Resources - Tips
Resources - PDFs | Resources - Tips | Resources - Project Downloads
Various tips on various site info and digital phenomenon.
What is this "Pi" Symbol that is on every video page?
This icon is a quick link to get back to the product info. If you click it--it takes you to that specific Product's Info page.
What is this Apple Eye squiggly Arrow icon for?
If you see this icon next to a video title, from your device,click it and you'll be able to watch the video from there, whether you are viewing from an iPad, iPhone, iPod or other mobile device! If you right click it from a computer and choose "Save Link As"-- it will download a 1280 x 720p (approx.) MP4 file which you can later view and re-size in Free QuickTime or Free Windows Media Player.
I just purchased CS6 & was trying to move my wonderful actions over & most of them won't work...... What am I
suppose to do? I am so sad...... Please let me know. I have loved
your products & use them all the time.
On more than one occasion it has appeared as though they
didn't work because customers were trying to use them on 16 bpc
images rather than 8 bpc. Could that be the case for you also? Look in
the title bar of the active document window, at the end it should say
RGB/8 not RGB/16. You can convert from the top menu Image>Mode and check
8 bits/channel.
Also if you are importing images from Adobe Camera Raw, those preferences can
be changed there to open as an 8 bit rather than 16 bit.
When I loaded some of Mama Shan's Actions, a red check mark came up to the left side column of the action panel (to the left of the action name). When I checked this out, it said that the action or part of the action would not work. I'm not sure what is going on. I did load directly from the disk & not from a file. Any suggestions?
This is one of the major reasons we recommend viewing and using the Actions in "Button Mode" as opposed to "List Mode." You are NOT supposed to be checking or un-checking anything in the Actions in list mode. Some states have red marks some have black. Red checks do NOT mean it's a warning; just leave them as is. Stay away from the modal columns on the left side!
I would say at this point, you have corrupted the actions. You should delete the set in your panel and reload a fresh set and view in Button Mode to use or don't change anything in the modal columns, when viewing in "List Mode!"
Can I download your videos from the product pages?
Yes, for your own personal educational enrichment. You may not copy these videos for re-distribution and/or re-uploading of any sort. If you want to share the page link, that is totally fine.
Can I upload your videos to other sites?
Yes and No. I don't allow others to upload my mp4 videos that have been downloaded from mamashansdigital.com or photoshopmama.net However I do allow others to link to or embed any of my videos that I have uploaded to my YouTube. In some instances, the content is the same, but the coding is different, so if you want to spread the love of my videos, share them through this access point http://www.youtube.com/photoshopmama or just share a video page link directly from Mama Shan's Digital by copying the address in the URL address bar of your Web Browser.
What programs are recommend for playing the downloaded MP4 videos from Mama Shan's Digital?
- You can play the .mp4 videos in Windows Media Player., QuickTime , or any other video player you have that supports the .mp4 video codec.
- You can re-size the video player either through Menu options or clicking on the lower right corner and pushing inward or outward.
How do I View Type on Web Page Bigger or Smaller?
Pretty much, across all Web Browsers, on Windows, clicking the keyboard shortcuts Control + (plus sign) or Control - (minus sign), a couple of times will enlarge or shrink the type on a Web page.
On Macs that would be Command + (plus sign) or Command - (minus sign). There are menu items in each Browser that do this, too, but their location varies--some are under the View Zoom menu and some are under the Tools icon.
How do I Unzip Folders?
- PC: Right click on
icon of the zipped folder and choose "Extract to here" and it will
create a copy of the folder and contents that is not in a zipped folder to the
same location as the zip folder (usually to your "Downloads" folder but can be redirected to desktop)
- Mac: Double click on icon of the zipped folder and it and it will create a copy of the folder and contents that is not in a zipped folder to the same location as the zip folder (usually to your "Downloads" folder but can be redirected to desktop)
What is Zipping?
Zipping files and folders protects and compresses them for internet transfer and download. Other terms for this process is Archiving and Unarchiving. Think of the .zip as a container like tupperware. While some utilities and programs allow you to see the contents inside a zip folder, they are not usable or loadable until you take them out of the container (unzip, unarchive). Therefore, you must unzip all folders to actually utilize the contents. Unzipping does not remove the contents of the zip folder, but rather it makes usable copies. You can unzip a folder multiple times and it will generate multiple copies of its contents. To conserve space for saving backups you can save the .zip folder rather than the unzipped contents.
