroups where different people might be working on different parts of a large file. 

You can filter the layers by clicking the layer filter drop-down menu at the top of the layers panel and selecting Kind, and then clicking the icon to filter by pixel layers, adjustment layers, type layers, shape layers, or Smart Object layers. You can also filter layers by selecting a different type of filter in the drop-down menu. You can then filter by the layer name, by a specific type of layer effect, by the blend mode, by an attribute such as locked layers or visible layers, or by the layer color.

 The layer filtering switch enables you to view only the filtered layers and then toggle the filter off to view all the layers.

 1 Open a file that has multiple layers and different types of layers. 

Note: Pixel layers are those that include pixels, such as a photo or rasterized image. Other types of layers can contain shapes or type. Others, such as adjustment layers, may not show anything on the layer and simply affect the layers below. Layers and groups can be color coded and/or named. 

2 Click the layer filter drop-down menu and select Kind. 

3 Click the filter for pixel layers icon. 

Only the layers filled with pixels appear in the Layers panel. 

4 Click the layer filter switch to turn the filtering off. All the layers are again visible. 

5 Click the layer filter switch to turn the filtering on again. 

6 Click the Filter drop-down menu and select Color. 

A The Layer Filter bar changes. 

7 Click the drop-down menu and select a color such as green. 

 B Only the layers coded with that color appear in the Layers panel.

 8 Click layer filter switch to turn layer filtering off. Layer filtering is temporarily turned off and all the layers appear in the Layers panel again.

 Note: To remove all the filters, click the layer filter drop-down menu and select Kind. Click any of the filter icons, such as pixels or type, to deselect them if necessary. 

TIPS

Important! 

The Layer Filter settings remain in effect as long as the document is open. Once you close a document, the filter state is not saved. 

Did You Know? 

The selected layer is called the active layer. You can select multiple layers by pressing Ô (Ctrl) and clicking them. You can then color-code them to match, move them together to another open document, or add effects to them all at the same time. 

Try This! 

To move the Background layer, unlock it by double-clicking its name, type a new name in the dialog box that appears, and click OK. To quickly duplicate the Background layer or any active layer, use the keyboard shortcut Ô+J (Ctrl+J).