Adobe Photoshop CS6 Adobe Bridge Overview

Hi, Michael Brown again, welcome back the educator.com's Adobe Photoshop CS6 course.0000

In this lesson, we're going to discuss the overview and workspace for Adobe Bridge--the sorting, editing and rating program that is an integral part of Photoshop.0006

In the previous lesson on How to Learn Photoshop, I told you that Photoshop is really three separate programs: Bridge, the sorting, editing and rating program, Camera Raw--the non-destructive preliminary work on your pictures program and then Photoshop the Big Dog.0018

So the first thing you have to do is get your images into your computer, sort them, find the best ones, and then get them out of there and work on them, and that is Adobe Bridge.0036

So we're in this lesson going to look at the overview and the workspace.0049

Alright, let's get started.0053

When you're in Photoshop, go to File menu, go down to Browse in Bridge...and this is the basic essential mode of Bridge (I have already opened up a folder of items in here) but this is what you see when you get started in Bridge.0056

It's very similar to Photoshop in its layout, there is a Menu bar at the top, once again, and on the left side and the right side in this case--both sides we have panels, this is a viewing window over here, every time I highlight a different thumbnail you see it in the viewing window, and we have access to different panels, pretty much the same as was laid out in Photoshop.0079

The first thing we're going to look at is the basic interface.0107

Now, as with Photoshop CS6, you can adjust the tonality of the background and the primary windows--in this case the viewing window and the thumbnail displays.0111

Go to your Bridge, go down to Preferences--not Camera Raw Preferences but Bridge Preferences, and when that window opens up...you'll see there are several tabs--we're going to deal with the General tab here, and the first thing you see is Appearance, and this actually works a little slicker than Photoshop.0127

You have the option of the four different pre-sets for viewing (I personally like this one here) but you also have additional control for the Interface brightness, and you notice how that's working separately from the viewing windows, so you can fine tune whatever tonality you like (I happen to still like that) and the image backdrop itself for the viewing and thumbnail windows...you can adjust those separately to whatever tonality you wish.0150

The Accent Color is the color that you see that appears around the thumbnails, and the way you can adjust that is just pick whichever one you want (what's obsidian--ew, why would you have black?) sapphire, that's a little bit dark...amber...yellow works pretty good but I like the emerald.0184

The default was the...kind of a blue tone, it's dark but this way with the emerald notice the buttons and the surrounding areas are very, very visible.0207

OK, that's how you adjust your Interface, same way as with Photoshop.0219

So, we've talked about the basic Interface (that takes care of that) now we're going to discuss the panels (we'll go back to Bridge).0225

Now, these are the default panels that you see (let me get an image back up there) and once again you see some of them are tabbed up and they have different collections of them if you will--grouping of the panels.0238

You can't float them...actually you can, look at that!0258

I just learned something myself--I dragged it away to float it, and it popped in right with the content so in other words they tab up wherever you drop them--I just learned that one myself, but I certainly don't want my favorites in there (I'm going to leave them back over in here).0263

The way you move them around is just like in Photoshop, in this case if I want the Metadata and keywords to be separated, I grab the keywords--and you notice once again it's tabbed and you see the framework so it's tabbed in there, if I move it down, there'll be a line that will now appear below Metadata.0278

Notice Metadata keywords--if you want to collapse a panel, double click the tab, and then double click the tab again to open it.0302

You can adjust the length of the tabs by going to the top frame and moving those--you can adjust the width by again moving your cursor until you see the double arrows, and the same thing on the right side.0310

So those are the adjustments that you can make, and the panels are all under the Window menu just like in Photoshop.0326

One slight difference--you notice the checkmarks, in Photoshop a checkmark indicated an active panel...in Bridge, it indicates any panel that is open on the Interface.0335

In this case you notice that the folders is not the active one, nor is collections (I think that's the only one) collections, export and folders, but they're all checked...0349

