Adobe Photoshop is considered one of the most important digital design programs, widely used in the fields of fine arts, media, and advertising design, due to its powerful and flexible tools that help artists produce precise and refined works of art. This article aims to provide a concise and clear explanation of the most essential Photoshop tools that second-year students in the Department of Fine Arts need to develop their skills in digital drawing and image editing. 1. Selection Tools Selection tools are among the most fundamental steps in working with Photoshop, as they allow isolating a part of the image for manipulation without affecting other elements. Marquee Tool (Rectangular and Elliptical Selection): Used to select simple geometric areas. Useful for cropping parts of images or applying effects within a specific area. Lasso Tool (Freehand Selection): Gives the user the freedom to draw the selection boundaries, especially useful for irregular shapes. Magic Wand Tool: Selects areas with similar colors quickly, ideal for isolating uniform backgrounds. 2. Painting Tools Brush Tool: The most important tool for digital drawing, offering different types of brushes that simulate traditional painting brushes, allowing artists to express themselves in various styles. Eraser Tool: Used to remove specific parts of the digital canvas, with adjustable size, opacity, and edge softness. Gradient Tool: Creates smooth color transitions between two or more colors, used in backgrounds or to give a sense of depth. 3. Retouching Tools Clone Stamp Tool: Used to copy a part of the image and paste it in another area, essential for correcting defects or removing unwanted elements. Spot Healing Brush: Automatically fixes spots and imperfections, useful for cleaning up images. Blur & Sharpen Tools: Used to soften or enhance details, creating visual focus on specific areas. 4. Text Tools The Type Tool allows adding text in various styles and fonts, which is important for typographic design, posters, and advertisements. Users can easily control font, size, color, and alignment. 5. Transform Tools These tools allow resizing, rotating, and stretching elements. Free Transform is the most used tool, giving full control over the elements. Often used to arrange and reshape components according to the desired design. 6. Layers Layers are not just a single tool but a fundamental system in Photoshop. They allow organizing the work and editing each element separately, making the process more professional and precise. Understanding layers is an essential skill for any digital artist, as it facilitates adding, merging, hiding, and modifying effects. Conclusion Understanding Photoshop tools is a crucial step for Fine Arts students, as it enables them to produce digital works that combine technical precision with artistic imagination. Mastering the tools mentioned above provides a solid foundation for advancing to more complex skills, such as photo compositing, professional digital painting, and advertising design. This equips students to effectively use modern technology for artistic expression and to enrich their creative experience Almustaqbal University, The First University in Iraq