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Smart Objects

Lesson 16 from: Everyday Adobe Photoshop: From Workflow to Smartflow

Dave Cross

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Lesson Info

16. Smart Objects

Next Lesson: Smart Object Tips

Lesson Info

Smart Objects

So smart objects, first of all, as a general statement in photo shop, I like to always give some tips just in general. So if you are looking under men using retire, decide which of these things should I use, and my philosophy is, if anything that has the word auto in it, he should not use because that means it's automatically doing something somehow on how to unearth. Do you know what it's doing? Anything with the word smart in it definitely use it, because smart in photoshopped terminology means the ultimate inflexibility and it's as an aside if it has the words, content aware and it's. Equally important to use was content aware is fairly new technology that across the board, wherever it exists, is a good thing. So smart objects is without trying to sound over dramatic in photo shop. Three layers came out, and it changed everything for me because it was so much easier working photo shop when smart objects first came out and whatever version it wass that I remember now, cs four I remem...

ber, um, right away I was like, wow, this really changes a lot because a lot of the backup plans I usedto have, like I'd always be like, what better do kate this layer first to make a copy of that that all went out the window because the premise of a smart object is it's going to protect information in a way that I can always get back to it no matter what I do other than deleting but everything else, so it opens up some really interesting possibilities and the best way I I can think of to describe a smart obstacle. This is not official adobe terminology, but for me, when I was trying to learn it, it made sense to me to think of it as a normal layer is just pixels on a layer. When I converted to a smart object it's, like I've put that layer into a container, so now, even though I can see it it's protected, so I can't unintentionally touch it or break it or do bad things to it because it's inside this container so the concept of smart object comes down to containers and its contents. So as we progress along you, you'll see maur what I mean now, just as an example to get us started here's before smart objects how things worked in photos show I have a layer or excuse me, a logo that I brought in and it's not vector, even though confusingly enough, the name of the company is vector that was just kind of unintentional thing I did, but the logo looks good at this size because it's the original size, however and photoshopped this is the way it's always been if I use free, transform and scale down much smaller as soon as I hit enter excuse me that's its new size that's not one hundred percent so if I can't undo it say I've moved on and it's now tomorrow and I look at it and go oh that you know that was kind of silly I should have kept it bigger find try and scale something back up it looks horrible same time you scale pixels up, something has to happen and photo shop invents pixels and it always just has this very soft edge kind of pixel eyes look that's just not good at all so instead if now and this doesn't happen automatically that's when the first keys about smart objects is with a few exceptions you have to choose to do this some of the time. Other times it does happen automatically is I want to protect this logo to give myself more options so the first thing I do is right click or control click and shoes convert to smart object when it says convert to smart object in your mind you should be thinking to yourself put inside protective container because that that in effect is what's happening so at first glance it looks exactly the same on the image area because it's still the same logo but if you look at the layers panel that little symbol appears in the corner and that's the indication this is now considered a smart object, which simply means it's giving me mohr options. So what happens is now let's do the same thing. I scale it down to a tiny size from the original and hit enter looks pretty good at that size now, in the first case, that was one hundred percent now what's happened the smart object that's like that's, just my current size. But I remember I was originally this big because that's protected inside that container, so this could be two weeks from now. After saving and doing all this other stuff, I suddenly think that was a bad idea I should have made kept it bigger, I can now scale it back up because I'm not going to lose any quality that's all I'm doing is putting it back the way it wass now, I still can't scale it bigger than originally was because that's doesn't change that it's not they're smart object, they're not magic objects, so it doesn't change that back, but at least the means now I feel like I can experiment because I can do a series of steps and know that well, if I really don't like something, I can always change it because that the original information is inside of it. Before we go too far, though, talking aboutthe wonders of smart objects, there are a couple of things that cause people grief initially that are important to address because people ask me all the time. Well, you seem to love smart, obviously, are there only any downsides to it? And I say, well, there's, I wouldn't call it a downside, but it's definitely something to be aware of and, for example, so here I've made this thing smart, and I'm working away, and also I think, you know, I'm not sure that I want maybe I want to add something or change the color of something, so if I take, for example, my pink brush and attempt to paint on it, I get this little symbol that says, nope, and if I try to do something, it says the smart object must be rast arise before proceeding. That definitely is number one on the no no list, because that defeats the whole purpose of it being smart, so I don't want to do that, and I had canceled, but how do I get to it? It's inside a container and I can't touch