Lessons

Lesson Info

9:15 am - Browsing, Favorites, and the Path Bar

So I've got bridge running right here but if you don't have it running if you've got photo shop open you can launch it straight from photo shop so you contrite up to the file menu and choose browse enbridge you also see that there is a browse in many bridge that's going to open up a teeny tiny version that bridge right here in photo shop and if you watch some of my creative like classes before you've seen me use that a whole lot because it's a really neat way teo open files combined files into a single photo shop document and things like that so if bridge isn't running already go ahead and choose browsing bridge ours is running already so we're gonna pop back over here now you'll notice that here I've got all those tools of the top that let's meet navigate as well as that wonderful path part here so you can see exactly where I am and so far is my structure on my hard drive so here's the computer the hard drive users baba bubble bubble ball and we're currently in the client's folder and...

I can see all these wonderful previews right here so down at the bottom right? That slider that I mentioned earlier that's how you can control how big or how small those previous are and as you can see I'm making my pretty big this is pretty amazing you can make your previews nice and large where you can see exactly what's going on there also down at the bottom right of the interface you've got several different ways that you can view in the content area right now I've got view content as thumbnails, but you can also view them is a is a grid like thing and and you can view the file previews with details so this is another great thing a brat bridge that you're simply not going to find in anything like a finder window or when those explorer window so in the little promo video that I did for this week's classes, I can see the date I created it if it was modified how big the darn file is, which is good to know video files are huge, they're just massive what kind of document it is and if it's got any kind of color management going on on it so the's changes in the view are being handled down here with the tiny little icons at the bottom right of the screen. And then of course, the last one that we've got is vey your content as a list I usually just keep mine in thumbnail mode that's the way I like tio to roll with that so let's take a look at browsing through let's say a folder it images say maybe a stock photography file if your designer chances are you are downloading some stock photography or even if you're a photographer you could make some really beautiful collages using your own photography in conjunction with other things let's say fading a wedding photo into a bed of roses you may not have that bed of roses shot but she can get it easily from a stock photography side so let's take a pig at my stock art folder that I copied over here look at those wonderful previous is that nice? We got big they are you can really see what you're looking at and again you can use that slider at the bottom to make him even larger or smaller now let's, take a look at that same folder over here in the finder I saw switch back to the finder on the mac so here's my client's folder and then down here is my stock are folder okay? So not extremely helpful on the windows explorer side you're going to see similar stuff now I will say on the mac that we have something called cover flow and it's the soul icon at the top of any finder window. This guy right here you can choose to show you're previews in a little window above the file. Okay, something get back to my stock art folder here, okay, so that can be helpful. However, I don't think you have that on the pc you can see images but you can't see inside folders so if I were to come across a folder here which I should eventually anyway you cannot see inside folders hope there's one groups so that's not really helpful at all. Is it ok? We'll ever hear in bridge you can see everything I mentioned that we would learn a secret with a path bar. This is probably one of the most useful tip she could learn and it's worth the price of today's course, even if you tune out right after I say this thing is that in this path bar you'll notice that there's the's little tiny like greater than signs after each folder you can click those suckers if you give that one a click you have the option of going and browsing in any of these folders, so the folders that you're seeing in this list are actually sub folders inside my stock art folder ok, so you could cruise down to another folder that way, however, the huge tip is if you choose this second item in here show items from sub folders, you get a flattened view of everything. In other words, you see through the folders as if they were see through ok, so you get a flat view that is also the way that you can force bridge to draw previews of all the files in a single folder ok, so that is a huge too huge for you right there, so let's, go ahead and take a look at that so I wantto choose show items from sub folders and now you'll see that I've got a little cancel icon there, so when you see that icon, that means you are seeing a flattened view of all of your files you're still going to see folders, but you could even turn that off and I'll show you how to do that in a second. But if you want to get back out of this flattened view, then you can just click that little icon right there, so let's, zoom back out so we can see everything now when we're cruising through our stock art file and any time you're using royalty free imagery, one of my favorite sites to get imagery from right now is for tolia dot com and we've got a special deal from those folks, and we'll talk about that here in just a little bit anytime you're using royalty free imagery, save that stuff, keep it make a master file of that stuff because the whole royalty