When working with Photoshop images, you may need to make a few changes to either adjust the angle slightly or rotate it a whole 180 degrees. Whether you would like to change the orientation simply adjust the angle, Photoshop gives you several options to rotate an image. The software also makes it possible to rotate individual layers instead of an entire image.
Rotate An Entire Image
Once you have opened your image in Photoshop, navigate to ‘Image’ on the taskbar. On the drop-down menu, hover over ‘Image Rotation’ to bring out a sub-menu with several rotation options. ‘180 degrees’ will rotate the image half of the way around a complete circle. This means that your image will be flipped so that the file appears to be upside down.
Other options on the submenu are ’90 degrees CW’ (clockwise) and ’90 degrees CCW’ (counterclockwise). ’90 degrees CW’ will rotate the image to the right, a quarter of the way around a complete circle, while ’90 degrees CCW’ will rotate the image to the left, a quarter of the way around a complete circle. The ‘Arbitrary’ option on the sub-menu will allow you to specify the angle in degrees, as well as the direction, clockwise or counterclockwise.
Rotating Individual Layers
Using the transform tool, you can perform Photoshop image rotation on individual layers. First, ensure that the layers panel is visible. If not, navigate to the taskbar, then select Window » Layers to toggle the layers panel. Select the layer you would like to rotate, open the ‘Edit’ menu from the taskbar and hover over ‘Transform’. You will be presented with similar options as we have discussed above, ‘Rotate 180 degrees’, ‘Rotate 90 degrees CW’, and ‘Rotate 90 degrees CCW’. You can also use the free transform tool by using the shortcut Ctrl+T on windows or Cmd+T on Mac. Hover the mouse icon over one of the corners until it changes to the rotating arrow icon (curved line with arrowheads on each end). Click and drag up and down to change the angle of the layer.