it because it's protected. So the way that we get to the contents is you look inside the container and photoshopped terms, that means double click on it, and it opens a separate window with the contents so one of the first things that throws people off is that you're going to end up with two documents open at the same time the one you're working on that has your smart object and when you double click on it opens a second window to say this is the contents of this document okay? So if for example I decided that I wanted and this is it happens this one is an actual text anymore sta graphic but I can still change it if I go and severally wish the word vector was actually black instead of whatever color it was I change it in here and then when I save it I'm saving the contents when I come back here it updates so this is the one part that initially throws people off because it's a little bit different you no longer technically editing directly on this image because you can't but in many ways that's a good thing because that's how we're able to protect it is we can't unintentionally our race delete change or whatever because it's inside that protective container so that applies to anything that you want to edit as part of is that the first thing that kind of throws people off as they go to try and use you know, the clone stamp tool and they try it this goes no can't do it because that's just you can't do it directly to an image you either have to go to the content to do it there or use another method will talk about along the way okay? So that's kind of the first thing that you have to get used to this a little different about because not typical photos operate operation normally work in this document and that's it in a smart objects we have to be saying well this is ultimately my end result but to get to the information I have to look inside of it and depending on how the smart object is created will determine what the contents are look inside and go well there's one layer or their seven or it's a camera smart object or something but that concept is the same so for some people that is enough of a difference workflow thing that it kind of throws them off and they're reluctant to use smart objects fellow I work too it was like you know I keep trying smart objects but every time trying use them and try and click on it to edit it on like a pause that's your problem right there you're clicking on it to edit it instead of double clicking on the thumbnail to open the original so if you always think container and contents that's step number one because you can't edit the container other than size you have to edit the contents and you do the editing is it now forever changed or is there an original that what is it's changed in the sense of if you make a change of the contents that's new contents in the original contents have now been edited so for example let me give an example that if I double click on it and decide that I for now I think maybe I just don't want the word vector to appear at all so actually made me do it this way all right so I would still do it in a way that now if I say that in my updated one it looks like the word vector is gone but at least in the contents document I've done it in a editable way so I could always say oops that was a bad idea let me not do that thanks so difference would be if I pulled out the eraser and erase the word vector then there's no going back so you still have to think nondestructive as faras the contents go and then when you save that it will update the container document let me again stress no one else calls on that except me I don't think so don't go looking under a menu for where's that container thing it's smart object and contents just made sense to me to call the container ok that makes sense okay my mind my question would be I was under the impression that a smart objects this is just really a high risk jay pick or maybe that only applies for the ipad version of it could be because in in photo shops impression it's just it's a protective it's, a different way of working so it could be you could have a document had four smart object in the each one that was a combination of different layers, or it could start from light room as a smart objects or how you get in there. But that's it's has the ability to preserve all the photo shop stuff in a way that's even mohr editable than it normally would be. So it doesn't really is not a j peg thing, it's just so that probably is something that way, and I ask the questions, don't be actually made that statement last month, right? That it's just actually think what you might think I was smart preview, which is the thing in light room, where it allows you to work on a preview image than it then it eventually applies to that that's a smart it's, a different type of smart it's, a smart preview is supposed to a photo shop smart, okay, similar principle, maybe, but a little bit different. All right, so as we're going along and that's, I'm glad you asked that question because one important points is this document, I can't at it because it's just I'm sort of looking at it, but when I come back to edit the contents and still have to be conscious of doing my editing and here in a way that gives me the most options, so I wouldn't want to erase or delete or, you know, change the color in ways that are going toe paint myself into a corner. So I'm still and that's kind of the reason I structured the class up until now to talk about all those other things like mass and adjust mariscos I might in here decide, for example, I want to change the color of this piece, but temporarily so I would do that in here by using a huge saturation just layer with a mask, okay, so now when I say that it will update in my original document, but I know that the contents document, I didn't do it in a way that's going to cause myself trouble down the road, I still used nondestructive editing off the contents to give myself more often that happens. This was a logo I grabbed from somewhere I, for whatever reason, don't have normally those would be type players at the bottom, but whatever reason that much