Speed and quality.
That's what everyone is looking for when they use Photoshop. That's why knowing how to fully automate and optimize your working process is so important.
In the previous article, we explored some of the best tips which can help you to boost your workflow. Now, we're going to examine seven more tips, focused on streamlining the way your work with Photoshop.
Again, for the sake of brevity, we'll talk mostly what needs to be done, rather than the nitty-gritty detail. For fine-grained instructions, dig into the Photoshop's documentation or you can search the Web for practical solutions and tutorials.
1. Learn and Practice Keyboard Shortcuts
[caption id="attachment_115284" align="alignright" width="240"]
When beginners start using Photoshop, they usually learn to perform a particular task by following a logical set of steps. During their movement from point A to point B, they are like a tourist train that needs to stop at every way station along the route.
This is not wrong – we all started in that way – but at some point you have to step up your game. Once we know how to perform a particular task, we need to catch that express train that skips the way stations. That express train is the keyboard shortcut!
Here is a Photoshop's default keyboard shortcuts list. If you prefer other shortcuts, you can edit the existing ones or even create your own for the tasks which don't have a shortcut assigned. Just go to Edit > Keyboard Shortcuts and make the needed changes.
2. Swap Your Computer Mouse with Graphic Tablet
Let's face it: Using a mouse for drawing and painting is not natural. There's a reason that pens aren't shaped like potatoes.
Using a tablet for the first time may feel a little strange, but once you get used to working with it, you'll wonder how you coped without it.
With one hand on your keyboard (remember those keyboard shortcuts) and the other on the pen, your speed will really spike for tasks like masking, retouching, and vector linework.
The key factors to consider when buying a drawing tablet are:
- size
- pressure sensitivity
- tilt sensitivity
- price
You don't need to spend a great deal but if you use Photoshop for painting you might find a tablet with tilt sensitivity useful.
There are also some other handy features, like touch support and shortcut keys, which can add an extra layer of speediness and comfort to your workflow, but are dependent on your budget.
Rather than going into fine detail on tablets here, I'd recommend you check out Parka Blogs excellent 2015 tablet buyers guide for a great summary of what you'll need in a tablet.
Personally, I use an old Bamboo Pen with no tilt sensitivity, no touch support, and no express keys, as I don't generally use Photoshop for painting or drawing. The tablet works perfectly for making selections, using tools such as Dodge and Burn, etc. – all the features I need for my current Photoshop work.
3. Automate Your Workflow with Photoshop's Actions, Droplets, and Scripts
Photoshop's actions can be one of the most powerful weapons in your automation arsenal. A task made up of multiple steps can be performed automatically with one single click. It takes time to record an action the first time, but time is saved every time that action is repeated in future.
Let's say that you have a dozen images which you want to convert to a specific size and resolution. Instead of repeating the conversion for each one of the images, you can perform the task once, and save it as an action.
[author_more]
7 Photoshop Master Tips to Boost Your Productivity
What is Adobe Extract - And Why Should You Care?
Generating Responsive Image Assets with Photoshop CC 2014
[/author_more]
Applying actions in Photoshop requires you to:
+open the Actions panel +find the desired action +click the Play button
Wouldn't it be great, if we could perform this operation in a faster and easier way? Well... there is such a way, and it's called droplet.
Droplets
{IMG}
A droplet is a special file – which you create and save on your hard drive – containing a specific action defined by you. To apply that action, you only need to drag an image over the droplet and.. well.. drop it. Et voila.
The cool part is you don't even have to open Photoshop!
Besides actions, there is one more similar method to automate your workflow. Photoshop allows you to use built-in or user-created scripts. A script is more flexible and powerful than a standard action because it can change its behavior according to certain conditions – but you will need at least a decent working knowledge of JavaScript to write it.
This is not a big problem. There are plenty of scripts built by other people which you can download and use. One the other hand, if you know JavaScript, you can surely take the advantage of writing your own custom scripts.
Continue reading %7 MORE Photoshop Master Tips to Speed up Your Workflow%
by Ivaylo Gerchev via SitePoint
No comments:
Post a Comment