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Sign up for updates now »Ever been confronted, in Photoshop, with this (totally useless) crop tool icon?
Or been using a large paintbrush, and seen this equally useless icon:
Even though your preferences clearly designate the “brush size” cursor should be used?
In either case, press CAPS LOCK. You will get the latter icon, which is the only good way to crop, if cropping, and you will toggle back to the “brush size” icon if you are using the brush tool (and your brush size is big enough).
It was quite awhile before I discovered this, and I always thought I had a buggy copy of Photoshop in the “brush size” situation. It seems everyone else I’ve encountered has thought the same, so I hope this helps you.
Blump said,
February 22, 2005 @ 4:57 am
ha thanks! I always restarted my comp to fix it, feel kinda dumb now, but thanks for havin enough guts to post this!
George said,
May 1, 2005 @ 8:13 am
Thanks! I thought the same–buggy and slightly flaky–until this morning when the frustration led me to lok for a solution, and lo, here it was.
Dragos said,
May 20, 2005 @ 3:22 pm
Thanks, this was driving me CRAZY
Graham said,
September 15, 2005 @ 12:30 pm
Thanks from me, too. Like most problems, it’s so easy when you know the answer. I always wonder why these embuggerance factors are not covered more prominently at helpdesks on the makers’ own websites.
Keith said,
April 21, 2006 @ 4:23 am
I also ound this out by accident. What bothers me more is the colour of the cursor. It seems designed to blend in with the mid range colours & can be almost impossible to locate.
Is there a method of changing this? I have version 5.5 & I can’t beleive something so annoying has survived so long
Jonish said,
December 30, 2007 @ 12:34 pm
Woohooo, that’s great, i was jsut googling solution for this
Mike said,
March 4, 2008 @ 9:18 pm
haha, thanks for the tip. So simple and so frustrating.
Sneha said,
August 31, 2008 @ 5:33 am
Thanks a lot for this tip! This problem had been bugging me for ages.
ms said,
September 20, 2008 @ 5:14 am
This has saved me from getting smashy. Also it was the first result for my shot-in-the-dark google search “photoshop cursors”. Ultra thanks upon your head sir.
Oscar said,
December 5, 2008 @ 8:10 pm
What can I tell you after years of frustation about that problem.
Thanks for taking your time to ilustrate us.