your wife remember it's not, but normally for me, that would be what you would see is type player type, player shaped layer and then happens that in my other document, it looks like one layer because it's a smart object, but I'm still preserving all these pieces inside of it. Okay, so there's lots of ways to use oh, by the way, the other start time with this advances the first one is that whole wait, I can't edit it directly and that's just the way it works, and the second one is, depending on what you're doing, your file size could get bigger because you're almost embedding mohr information side. But personally, I don't have a problem with that because I'd rather have a bigger file with more options than a small followed I couldn't edit, so here's another example of how I might use this? This was that project we were working on before I say we like you were helping me very much in that whole project here's the project and I was working on before it has a whole stories of layers now, maybe I want to pull that into a different document to work on. It is, if I'm showing here is an example of an album page, I don't want to necessarily pull five separate layers and on risk pulling them apart by mistake, so what I could do is take all of these layers and convert to a smart object so now it looks visually like it's been flattened doesn't it because you only see one icon but there's a very important difference I didn't use the word merger flattened I said convert to smart object so once again we see that little symbol on the thumbnail to say yeah that means it's smart which also means same principle now if I want to look at this and play around with it I double click on it to open a second document that has all the layers so now I could say I don't want that on there save it and this one will update so let's take this a step further and say I was doing I don't know ad for ah magazine I want to show this is an example of what I would do for you so I would take this um along close the wrong document there in here we go let's try that again ahead of myself there ok so here's that smart object that looks like one layer it so much easier now to just dragged that one thing in here and I drop it into this document it's way too big but that's okay because I'm deliberately doing this is kind of an example that I this bay and I rotate it like that so it's on here and I might even just to take things a step further because I could let's do it this way this is what I will do instead and I'll explain momentarily what's happening here but I want to sort of set this up so you can see an example of the many interesting possibilities of smart objects okay? All right, so now I'm working on this project I took the first smart object and just lowered the opacity on I duplicated it which means and thinks exact clone of the first smart object so now I've got in this document on ly two layers but each one of them in effect points to or contains all those many layers that was my original so from an editing standpoint it's much cleaner because in here all I'm worried about is here's a layer looks like one layer that aiken rotates scale at a drop shadow blah blah, blah whatever I want but if now I look at and go you know, I wish I had kept that little floral thing that was on there I didn't delete that I just hid that layer, so if I double click on here it'll again open a document with all the layers in it I show the layer that I want and I could tweak whatever else like this layer needs to be moved over here a bit and whatever it is I save it and when I do it is going to that that don't wait for it update in my document now, before smart objects, I would have had a layers panel that was this long, you know, really huge that I'd say, ok, wait a minute, which one is the correct? Plus, I've got two copies of it, so I'd be like, wait, is that the right one? It was just a nightmare because you have all these layers have to go, which one of my and now from a visual standpoint, I'm only actually seeing a couple of layers in there, this one like the one that's tilted and the bigger one that I can play with, but I still I'm able to get all the pieces inside of it just by double clicking and that's really the part for most people that kind of leads to initial confusion is that hole to document thing it is, but if you think I find contents, is this you know, because I've seen it as if it's one layer and then I want to edit the contents. It opens that second, second document and it's a subtle thing, but it's important to know that any time you're working on a document like here, this is a just a standard document it's going to be a psd file when I save it when you double click on a smart object and it opens a second window it's called dot psb not psd so there's two things that tells me this is the contents file one is it has a whole bunch of layers the second is and it says dot psb which from a tribute standpoint stands for photoshopped big really does such a weird name but that's what it does so this way I know that I have access to all the layers in here but yet when I'm finished I can close it and if I've done in change little update over here if I when I save it so what? I continue work so I can again alter this scaled up or down rotate do whatever I want but it's giving me a much nicer way of working again the recurring theme in all this is the part that throws people off is if they say you know that little light thing there's a light part on the pavement that's distracting me I want to get rid of that if you try and take the clone stamp tool no can't do it so I'd have to think well how can I do it there's two options for now for this situation here I would say well let's open the original and then add a new layer and do that actually probably used the patch tool frankly, but since I start time with the cold stamped we'll just use that one and you know covered up close it save it and then when I do it's gonna take a moment to update and you see now it's updated over here now again, I clone onto a separate layer so even that decision goes back to our original discussion of even cloning