That just shows you that they're already up here somewhere on the Interface...if you want to remove one, such as the export panel which exports items to Facebook, Flickr and so on, I don't use it very often so if I want to remove it, go to the window, drop down to the export panel and then highlight it, and you will see that it disappears and you'll notice that it's no longer checked.0364

Alright, so that defines the panels...we'll talk a little bit more about the individual panels in a separate lesson, so we'll cross off the panels.0386

Let's talk about the Toolbar...back to Bridge (put it back up here).0396

The Toolbar resides right above your viewing windows and panels--that's below the buttons here to this border, and what we have here is three basic selections.0404

We have navigation tools, which start with the arrows at left--you can go backwards and forwards from previous workspaces, or let's say I go to my desktop here and I see my desktop folders, if I go backwards it comes back to where it was before, if I go back again it continues to allow you to go forwards or backwards several steps...very good.0417

This one here, it goes to favorites...you notice the favorites here are computer Michael desktop documents and pictures, and there they are right there.0442

The clock reveals recent files that were opened up--you can go back and find one of those, let's say for example I wanted to see this file (there they are) and I can go back immediately to where I was, kind of cool.0455

The boomerang, that's how you get back to Photoshop...hit the boomerang here in Photoshop, go to Browse and Bridge, go back, boomerang to Photoshop and back.0470

Those are the navigation methods, and you can also navigate via the identification of where you are, in other words when the computer and the Macintosh high drive down to the desktop--I can go all the way back to the desktop...and then I can also go back to where I was...cool navigation features.0480

Next to the navigation features are your Tools...getting photos from the cameras, this is a refine--it allows you to, let's say I select all of the items in this particular folder, and I wanted to do a batch rename, I can do that from here, and it'll call up the batch rename box and we can deal with that, or I can get file info, or I can do what's called a "Review Mode" which is kind of cool...I don't use it that much but it's nice if you're going to put it on a little presentation.0500

Here's all of your images displayed this way and with your arrow keys or the arrow keys down there, you can simply scroll through those images.0535

Interesting you can also rate them, I don't find it particularly useful, you'll see why in a minute...I have a mode that I use that...you don't want to get tricky in Bridge...the reason Bridge is there is to get the images in, find the images you want to work on and get on with working.0545

Tricks and tips and the little tricky things, I'm not in to that too much, sorry about that.0566

You can go directly to Camera Raw--if you wanted to open up this image in Camera Raw just click it here or double click.0571

This particular one here gives you output to web or pdf which you can get from the output folder over here, or rotating an image from a horizontal to a vertical...that's what the tool...0577

So these are your using tools, those are your navigation tools that we went over, right here are the various workspaces but underneath that, this left icon right here, when you load a folder (I'm going to go back to a folder here, see if I can get the Genesis folder here) these are high res' images...and I'd already loaded them before so let me find another one that's new...alright here we go...notice it takes a little bit of time to load up the images.0590

These are smaller but if you had larger thumbnails it would take a little while as they're high res' images...if you check this it will just load a low res' preview thumbnail that's embedded in the image--I prefer to just let it do the always high quality...I want to look at my images in the best quality that I possibly can.0628

This is a method of rating from here that's also up on the top, you can sort by various things--I prefer to leave it at the file name.0649

This is by descending or ascending order, and this allows you to create...to open a recent file from over here, as well as creating a new folder.0659

Now, let's get down to the workspace layouts...this is the essentials mode where you look at all the thumbnails over here, and a smaller image of whatever particular thumbnail over there, adjustable, but it's still a fairly small image.0671

In my mind, the purpose of Bridge is to get that image, and be able to look at it large and clear and to find the best ones.0686

Film strip is another mode.0695

This, to me, is the best mode yet--you get a nice large view of your image, and there they are in a thumbnail view, slideshow, arrow keys, you just go from image to image to image to image...back and forth.0698

If you want to compare two images side by side you hold down your Command on a Mac, Control on a PC, and click and there is your other image and you can go "I like this one better than that one" and you're back--very, very quick, very simple.0713

Metadata format shows you thumbnails and all sorts of data...I don't care about the data--you might, so it's there, but I want to get my images worked on--that's why I like the Film strip.0728