free licensing covers any promotional use and it's not a one time license, you can use the stuff again and again and again and again and again, so over the course of several years, as a designer, you're going to create quite a stock art file, so keep that stuff around because you may need it later. So my stock art file is pretty honking big as you might imagine. So now I'm seeing inside every folder, so if I don't want to see these folders, then you can come up to the view menu in turn off show folders. So now I'm I will be seeing on lee the imagery inside that stark out stock art file, no matter how many sub folders air in that thing, so that is very handy stuff. You cannot do this in the mac os finder or in on a pc and windows explorer, so go up to the view menu, choose show folders. All right, now, another way to preview your files in bridge is to tap the space bar. Ok, so we're going to come up here to one of our pretty fall shots. Let's say this one right here and let's say, I really want to see it big. I could use my little thumbnail slider down here at the bottom, but then I'd have to change that back when I get done preview in that one image will enbridge starting in. Gosh, I think cs five, we have a full size full screen preview, and the keyboard shortcut is the space bar. So that's, a really, really handy thing. And how do you get out every full size preview that space bargain? So that one is really easy to remember very, very handy I mentioned also that there's easier file management within bridge than in your operating system. And again, anything you do in bridge happens to the file in the finder. So if I come over here to one of my let's, see if I come over here to one of my client files and I rename a file in bridge well, go ahead and click artal chevron or a greater than sign so we can see items from the sub folders. See how happy that isthe it's amazing and again, it forces bridge to draw previous of all of those images, and it only has to do that once. Ok, so every time you go into that folder doesn't have to read your other previous, but it does do one time. For example, when I transferred all my files onto this computer that I'm teaching from came in yesterday to the studio and I dumped everything on the desktop, and then I went into the desktop folder here, click the little chevron next to it and said, show all items from sub folders for a flattened view in it, indexed or cashed. Every file so that you guys wouldn't have to wait for that to happen while I'm teaching, which would be a bit of a drag and make me a big old loser is an instructor so if you a preview a folder in bridge for the first time in you don't see those thumbnails right away don't panic bridges drawing them you'll see a little status far appeared at the very bottom left of the screen is kind of microscopic, but that lets you know that those previews are being drawn and do it one time and you don't have to do that again I see their their folders showing up there if you set those in her folders to also display everything in them will that is it is it recursive that way? Can you see like everything within all the sub folders within a folder that's what we're seeing right now, okay? Just cause I can see the folders there s oh, could I see what's in the three pretty folder as well? Yeah, we're seeing that ok it's a complete flattened view of all sub folders. Yeah, great question. So it shows the folder and everything within it, right? Okay, so and again we did that, so this is just the regular old view that you would see inside this particular folder you know, not really helpful when you're turning to hunt around for stuff you know, where is that piece of art that I need on the goodness? Is it in the website adds folder holy cow and then we can use our little back arrow to go back is it in the oh my gosh is in there? No where's the dad is it in the art folder? Good gosh, I still can't find it. Well, that's a great use for that little flattened view. So when you're in a folder and you see the path bar up here, click that little chevron and shoes show items from sub folders, and that will get all of the sub folder. So it's a liberating everything. So now I could quickly cruise through here and find the piece of art that I'm trying to find. Okay now, tio, make it where you don't see those folders, then you contrite up to the view menu and turn off show folders, so yeah and again, I mentioned that you can see pdf ce I'm also hunting for a p s file. See here's an m p s file finder can show you a preview of an a p s file. Neither can windows explorer pay e p s files are a little interesting in the software you're using to create them, so it would be what coreldraw used to be free in adobe illustrator the previous air handled in the part as part of the safe process you can set those up, but if previous for mps files can be either mac or pc based so it gets a little sticky if they're old enough in need may not be able to see them at all but I'm happily we can see these guys right here so let's go over here to another folder and let's take a look at a pdf. I'll make my previous a little bit larger. So here's a pdf I did for, uh actually an npr based I believe radio show in boulder called e town has been going on for over twenty years and as part of a fundraiser I donated my graphic design time and did a a trifle pdf for them brochure. So over here, on the right hand side, you can see that I've got another preview the file, but look what I've got going on here pated numbers so if I click that little right arrow now I'm seeing page two of that pdf and I've not even had to open the darn thing, okay, this little magnifying glass right here, this is your should be your loop! There we go so I don't even have to zoom into that preview to read part of that pdf file, which is really anything now in when you're creating pds this one was creating cork but when you're