Photoshop: Cropping a single layer
by TheRiverside on Nov.15, 2009, under Photoshop
Here’s a little trick I just learned. In Photoshop, if you are resizing a layer, you might want to crop that layer to the size of a specific selection. If you invert that selection and press Delete, it only deletes the visible pixels. If you move the layer around, you’ll notice that there are still pixels kept that were out of frame when you pressed Delete.
In order to keep only the pixels in the selection, just make the selection and press Ctrl+J. I usually use this just to duplicate (or “jump”) a layer. However, if you have a specific area selected, it will just jump that selection… trashing the rest of the pixels in the process. Jump the layer and delete the old one… instant single-layer crop.