I didn't do it directly on the image because I want to have the option of well, wait a minute, maybe that doesn't look as good or I don't like the way it's clone or something. So all the things we talked about up until now like layer mass and justin layers, including mass are still all relevant it's just we're doing it inside the contents document, not the original question, so the photo donna to question actually photo dances with smart objects the file size I have this very large is there any way to deal with the how do you deal with these really extra large files? Well and we'll get to that a little later is a new option if you have a fairly recent update in the creative cloud version of photo shop because before smart, obvious were always embedded inside. You never had a choice that's just the way it was now you have the option of linking certain smart object so that could cut down on the file size a little bit, but one of the unfortunate realities that price we have to pay for all this edit ability is often a considerably larger files including sometimes where doesn't make any sense because you look at the size of your file and it's like you know two megabytes you make it smart and seven it's like what what happened there I mean sometimes it doesn't make logical sense but unfortunately that's the reality but as we'll see in a bit the um ability to link smart objects can help to some degree follow up I know you and I we talk a lot about with our audience about the that you can't use the rubber stamp we called the rubber stamp clone too do you from a workflow standpoint do usually start with all that the work using the clone stamp tool at the beginning of a project and try and look at blemishes and all that kind of stuff and then jump into the smart object workload well it depends I would say as much as possible I do however there is a way that I can work around it because when you're working on image let's do it this way now I'll talk more about what happened but this is automatically a smart object because it came from camera and that's the way my cameras set up so here's a perfect example I try to clone or hell or whatever it's like no doesn't matter which tool I use spot healing brush no because I can't work directly in this in this case the contents of this smart object is camera it's not a separate layer or anything so it's a little bit different but the same principle? So if you think about it when we talked about cloning and healing and all those kind of things even before smart objects my philosophy was do it on a separate layer so at a blank layer make sure your tools says sample all layers so it's no different here so with smart objects I have two options I could either if I in that other example where I hadn't made it smart yet I could do is much healing and cloning and everything first and then make it smart in this case I can't help it because already a smart object it's kind of too late to do any cloning, so the solution is at a new layer and I mean this is the way I I retouch anyway even before smart objects take whatever tool let's say we're going to use the spot healing brush and go over these areas here and it looks really bad so far and then I lower the opacity because I never really want to take things away again. That part looks really bad, but you get the idea so now is I'm going around and doing my retouching the results of this tool are on the separate layer now from a workflow standpoint or an order of doing things the on ly thing to keep in mind is when you use this method of cloning healing retouching, et cetera onto a blank layer it's not a live effect in other words, if I one of the benefits of using smart options, I could go back and change my mind about things like exposure and total stuff, but if I do that, I'm going to run into a problem because the healing brush work based on what her photograph looks like right now if I decided for example, to go, you know what I think I wantto, you know, change the white balance a little bit, so I change it and I make a little brighter and I click ok, I'm gonna have a definite problem here because what happened is the photograph updated, but the healing and cloning didn't so that's where you do have to think about the order and make sure you're as close as you possibly can be to the look do you want before you start doing this? I mean, at worst I'd have to delete that layer and do it over again. But if I did a lot of retouching, I wouldn't want to do that, so I try to be at least as careful as I could to say let me get all the other settings looking the way that I want before I start doing this, okay, so with this exception, most things and smart obvious that benefited the order doesn't matter all that much because you're already preserving all these things. This is probably one of the kind of prime examples is the order does matter, especially in this case because coming from light room or cameras smart object it's not an option and already is a smart idea can't change that. Okay, okay, the question. All right, we're good. Thank you. Okay, okay, so, uh let's see here. So one of the projects that I was playing around with earlier on and I took this document, I added multiple adjusting layers with masks and at this point, if I wanted to move on and do something else, I wanted to apply a filter or just use another document. This would be another case where I certainly would not want to merge everything because I want to preserve all that work I've done and the blue the edited but I wanted to be effectively treated as if it's one layer so again same thing apply just take all these layers and convert to smart object now I might even save it that way. So when I say that next time I open and it looked just like that like it only has one layer but I know inside that embedded inside are all those separate layers including all the adjustment layers and masks this is going to make the file size a little bit bigger but I think from a editing usability standpoint it's so much easier to look at this and say I'm going to treat this now as if it's a photo that I can use in other