creating pds and in design there's a preference in your indesign preferences that lets you tell in design hey make me a pdf with more than two pages of a preview and we'll look at that here in a little bit okay? I also mentioned movies and audio files so I've got some of that going on over here and you can see that I'm just navigating through this folders tab and I can see my entire folder structure here so there you go so if I click the movie file now we can see over here in the preview area the top right that I gotta play then I can scrub through the movie if I wanted I can play it I kid while I'm playing I could choose to turn the audio offer on so you're not forced into listening to the audio which could get really old after a while so all kinds of wonderful preview opportunities ok? So for file management let's say that I wanted to rename this file okay I can control click on a mac or right click on a pc to some in this handy shortcut menu so look at all of the kind of file management activities we can do here course we can open the file boring we've got an open with menu that lets you tell bridge hey I want to open this image file with elements or I want to open this j peg with camera raw, ok, I want to open this pdf with a preview, said an acrobat, and so on and so forth, you're going to get a list over here on the right hand side of all the programs installed on your hard drive that could possibly open that particular file type. So this one is a quick time movie. So these air the files installed on this computer that can open that kind of file format, this purge cast for selection that is talking about those little thumbnail caches, and we're going toe skip that menu item just for the moment here you've also got a cut menu, so that would kind of delete the file. You can copy the foul, duplicate the file, move the file to the trash straight from bridge. One of the handing ones that I use a lot is the move to command here so I can move it to look. I'm seeing all of the recently use folders. I can see my favorites when we talk about favorites here in just a second. That's how you store frequently accessed folders in bridge. And then I could also choose to open another folder that I don't see in this list so you can handle moving files back and forth into different places right here within bridge and that's a good thing to do if you're going to decide to use bridge for to keep track of your files again, you don't have to use it to import them. You want tio do the file management stuff in bridge, because if you start moving things around on your hard drive and the finder windows or in the windows, explore and you've done any kind of saved searches in bridge, the bridge can lose that connection. If you start renaming and moving stuff outside of the bridge interface it's kind of like for you web gers out their dream. Weaver right has a website management tool inside of it, and you really don't want to be renaming web pages or renaming graphics outside of dream weaver because a dream weaver is keeping track of where everything is for that particular website it's kind of the same thing here in bridge, the copy to function is really nice. One more thing on the move to function until the latest version of the mac os, we had no way to move files with the finder it's. It was a physical drag and drop situation if you want to move them from one folders another now we have a menu item, but we didn't used to, which made bridge even more powerful. You've got a copy too function here, which is really handy let's say we want to duplicate a file, but then we want to stick it in a different folder. How many keystrokes would that take you do in the mac os or when those explore way too many you can handle it all right here in bridge so if I've got a layout that I like and I want to copy it to enter the client folder, I can handle it all right here so it handles the copy and the move process in one command the place file as you might suspect, lets you placed graphics or import graphics into other creative suite applications, which is very, very handy. We're going to look at doing that here in a minute. You can also choose to reveal any of these files in the finder where the heck doesn't live in the finder will you can click this I'm right here and you see where it isthe and it's highlighted ok, so that's where it lives within my folder structure and again, anything you do over here happens over there because it's dealing with the same files these aren't duplicate files or anything it's just letting you see the files on your hard drive in a different way so if I want to rename this one I can choose the rename command and I can call it lisa remember deep dive pro click returned to let bridge know that you're finished renaming and now I can come back over here to the finder and we see that the name has been changed there is well ok, so do you get that into your head that what you do over here? It happens over here all right? Other items of note underneath that menu the battery name that's how we're going to rename a slew files and we'll take a look at that later you can also lock the items so you can mess with it and you have a quick access to file info okay, so if you need to see how big it is or who has permission to reader right to that file, you can pop that open right here. If you're into color coding, you can apply all kinds of labels here or if you're working within a work group that can be handy if somebody is working on a file and you get that file back and it's finished and ready to go to press than you could perhaps change the label to approved, use the other labels for files you still need to review and so on and so forth you can create new folders from here in bridge and you can also handle how the sorting is managed ok, so by default bridge is going to put them in order by finally, but you're not stuck with that, ok, if you want to