Creating Actions

by Phyllis Davis

What happens when you want to repeat certain actions over and over again? For instance, suppose you need to convert 50 images from RGB to Grayscale? Well, you could open every image and then choose Image>Mode>Grayscale 50 times, but that would take a long time and be very tedious. Instead, you could record a mini-program, known in Photoshop as an action, and play it, simultaneously applying the action to the entire folder of 50 images. In a few seconds, an action can perform the repetitive task that would take an hour.

Also, while actions are great for performing repetitive tasks, they can be used to automate any process you can come up with in Photoshop. Suppose you create a cool effect that changes a regular old black letter B into a stunning B that has the appearance of translucent liquid blue gel. You can record the steps that create this effect, and then play them back, instantly transforming any letters you want.

An action can consist of anything from a keyboard shortcut to a complex series of commands that trigger other actions. Actions can be created in Photoshop or ImageReady. The Actions palette shown in Figure 1 is used to record, play, edit, save, delete, and load other actions. And, to make it easy to use actions, you can assign keyboard shortcuts to them.

Figure 1: The Actions palette is used to create actions, mini-programs that can save you lots of time and increase productivity.

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