projects or wherever but I know in a pinch if I need to if I look at and say and that one part's a little too dark or light able to access that information so a lot of people use this is where they get into thinking of themselves will have to merge or flattened or to move on and the reality is you don't have to because this effectively gives you a similar result as merging or flattening but without losing information so that's probably one of the most common ways that people use smart objects as they want to feel like ok, I've reached a certain point I like the way it looks I want to move on and try some other things but not lose any of that other work so convert to a smart object continue doing other things with it whatever it might be I don't know and we're doing something whatever add some text you don't do something else on top of it and then decide still there's part of it I don't like doubleclick it's going to open that other file with all the information preserved one of the the ways that people there's a function people have to sort of think about explain this first about a function that people used to do and why I think it's important not to do it this way anymore actually use this other one I think this would be better okay to go back to here all right so there's a function in force that's been around for a long time that that lot of people call stamp visible and the concept of it was okay I want and I usedto advocate this all the time before smart objects and then it was smart of camel as I don't do that anymore. But it's been so ingrained in people's minds and it's kind of a cool idea but it's unnecessary. Now what people would do is they say ok, so I'm working on this project at a certain point I now want to move on, but I don't want to lose the ability to edit the layers so there was this kind of little trick that people would do there's a command and photoshopped called merge visible. Now if I do that right now that's the same it's flattening because all my layers are visible, so if I chose it it would be bad because now it's flattened it's not smart, so I don't want to do that, but one of the recurring themes we've talked about is it was very special little modifier key is the option or all key when you do that, it adds some little special thing in this case. What happens if I choose option merge visible? It makes a new layer on top that's a flattened version of all the layers below now let me quickly add don't have dues anymore, but this was a very common way toe work because it let people do almost like people concerned like a milestone to say I've got to that point now I know I can move on because I've got that top layer, but I have all the bottom layers just in case the problem with it always was in the time it was like, oh, well, it's still better than nothing is it's like a snapshot of that moment in time? So when I press that that little shortcut it made said, let me take whatever your layers currently look like make a new layer on top that look looks like this little merged version. The problem is if I want to make any change like I want to get rid of that little floral gizmo or move this layer to delete that layer and start again because there's no way for me it's not in other words it doesn't update dynamically it means when I pressed that shortcut it took a snapshot so if I decide I want toe hide this layer and take this layer and move it nothing appears to have happened because it's underneath that layer so I have to take this layer, throw it away and then take a new snapshot which used to be the way we would work because that was the only alternative. Now what I would do instead as we did a moment ago is I would take take all these layers and once I'm thinking ok, I've reached that kind of milestone idea I would convert to a smart object now I could do something like I don't know apply a filter normally you can't apply a filter toe eight separate layers at once, so this would be one reason why people would do this is let's say we wanted teo I don't know I just do something like sharp in the seat I'm going over sharpen it so you can see what's happening normally would not sharpen anywhere near this much but I want you to see that I am actually making a change to it and we'll talk tomorrow about what just happened with this because this is a special kind of filter that's very also smart but the differences in the previous method if I had made that merge visible copy thing and then apply to filter decided I want to change one layer I have to start all over again in this case it goes back to that recurring theme to say I want to just double click and say let's, turn off this layer and let's take uh this layer and move it over here whoever it might be like this one would up a bit and then save it it instantly or semi instantly depending on how much ram you have has updated in my smart object and reapplied the filter so what this eliminates is a lot of I've done five steps darn it all I've got to take away those last four and do him again now it just like keep going just after that the biggest roadblock to people initially is a very different way of working to say so I don't edit in my main document I added somewhere else that is correct and that's the part that really takes a bit of because you're so used to saying this is my photo shop document now it's like this is my contents document this's my container document trying to get access to my contents to do the work, but once you get used to that this I can't even again. I wish there was a way to say this is save me x amount of time it's it's really amazing it's also let me do things that I just couldn't have easily done before where someone would say, is it possible to whatever blah, blah, blah and I'd be like I'm not sure I could do that now, but we make a smart object and then I mean, just it's opened up more possibilities, especially one of my favorite parts of this is a lot of people are reluctant to really go all out an experiment because they go down a certain path, they realize if they don't like it, they got a lot of backwards stepping to do here, it could be just