rearrange them manually like like you would say a photo album, then you could turn on this manual control down at the bottom of the sort menu and it would allow you to do that and of course you consort by date created datemodified I used eight modified a lot for my stock image folder because the datemodified is the date that I downloaded it. So if I'm hunting for a piece of stock are that I downloaded from fa tolia recently and I've got thousands of a tolia images in that same folder, it could be difficult trying to find the one I want if I have not given those images any kind of key word in your custom names or anything like that because any image you download from a stop art side is going to be named incredibly cryptically okay, so I used datemodified and that will sort my most recently downloaded items either at the top or at the bottom of the list, depending upon if you've chosen ascending order decent in order, so that can be really handy when you're trying to find art that you just downloaded another thing that's really great about bridge is setting up favorites this will make you really, really fast and that you do need to set up favorites toe use the program efficiently. So over here on the left hand side what we're seeing is just a view with my hard drive okay, so I'm in the little folders tab well, if I click over here to the favorites tad I can see oh, well, bridge has given me some kind of frequently used places easy access to those places it figures I I probably want to go to my desktop a lot. I probably want to go to my documents folder and I probably I want to go to my pictures folder. However, you are not stuck with the favorites that come with the program and you can add your own so let's take a look at adding our own so I'm going to click desktop because that's where my particular files live ok, so in the bridge deep dive folder I can come over here and say, well, I use this client's folder a heck of a lot let's added two favorites super simple click drag done that's it so now instead of going to the desktop double clicking here double clicking here I can simply access it right there I use that a lot for my books and clients so let's say for example, when I was working on the e town brochure you khun bit that I had that sucker over here and you can also bet that my stock art folder is over there as well so let's, go ahead and add that one there we go so keep that one over there and you can also re arrange these in any way you want. So if you access that stock art folder ah whole lot well, you might want to have it at the top or forever, okay? So let's, just stick it right there so just dragged them around to rearrange them if you want to get rid of them for any reason let's say you finished the etown projects that you don't need that in your favorites list anymore then you khun just right click it on a pc or control clicking on the mac and state removed from favorites and you can also use that shortcut menu to say, where the heck does that file live on my hard drive anyway? But again, any time you've got a folder active over here in the favorites or in the content panel, you're going to see the path for that file right here in the bread crumb, uh, path bar and incidentally, prior to version cia six of bridge the path bar had a nasty habit of just disappearing for no apparent reason so if that's happened to you, you can access it by going up to the window menu path bar it was a very strange thing it was just disappeared you would hear a slight popping sound when it happened but was very soft so it was easy to miss. I'm kidding, ok, so let's say we've added some favorites I'll go ahead and add a couple more some that we're going to be using today so here's one of my book file someone I'm working on a new book you can bet that folder is in my favorites list so I can go straight teo and find what I need really, really fast now let's say you don't want these other default presets for favorites, okay, so you can change that by trotting up to the bridge menu or the edit menu. I believe on a pc and you're going to choose preferences in in the general section of bridges preferences if you look down here in the bottom, you're going to see those preset favorite items so I can turn off pictures if I'm not going to be using that, I can turn off this folder and I can turn off that folder so that's how you delete the preset favorites also, while we're in the general preferences pain here new ncs six bridge got its first new coat of paint several years if you don't like that new coat of paint you're not stuck with it just open the preferences and here in general you can go a shade darker if you'd like you can go attempt lighter and if you go the lightest tent over here at the right that's the color bridge was in every other versions so if you don't like that dark gray you're certainly not stuck with it but give it a try because I've noticed that my eyes don't hurt news badly looking at the computer all day long is I tend to do half the night to a lot of the times so try try that charcoal gray and and see if you don't come to love it okay now let's talk about bridge cash since we got into preferences we may as well talk about that so I mentioned that any time you view a folder for the first time that bridge needs to draw previews of everything okay so basically it has a draw previous it doesn't know the file exists if you've not opened it in bridge before or you didn't use bridge to import your photos when you're using bridge to import those little thumbnails were being drawn automatically anyway but from the factory your cash information or your preview information is stored in the bridge application folder ok so on a mac is in the applications folder in the bridge csx folder you've got a folder called cash and I'm windows explorer it's kind of in the same little area so basically bridges going to store all of these previews in one