The pattern stamp is not really a retouch tool in a strict sense, as it is used to apply graphic patterns to an image with painting strokes (not usually appropriate for retouching digital photos). It can be extremely useful for certain special effects, however; and because of its grouping with the clone stamp tool, it will be covered here.

To use the pattern stamp, first select it from the Photoshop toolbox. When you select it, its options will be displayed the in the options bar.

Just like the tools previously discussed, options for setting up the brush qualities, and blend mode of the pattern stamp are readily available. You will also see an Opacity field that allows you to enter a value directly or use a slider switch. The higher the value, the more opaque (solid) the stamped pattern will be.

At the far left is a pattern drop list. If you click the small arrow at the right of the Pattern preview box, a drop down palette will appear (pattern preview list) containing samples of patterns that you can access.

You can choose a pattern from this palette by clicking on it, and it will then be displayed in the Pattern preview box in the options bar. If you drag your mouse pointer over an image, the selected pattern will be painted along with your stroke.

If you click the small arrow in the upper right of this palette, you will reveal a sub menu with several pattern options. You can choose to have the patterns displayed in a small list or a large list. You can choose to display large thumbnails in the list, or small ones. At the bottom of the sub menu is a list of available patterns.

If you select the Load Patterns option from the sub menu, the following dialog box will appear.

You can select any one of the sets of patterns in this box be clicking on it. The next step is to click the Load button. Then, the set of patterns you chose will be appended to the pattern preview list. Once the patterns are in the pattern preview list, you can select the pattern of your choice for the pattern stamp tool.

If you ever want to return to the default Photoshop patterns, simply choose the Reset Patterns option from the pattern list sub menu.

As with most painting or stamp tools, you can make a selection or inverse selection with one of the selection tools, and then paint inside the selection. Your paint strokes will be confined to the selected area.

The rather bizarre background in the image above was created by making a selection around the gentleman with the polygonal lasso tool. In the nest step, Select->Inverse was chosen from the menu bar (making the background area the selection). The pattern was then painted into the background area with the Pattern Stamp tool.

It is fairly easy to create your own patterns in Photoshop CS. Just make a selection with the rectangular marquee containing the image data you want to use as a pattern.

In this image, the eagle’s eye has been selected with the rectangular marquee.

To make a pattern from your selection, choose Edit ->Define Pattern from the menu bar.

The next step is to enter a name for the pattern in the dialog box that appears. When you press the OK button, your new pattern will be appended to the pattern preview palette. You can then use the Pattern Stamp to paint with your new pattern.

To save your custom pattern, you can click the Save Patterns option in the pattern preview palette sub menu.

Alternatively, you can choose Edit->Preset Manager from the menu bar to display the preset manager drop list. Next, select Patterns from the Preset type drop list and then click on the pattern that you want to save (Shift + click to select more than one). The selected patterns will have a dark border. Finally, click the Save Set button to save your patterns.

Above, you can see that the eagle’s eye pattern has been selected for saving.