The output viewing...enables you to output images to a pdf or a web gallery directly from Bridge so here are your folders so that you can navigate and find a folder full of images, and there would be--select them all, make yourself a pdf, so on and so forth.0738

You can also...I went through the Toolbar, OK we got basically that--we're still on the workspaces but that defines most of the Toolbar, basically navigations on the left, basic operational tools to get images in and review them and get them out to Camera Raw, or output other things are right there, with rotate--the workspaces are here, and a few other sorted ones are down here along with the Toolbar.0759

That takes care of the Toolbar.0791

Navigation controls--we have discussed those already as we looked at the Toolbar--they're part of the Toolbar.0797

Let's take a look at the Menu bar.0803

Just like in Photoshop, at the very top we have a Menu bar with a series of dropdown menus that we will define specifically in a lesson just on the Menu bar...so they reside up there just like Photoshop--we got a Menu bar, we got a Toolbar, we got panels, we got a viewing window, and so forth so it's pretty easy right?0809

So we got the Menu bar, content view controls...are down at the bottom here, the bottom lower side.0832

Now, I'm going to go to my Film strip mode and I'm going to show you that you can adjust the size of these thumbnails with the slider (like this) or you can simply go right here and adjust the size by adjusting the viewing window, which will, at the same time, change the thumbnails, or you can max them, minimize them, or pick whatever you want with that slider.0843

Now, you notice the thumbnails are sitting there--that's a good size, if you want to identify them even a little better between them, notice right here, it's just on the thumbnail view...this one doesn't do anything other than separate them with a line, and I kind of like that.0873

You can also view content details...and now they're in a vertical mode which to me doesn't do you a lot of good (there's that thumbnail mode again) or you can view them as a list--that would be useful perhaps in the essentials mode.0890

There you have them, that's kind of the Metadata methodology or there's a simple list which is pretty much, to me, I'm looking at my images--I want to go back, and I want to view them as thumbnails--and now they got a little too large...and so there are the controls for thumbnails and viewing modes down at the bottom.0907

And the final thing we're going to discuss here is customizing the workspace.0929

Now, in my slideshow mode which I like you notice we lost some panels.0935

If I go to the right side until I see the double arrow and drag, I have a space for panels, and I have plenty of room for my viewing window, and my thumbnails are of a manageable size (now they're divided).0942

I go to my window, I want to see the Metadata panel, it appeared on the left--if it appeared on the right you can drag it over to the left...I want to see the keywords which are also a search method.0955

Now they came in tabbed up, I'd like to separate them so I'll grab the tab, go down past the bounding box to the blue line, and now they're above each other.0967

For me, this is the way I like it...I have my slider at the bottom that I can do this or I can go from image to image with the keys back and forth, easy sorting, the thumbnails are of a decent size, the viewing window is of a decent size--I'm happy with the coloration of the Interface, everything set the way I want it.0978

So now I can go to either: the dropdown arrow and make a new workspace and save it, or go to the Window menu--workspace and there's a new workspace, just like Photoshop.1003

I'm going to save this as my favorite...I'll click save and you notice that now the button that's highlighted is my favorite--it came in at the upper left, you can shift these round if you want--I don't really see a lot of reason for it, or you can change again to whatever you want, and now you have your workspace specifically set.1015

So that's how you customize the workspace in Adobe Bridge...and we'll check that off.1038

And we're going to do a very quick review of everything that we went over.1044

We have panels, again under the Window menu, we have a Toolbar with the navigation controls, mostly on the left, tools for bringing pictures in or getting them out, we have the workspaces, we can also sort them a little bit up here, we have options for setting the viewing window at the bottom, we have different panels that we can put in there and we have a Menu bar across the top, and that sums up...and getting back and forth go to Browse to Bridge or the boomerang.1049

That sums up the overview, and the workspace of Adobe Bridge.1088

In the next lesson, we'll begin to look at the specifics and how you set up the various panels.1092

I'll see you at the next lesson.1097