Have you ever had one of those mega-complicated images with dozens of layers? If so, you are probably familiar with the agony of having to fumble through an endless sea of layers, hoping you won’t drown before you find the right one. If this describes you, you’ll be ecstatic to know you can group a bunch of layers together. A group of layers looks like a folder in the Layers palette. You can view all the layers in the group or just the group name.
Note: The folders that are known as groups in Photoshop CS2 were called Layer Sets back in CS. They visually look the same, and most of the functionality is identical. The only real difference is that you can select multiple layers and Shift-click the folder icon to place those layers into a folder. In CS, you’d have to link the layers together and then choose New Set From Linked from the side menu of the Layers palette.
To group multiple layers, select the layers and then either Shift-click on the folder icon at the bottom of the Layers palette, or choose Layer > Group Layers. You can also click the folder icon (without holding any keys) to create an empty folder. Then, you can move any number of layers into the folder by dragging and dropping them onto the folder you just created. The folder will have a small arrow just to its left that allows you to collapse the group down to its name or expand the group to show you all the layers it contains. You can even drag one folder onto another to create a hierarchy of up to five levels of folders. This can greatly simplify the Layers palette, making a document of 100-plus layers look as if it’s made of only a few layers.
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Note: To get rid of a group without throwing away the layers that are inside it, click on the group to make it active, click on the Trash icon at the bottom of the Layers palette, and then choose Group Only when prompted.
Option-clicking (Mac) or Alt-clicking (Windows) on the arrow next to a group will expand or collapse all the groups and Layer Style lists within that group. Adding the Command key (Mac) or Ctrl key (Windows) will expand or collapse all the groups in the entire document.
Groups can also be useful when you want to reorganize the layers in your image. If one of the layers within a group is active, then using the Move tool will affect only that layer (unless it’s linked to other layers). If the group is active, then using the Move tool will move all the layers within that group.