Help! Sizes all over the place!

[Scrapowl]

Hi anyone! Hope you can help...I am self taught on Photoshop CS2 apart from an online brush course that I did, so now struggling...
Every time I start a new file, and try to add something to it by dragging and dropping from the Bridge, the new layer appears huge and I have to spend ages resizing it to fit the page, what on earth am I doing wrong? This does not always seem to happen to reckon I must have different options saved on various items, but all my digi downloads always do the same. Also once I have resized the image (if its a photo) seems to be not so clear.

All assistance gratefully received to save me hours :)

TIA

Raine

[heather belle]

Now, I'm no expert by any means, but if a new layer seems too big then it may be due to the number of pixels per inch not matching between your working document and the elements you are trying to place on it.

If you look on the preset options for a "New" document, then they are all 300 pixels per inch. Most, BUT certainly not all, digi papers and elements are 300 pixels per inch.

I simply created my own 12" x 12" template so that when I open "New" it is a choice. This is set at 300 pixels per inch with a transparent background. Straight away I have my blank page to work on.