make a smart, I'll try to be more things will never mind, and you still have everything there because it's part of that container thing, okay, so this is an example of a different kind of approach it's, it's, it's the part again that most people get a bit hard to get used to because it's not I'm kind of working in this document, but I'm mostly doing my work elsewhere, but what it means I've had projects where six, seven years ago, I would have had thirty five layers. Now I have three in effect, but each one of those three layers of smart object that contains other layers. But I realize there are lots of times where I was taking a bunch of lawyers say, well, these ten layers make up this one part of my design or my layout. But I don't need aid, I just needed to visually look like one and that's part of the prince principle what this does for me is allow me to get to this point the use of smart objects khun b as complicated or a simple as you want and want to show you a really simple example before we go too far here ok, so let's do this I'm just going to add a shape and we talked about before. One of things we can do with layers is make it look a certain way by adding a layer style. So for example, I'm going to add a stroke to it and let's do a inside stroke and I'll make it obvious you can see it, make it fairly thick and click ok and that's pretty, you know first up one o one add a layer and put a stroke on, but what I found started happening fairly quickly is people who don't use photo shop would say, well, that's kind of need but can you put at a second stroke now? And the answer was always well no, because later style was like you can add one of anything if you want a stroke, go ahead if you want to strokes no and people used to always work arounds like duplicate the layer, but it's all always really complicated one of the little bonus things of smart objects is as soon as you convert to a smart object it's like you're resetting and starting again so if I take this layer with the stroke and convert to a smart object as faras fuller's helps concerned that's a layer that doesn't have any layer style on it because it's inside the container so that means I could now go to the layer saw menu and at a stroke that's a different colors you can actually see it that's a bad choice of color anyway pick something and again not to say that aesthetically this is pleasing but just to show you this something you could not have done before or without the same level of control because you couldn't have more than one stroke on one layer and technically you still can't but you can work around it by saying do certain steps like in this case adelaide style convert to smart object now that's a container that's ready to start again. So now the only kind of trick to this is if I'm working on this I think I wanted to edit the black stroke well it's not here it's inside the container so this is where I'd have to go and say let me turn that off or change it or do whatever I want so that's the recurring theme is the one this has said the one part that kind of gets people a little bit like hold on a second now because every time you have to always be thinking, look inside the container and we look inside by double clicking to either open a separate document or if it starts from light room or camera go back to camera raw to do the editing and then come back so it's still the same kind of idea of looking inside the container just in a different way but it's that's the part that once you get used to that gosh, the world of possibilities is so huge, especially when you think as they mentioned inside that contents document, you still use clipping masks and and layer styles and layer mass and adjustment layer so that part is still very flexible contained inside a very flexible container. So it's kind of building on toe get to this result so we can really see what we're doing. Okay? All right, so the other option is for those people that do have adobe illustrator and either know how to use it or can like copy and paste because if you're trying to create from scratch that's a whole different thing but one of things with ill share there's a lot of stuff built into it that I'll show you that even if you could just go to one place and use commands like copy and paste, you could do some interesting things and creating a link between illustrator and photoshopped back and forth what this is going to do is it's actually a different type of smart? I just considered a vector smart object so here's a lovely butterfly that someone created not me but it's there and I'll show you if you didn't have this some other things but so here's an example where I just take I want to use this vector information inside photoshopped inside of social document so an illustrator I just selected and copy it and then in photo shop do I have something open? Okay? And I paced now when I go to pace that it gives me several options, so I want to pace it as pixels who could mean eliminate the vector portion of it and just be pixels don't want to be a path, which would I can think of twenty years do that a shape player in our case, I'm going almost always except for a few specific deceptions choose paste as smart object so when I do brings in there's my butterfly and at this point it's one hundred percent vector even though it's inside photos show I decide I want it, they're and I hit enter and now my layers panel you see I have a layer called vector smart object it still has a little symbol on it to tell me it's smart, but the difference now is if I decide for example, I'm working and I need to change it somehow I can't edit it here just like the same there's no difference, but how do I look at it when I look inside the container in this case, double clicking means go back to illustrator so in here I could go in this would require a little bit of illustrator knowledge, but I could, for example, select a couple things and then pick a different color or something close it, save it and when I come back to photo shop, it updates so it's still very vector, very scaleable, but I'm actually in a sense I'm accessing