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I'm trying to create a layout of my apartment in Photoshop, for planning.

I'm a newbie at Photoshop. From Google, I learned that I can do the following:

  1. Upon creating a new image document, I enter the resolution as 1 pixel per inch, and enter the document dimensions as the same dimensions in inches as my apartment.

  2. From Image > Analysis > Set Measurement Scale > Custom, I again set it to 1 pixel per inch.

The scale still looks completely wrong. For e.g., I select the width of the image as 209 inches (pixels), but the scale shows the width as above 500 for some reason I can't figure out.

My question is:

1) How can I configure the document/scale so that I can view my room layout in inches? 2) How can I view the document as something like graph paper so that I can mark what area is occupied and what is vacant?

Thank you for your help.

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  • I can't reproduce the problem here. If I create a document at 209inx209in at 1px/in and set the measurement scale to 1px/in (which you don't need to do, since it's default to 1px=1unit), when I measure 79px it shows me 79 units.
    – Luciano
    Jul 30, 2018 at 11:41
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    Stop as long as you have not wasted more time. Goto a vector drawing program such as Illustrator or Inkscape. You can have a perfect scale, everything can be in as high resolution as you like, even one millimeter thing can have details, if needed. You probably want texts. They are also razor sharp in any size. In Photoshop every movable sub-image must be a new layer. That's a pain when you have say 50 things and layers. In a vector drawing program you make layers as you like. You can for ex. have layers per object categories.
    – user82991
    Jul 30, 2018 at 12:14
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    (continued) Check also Floorplan Software. You can easily find a dozen of them and many are available in several price and sophistication versions Even the simplest offer so much steam for a dollar that you never go back to the one pixel per inch in a photo editor -version.
    – user82991
    Jul 30, 2018 at 14:12

1 Answer 1

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It sounds like your settings are right. 1 ppi should make 1 px = 1 inch. But your ruler shows that 209 px = 500+ units.

Because 209 inches = 531 cm, I think your ruler unit is set to centimeters.

  • Enter Edit > Preferences > Units & Rulers and set Units > Rulers to Inches.

I haven't used the Image > Analysis menu much, and I don't think you need it either as you are using the Resolution as your scale. When the resolution matches the scale of the drawing, you can just measure with the Ruler Tool or the Rectangular Marquee Tool and read the dimensions in the Info panel. No need to use a Measurement Scale.

There are two easy ways to enable the "graph paper" you are talking about. Either:

  • Enter Edit > Preferences > Guides, Grid & Slices and set Grid > Gridline Every to 1 px (or 1 inch, in this case) and set Subdivisions to 1. Now you can toggle the grid with View > Show > Grid.

or simply (if you are using GPU rendering):

  • Toggle the Pixel Grid with View > Show > Pixel Grid.

Although it can be fun (and good practice) to do layouts in a pixel grid, Photoshop isn't really the right choice for the job. As stated in a comment, you should try using a vector drawing program like Adobe Illustrator or Inkscape.

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