A short intro to using layer masks in Photoshop. Layer masks are used to hide areas of a layer without deleting any of the layer’s colour information. I almost always use layer masks rather than the erase tool. You never know when you’re going to want those pixels back.

• Erasing non-destructively with layer masks
• Fine-tuning layer masks with tools like Blur
• Making a selection from your mask
• CAUTION: make sure you’re editing the mask and not the layer
• Moving or copying masks from one layer to another
• Using vector masks and combining them with pixel masks