illustrators editing capabilities from within photo shop that's one of those things where anyone has used illustrating for shop for any amount of time looks at this and goes, wow that's changing the game completely used to be you would take from illustrator bring into photoshopping the first question was like, how would you like me to rast arises for you? So it basically took away the complete advantage of using military files because there's no longer a factor here it is so technically it lives and breathes and illustrator and I'm just borrowing it in photo shop and that ability to use vector smart objects is really big because it means and we'll see in a moment you could actually now link this into five different documents and someone says, oh, wait, we need to update our logo it updates and all sort of across the board on updates and all your photo shop documents that's new, by the way, but even just the two way streets and elsewhere and photo shop is a huge benefit. Now what happens if you don't have a butterfly? You just you have creative cloud and you open illustrator and go ok, now what do I do? That's an intimidating looking piece of software so here's the thirty second how to take advantage of illustrator and photo shopped for those people never used illustrator before, so step number one make a new document illustrator comes with it doesn't have what you would consider a clip art, but it has graphic elements you just have to know where to find them it's not obvious because they're not called things like graphic elements or anything, you just have to kind of know where to look, so if I look weighed out the bottom, you see you have brush libraries and symbol libraries. These are things that photos excuse me illustrator uses for different purposes brush libraries are types of brushes that, while you can't use the brush and photo shop, you can use thie what it's, what it's, how it's created in a photo shop and symbol, libraries are like little tiny graphic elements that are already created, so let's, start with that want to just say, ok, I'm going to go to, uh, brown a regal vector pack that looks interesting. So when I opened it, it brings up this little panel says here's a bunch of stuff like, ok, what does that let's say? I want to do something with a this and I just drag it in here now. That's kind cool. So that's, how hard is so far? You just look through the symbol library and then drag it over copy switched the photo shop paste, okay, so without any knowledge of how to create that an illustrator, I now have it is part of my photo shop document that aiken ad layer styles and mask and do all the photo shop ee things we've been talking about, knowing that I can still edit the vector part of this, if necessary so that's a simple option there is and that's really just drag and then copy and paste. The biggest challenge with these is you can't make these thumbnails bigger. I wish you could the biggest you can make them as like now that's it. I just wish there was an option to say make the thumbnails vigor because some of them you look and see what is that and the only way to really tell us a drag it over so that's one option in illustrator is symbol libraries the other one is brush libraries and where's my favorite one I love this one because it's really hard to say artistic chalk charcoal pencil is the name of that set of illustrator brushes and these air used an illustrator to for example, stroke a path and what looks like something like charcoal or you know some artistic thing however all of these just a cz you see them here when I pull this panel down they actually look like little brush strokes that's to show you what they look like so normally an illustrator you would say make a path and apply it but you can also just say I just want this one and you just drag it out and give you this little tiny graphic thing so then you do the same thing you select it copy, switch to photo shop paste smart object make a little bigger and now I have this is actually really interesting to me is that you can do things that look like charcoal and water color but there's still vector, which means they're still very scaleable and I didn't have to create anything I've had to go find it so for those people who do have creative cloud have illustrated kind of sitting there going, I've tried it, but it's a little intimidating and confusing this is one of the simplest ways to use it in contract with photo shop, but just go grab things and bring them over. The only part that's in any way confusing is if I decided I wanted this now to be read, I can't just make it read here actually kind of can, but I see that a second if I want to edit that would mean now at least you have to know in illustrator well howto why go back here and take this and say I wanted to be a different color, so it takes a bit of illustrator knowledge however you wouldn't necessarily have to because if all I'm trying to do is change the color, you may remember that one of the examples had was think green logo had a whole bunch of type players, they just make them green, and I did that by adding a layer style called colored overlay. So now I have something happening here, so it's starting to cull arise that I picked the wrong one isn't done that before, right say one thing like colored overly and I picked the wrong one let's try that again colored overly I wonder why that looks so odd so they're unethical back, taylor's hair to make it color. I just use photoshopped methods, but to use these elements that kind of exists already inside illustrator, without knowing how to use illustrator to me, that's, an almost an added bonus. If you don't have illustrator there enough, then the other option would be. Do it in a photo shop, create some kind of vector shape, and is to allow to make sure you protect it more converted to a smart object. So now I have a vector shape as the contents of this, so I can play with this and do different things I've ever do want to edit the shape of it. I can go inside that and get back to the original vector graphic. That's, probably less necessary, but still a possibility.