spot ok, you can have the program store the previews inside the folder in which the images actually live if you want okay, the benefit to that is that if you move or rename a file outside of bridge, then any saved searches you've created won't get broken all of a sudden also, if you're burning a folder of images to a dvd or a cd to give to a client or let's say for backup purposes that person who opens at cd won't have to sit through redrawing of all the previews again it can take awhile okay? Because if you think about it, bridge is really creating kind of a duplicate j peg of that image as the preview case, the preview is a gaping right and if you think about how large you can view an image and bridge it's drawing high resolution previews okay, so it takes a little while so don't let that throw you. When I first started using bridge years ago, I thought, my gosh, this is the slowest program I've ever used in my life I'm never going to use that again and then I noticed it started speeding up it was because it had drawn the previews for me cashed all those all those files so keeping your your previous or your cash file stored in the bridge application folder is called a simple let's call it a day centralized cash you know, if you start making those previous be stored in the individual folders, you'll hear that called a decentralized cash or even more cryptic a distributed cash ok, so basically the preview file this lives inside the folder where the pictures live so it travels along with that folder, which could be a nice thing now how do you set that up? Well, we're going to go back into preferences, so we'll go teo bridge menu on the mac or the edit menu on a pc I believe and she's preferences and then we're going to choose cash and this is where you can set all that up, okay, so you turn on automatically expert cash to folders when possible now that your next question is going to be what's this one possible business? Well, if you work for a company let's say your designer thin, you're going to have a lot of files on the server it worked right when you're home, you're not going to have access to that server, probably right? Or if you have an external hard drive for all of your stock are you don't keep it attached all the time so that's what this one possible is talking about is whenever that particular volume which is you can think of it like a hard drive is mounted you know where you can use it on your computer then bridge can store things in those individual followers but if those folders are accessible of course it can't do it so that's what that when impossible miss is about this other stuff over here this location this lets you choose if you want to keep the centralized cash which means it's all in one place you don't have to stick it in that or leave it in the bridge folder you can put it wherever you want okay? And it is of note that if you've got several versions of bridge on your computer you can reclaim a lot of hard drive space if you let's say you need to keep that other version of bridge around for example, you know when I'm writing books I'll keep the previous version cause I have to compare everything right to see what's changed from program to program well if I've got bridge cs five on my computer and bridge cia six there's two cache files there and they're going to be huge we're talking gigabytes if you've got you know a lot of images on your computer and I'm sure that you do so even if you need to keep that other version of the application hanging around on your hard drive dumped that cash okay and you'll reclaim a lot of hard drive space how do you get the cash right here? This button will dump the cash for the currently active program but you can see where the cache files are stored so you could go in there in manually delete that in that other version of the program if you'd like or just pop open another version of bridge open the preference is to use cash and then purge it now if you notice that bridge is running really really slowly you can't come in here periodically and choose to compact the cash you can also tell bridge how big do you want your cash size to be and when you're changing all of this information and again the cash is on ly referring to seriously bridge the's previous right here this is the cash okay? So it's storing capturing, cashing those previews anytime you start bumping up this stuff let's say you increase your cash size and then all this kind of stuff you're just going to be using more hard drive space so if you've got a lot of hard drive space and new computer by army is not yourself out but if you're running on a little bit slower computer with limited hard drive space then you're probably not gonna want tio mess with us stephanie much and if bridge just suddenly becomes unable tio correctly show previews for whatever reason right all software has a bad day you know every once in a while so if it goes off the grid, then you can come in here and she used to purge the cash, and this option is available within the tools menu as well. It's a little bit easier, easier access to it. So that's just a little bit about cashes and some nails and all that don't let it scary if all of this discussion makes you a little bit green, then just don't think about it just know that when you go into a folder for the first time, bridge is going to have to think about it. And if you've got a big hunk in file of art like I did yesterday, that needs to be cashed, then you're simply going to use that little chevron trick. So that's, what I did last night when I came in, I dumped it on the desktop, said show adams from self folders, and I left I have no idea how long it took to draw all the thumbnails of, and I probably transferred about ten gigabytes onto this computer last night. I didn't care, you know, set that up to do when you go to bed and again put the chevron and she's show items from some folders.