Planet Photoshop

Documenting Your Work

November 12, 2008 by Corey Barker Blog 6 Comments

Did you know you can record every step of your work in Photoshop as a text file or even as Metadata that is attached to the file? In some professions, it is critical to document every step of your work. For instance, things like forensic imaging involve very detailed work and there is a risk of digital evidence being compromised. So documenting every step is crucial. However, there are those that aren’t necessarily working on something that critical. Maybe they want to record their process for reference or perhaps to improve their skills overall. Whatever the case, it’s really quite simple. Go to your Photoshop Preferences into the General category. At the bottom you’ll see the History Log. This allows you to have your History attached to your file as Metadata or as a separate text file. You can even do both. I personally used this sometimes when I am experimenting just in case I do something and don’t quite remember how I did it.

Posted by Corey Barker

Corey is the newest education and curriculum developer for the National Association of Photoshop Professionals. He is a graduate of the Ringling School of Art & Design in Sarasota, Fl, with a degree in Illustration. Over the years, Corey has worked as a graphic artist in a variety of disciplines such as illustration, commercial design, large format printing, motion graphics, web design and photography. His expertise in Photoshop and Illustrator have earned him numerous awards in illustration, graphic design and photography. Using Photoshop since Version 2, his expertise and creativity have evolved exponentially with every new version, which makes Corey an invaluable addition to the NAPP team.

6 comments on “Documenting Your Work”

  2. Thank you for this great tip!! I try so many things, it’s so easy to lose track of exactly which settings, filters, etc. worked the best. This will save so much time when trying to recreate a particular effect.
    Thanks again.
    Sharon

    Reply

  3. Note of caution though. Having this on while experimenting can get a bit confusing if you use multiple undos or the history panel to jump back several steps. The log doesn’t remove the steps you undo or even record how far back into your history you undo.

    also brush strokes are recorded every time the brush touches the canvas. My text files generally end up with pages of rather useless brush stroke entries: brush, brush, brush, undo, undo, brush, erase, brush, brush, brush, brush, undo, brush, brush…..

    Reply

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