Class Materials

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Smartflow Notes

Ratings and Reviews

a Creativelive Student
 

I enjoyed this class by Dave Cross. I like his method of teaching and found him very easy to follow and I learned lots of good tips on smart objects and working non destructively. I have just made the move from PS Elements to Photoshop CC 2014 so have lots to learn so I look forward to more from Dave in the future. Thanks Dave, I thoroughly enjoyed this class.

Roni Chas
 

DAVE CROSS IS AN EXCELLENT INSTRUCTOR. HE EXPLAINS TECHNIQUES SO THAT I CLEARLY UNDERSTAND WHAT HE IS DOING. I LOVE HIS TIPS, AND I LEARN SOMETHING EV!!ERY TIME I HEAR DAVE. I DID BUY THIS PROGRAM, I WANTED TO BE ABLE TO REVIEW IT AND GET IT ALL. I HAVE HEARD DAVE TEACH BEFORE AT NECCC CONFERENCE AND WAS SO HAPPY TO WATCH AND PURCHASE THIS COURSE. I CONSIDER MYSELF PROFICIENT IN PHOTOSHOP YET I CONTINUE TO LEARN NEW THINGS WATCHING DAVES PROGRAM! HUGE THANKS DAVE!!!

a Creativelive Student
 

Dave Cross is a wonderful instructor! He has a fantastic teaching style and has great mastery of his subjects!

Student Work

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