One of the most common design techniques in Photoshop is to utilize layer styles to create drop shadows, gradient overlays, strokes, etc. One thing I often run into is that I need to “finalize” or “apply” that style into the layer as pixels. Basically make it so that the style is no longer applied to the layer but it’s effect is still there to allow me to erase bits, do a new blend, etc.
Here is the complicated process I use to accomplish this.
- Create a new empty layer and place it underneath the layer you want to “finalize.”
- Right click on the layer you want to finalize and choose ‘merge down.’
That’s it. I told you it was complicated 
Brad
P.S. If you have a blending mode on the layer you want to “finalize” you should set it to Normal before doing the merge down. Then, once you have done the merge, set the new “style free” layer to the original blending mode.
Here is a list of useful default hotkeys/shortcuts that are extremely useful, but you may not know them. Of course you can override current hotkeys with your own or setup a fully customizable set. These are some of the more useful and highly used default ones.
- [ and ] – will increase or decrease your brush size of the current tool.
- Cmd +/- to zoom in and out of your canvas.
- x – will swap the background and foreground colors.
- d – will reset your background and foreground colors to black and white.
- Shift + Cmd + n – will create a new layer.
- Cmd + Clicking a layer – will select that layers transparency.
- Shift + any tool hotkey will toggle the tools options.
- Here are some of them
- w – magic wand
- v – move tool
- g – fill/gradient
- b – brush
- m – marquee
- l – laso
- Cmd + / – will increase and decrease zoom levels.
- Tab – will hide your tool pallets
- f – will toggle the canvas mode (open window, gray frame, gray frame free, black)
If you find yourself modeling something that is symmetrical and want to be able to model on one side and have the other side update automatically, then here are a few steps to get you going.
- Make sure you have an edge loop running down the center of your model. Specifically the axis upon which you want to mirror.
- Go into component mode (faces), select half of your models faces and delete them.
- Go back into object mode and make sure your half model is still selected.
- Check that your objects pivot point is sitting on the axis you want to mirror. If not, put it there (insert on pc, home on mac).
- Go to Edit > Duplicate Special []
- Make sure you have instance selected instead of copy.
- Set the scale value of the axis you want to mirror to -1.
- Hit Apply.
Now you will have your model in complete form again. However, if you start tweaking vertices on one side you will find the other side does exactly the same thing only mirrored. Caveats: Since you are ‘essentially’ working with 2 different objects at the same time you will always have a seam running down the center. Even if you work in smooth preview mode you will see the seam. Don’t worry about that while modeling. Just remember that when you are done, simply delete the instance and do a proper mirror and merge. The seam vertices and your model will be as smooth as you need it to be. Often you might find that there is a gap in the seam. If so, you can move all seam vertices together to close it, or make sure your pivot point lines up with the seam before doing your instance mirror.
