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Photoshop Action Pack Version 3.6

Mac-based Photoshop users who want to Automate their Photoshop workflows need look no further than the Photoshop Action Pack, a collection of 87 Automator Actions that allow you to script nearly all of Photoshop’s functionality from within Apple’s Automator.

The new version, which is for CS3, is primarily a maintenance update that offers improved rendering when using the Save for Web features. In version 3.5, Save for Web under CS3 yielded images that appeared washed out. This has been fixed in the new version. Version 3.6 also provides a completely redesigned Render action that now takes up far less space in the workflow window, making navigation of your workflow a little easier. Finally, one entirely new action has been added. The Strip Extra Channels action removes all extra channels from a document, leaving only the component color channels that are relevant to that document’s color mode.

Why use an Automator workflow when Photoshop has it’s own built-in Actions mechanism? Because Automator lets you build automation workflows that include more applications than just Photoshop. So, you can create a single automation that processes images in Photoshop, and then hands the output to another application for additional work. Also, with the Photoshop Action Pack collection of Automator actions, you get logical operations and conditional functionality that you don’t have with Photoshop’s built-in actions. So, you can build automated workflows that process each image differently depending on its characteristics.

The Photoshop Action Pack is available for free download at www.completedigitalphotography.com/?p=339. If you’re still using Photoshop CS2 or CS, then you can download version 3.5 from that same address.

Finally, if you find yourself burdened by extra cash, you can get some relief by clicking on the Paypal button located at the bottom of the Action Pack web page. This will walk you through a simple process that will relieve your excess cash pain.

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