Using PS Actions to Save a Buttload of Clicks

[Polygoblin]

In this short tutorial, I will show you how to use Photoshop Actions to save time and mouse clicks when exporting your texture maps for a CG asset.

Do you know how many clicks it takes to save out one texture map? Go ahead and try for yourself and count. I'll wait....

If you cheated, and kept reading, then it's about 8/9 clicks for a .tga, give or take (assuming you had your file path correct already). Now think about how many times you save out a map throughout the lifetime of a project. When you start saving other maps (normal, specular, opacity, etc), and testing over-and-over, those clicks add up! They add up fast!

Of course when I say mouse clicks, it accounts for the time and effort to perform an operation on a computer.

If you haven't used Photoshop Actions before, it is definitely a friend you should get to know Actions act as programmable scripts that you can "play" at any time. You can use these Actions to record anything you do in Photoshop and play them back at will. Now I will show you how to use them to save time and effort over the lifetime of a project:

As you can see in the image below, I have just started to texture a model of an AK-47. I have layers for the different materials, with folders that hold the base normal map and spec map info. I've already blocked out the base colors for the materials, and I'm ready to save a map for the first time...

I want to create an action to minimize my time and effort spent saving out files, so I will go ahead and set up my actions now, at the very beginning.

The action tab is typically next to the history tab, but since I'm still rocking CS3, you can always locate the actions by going to Window/Actions or Alt+F9 as a shortcut.

It's best to create a folder for your project's actions to be stored in. For obvious reasons.

Create a new action by clicking the little page button on the bottom of the action tab. It's important to know that once you click this button, EVERYTHING you do will be recorded by Photoshop until you press "stop".

I have named my action with a very descriptive name, with my layers already set how I want for a diffuse map export. Since I will only use this particular action to save maps, I want to get everything ready for the save procedure (hide UV map, show appropriate background, hide various layers, etc) before I press "record".

You see above that I'm saving over an existing map, and in a specific path on my hard drive. This action will remember all this so I won't ever have to see this screen again for a diffuse map.

Now it is important to actually press the "stop" button, represented by the square on the bottom-left of the action tab. This will stop the recording of your activity in Photoshop, and complete the creation of your Action.

You can now see below that I went ahead and set up actions that save out my normal and spec maps. I set each action to save a corresponding file, since I know these Actions will make my life easier as I texture my asset.

Now all you have to do when you want to save-out files is press the little "play" button on your newly-created actions. That is one click per save. One click! Booya.

I hope you found this tutorial useful, and start saving buttloads of time immediately :P

[airage]

Thanks a lot for sharing this, it's a real time (and nerve) saver when texturing.
I use vTools for saving textures. It's basically the same as an action like this, but with some more options

[maxthebest685]

Me also Use something..
to save diffuse, Spec, Normal map in just 1 click..
It's just Time saver...

[Maniak]

Awww, sadly all of the links are broken :/

[Polygoblin]

My mistake. All the links are fixed now

[MrN]

Great tutorial, this will definitely come in handy!