How do I View a PDF in the right orientation?
If you open a PDF in Acrobat or Acrobat Reader and the layout orientation is rotated for printing not screen reading, go to the top menu item in Acrobat, View>Rotate View and choose the direction that will turn it the right way for screen reading.
Why am I getting the Error Message "Filter not Available" during Action play?
- If you get this message while trying to run an action on your image, check to make sure you are working on an RGB 8 bits/channel image and not CMYK, Grayscale, or RGB 16 bits/channel image.
- Go under the top menu Image>Mode and look in the list to see the mode and bits.
- If you're image is in fact in 16 bpc mode and/or any other mode other than RGB, you can change it by clicking on the 8 bits/channel option and the RGB mode---but before you do this be aware this operation will flatten your image.
- There may be an option to uncheck for flattening, but this can mess up the colors on layered files.
- Best practice to do any "Convert" commands and mode changes on an image that is already flattened.
Why are my Actions running so slowly?
If your Actions are running slowly check the following:
- Close all running programs/applications except for Photoshop & Bridge
- Make sure another program (usually Acrobat or Apple) is not trying to perform a background update.
- If you are processing from RAW images, make sure your preferences are set to open an 8 bpc image rather than a 16bpc image. Set the ppi to 300 and the sRGB IEC61966-2.1 color profile
- Get more RAM
- If you are auto-backing up your hard drive to a "cloud" or other online service, this is notorious for gobbling system resources and slowing down functions in other programs, so temporarily shut that down while working in Photoshop!
- If your Actions and or basic functions are still running slowly after doing any one of the above, close the program and restart your system. Sometimes the computer just likes a little snooze to refresh itself. Upon restart open the Photoshop program, first (so the bulk of RAM is allocated to it!)
Also here are some good articles:
Adobe on Optimizing Performance
GPU Open GL Support | Photoshop CS4, CS5
Sluggish Performance on Mac OS
My computer crashed and I lost all of my Actions and downloads, can you resend them to me?
If your purchase was within the last 3 years, absolutely! Beyond that there is no guarantee. While the new mamashansdigital site has tools to find past orders it would facilitate the process if you do register during your purchase check out to create a Customer Record; this way we'll have all of your purchases over time in one place.
However, we still recommend that you back up your actions and downloads by copying them to a thumb-drive, an online cloud service, or burn them to a CD. We cannot guarantee being able to pull records older than 3 years.
What Virus Protection do you recommend for a Windows operating system, that won't slow down or interfere with Photoshop?
I can only recommend what I am familiar and happy with, and that's Nortons. If your ISP is Comcast - XFinity, they provide a Nortons Security suite for free. for both PC's and Macs. However, it also downloads 2 other programs, Constant Guard and Guarded ID, which I recommend uninstalling via the Control Panel's Programs Uninstall feature, after a restart. Both Constant Guard and Guarded ID programs have known issues to cause glitches in other Software Programs such as Adobe Photoshop. Symptoms of conflicts become apparent when certain tools no longer work as expected in Photoshop. You can download your free Nortons by going to the Comcast Web Site.
I opened the Virtual Room from Pindora's Box and decorated it and saved it without using the VR Actions, now the original has disappeared, what do I do?
Yes, probably because you saved your decorated Virtual Room with the same name as the template and you must have saved it to the same location as the original, so it overwrote that original! You'll have to re-download the Virtual Room from the Members Only Pindora's Box Support site or copy it again from your DVD, if you ordered the DVD. And from now on try to always use the VR Actions set to open the VR Room, as the action to open the Virtual Room protects the original always, giving you a copy with a different name to work with.
How do I find the pixel dimension of my photo / document?
There are several ways to find the pixel dimensions of your camera files. The easiest way is to use Bridge and navigate to a folder of your “straight out of camera” (SOOC) images. Highlight one of the images and look at the numbers in the Metadata tab or under the File Properties tab. Or—you can open a typical image and Alt/Option click on the Doc Status bar, at the bottom left of the document window (a pop-up window will appear). Also, you can go to the top Menu to Image>Image Size to view the pixels dimensions of the file.
Photoshop Image size and resolution