How To Export Only Tagged to Adobe Bridge?

[Bob Baron]

I'm using Photo Mechanic 4.4.3 on a Win XP Pro sp 1 machine; I shoot mostly Canon 1DMk2 and 5D raw files.  I view and tag a series of images and select View->Tagged. Is there a way I can export (directly or indirectly) just those tagged images to the Photoshop CS2 Bridge application?

I have set up Photo Mechanic to launch a single selected image in Photoshop CS2, but as you can see what I want to do is send a group of selected (tagged) images to Bridge.

And two related questions:

--Under Edit->Preferences->Launching, I have selected Photoshop.exe as the default application.  Can I give myself a selection to choose from, or can I only specify one.  If a selection, how?

--What is a 'photoshop droplet'?

Thanks,

--Bob

[Kirk Baker]

I'm using Photo Mechanic 4.4.3 on a Win XP Pro sp 1 machine; I shoot mostly Canon 1DMk2 and 5D raw files.  I view and tag a series of images and select View->Tagged. Is there a way I can export (directly or indirectly) just those tagged images to the Photoshop CS2 Bridge application?

I have set up Photo Mechanic to launch a single selected image in Photoshop CS2, but as you can see what I want to do is send a group of selected (tagged) images to Bridge.

There would be two ways to do this:

1) Drag the selected photos and drop them onto Bridge.
2) Set Bridge as one of your custom editors (Preferences->Launching, "Assign specific editing applications for each type:" Set...) Then when you are back in the Contact Sheet, right-click on one of the selected photos to get the contextual menu.  One of the items reads "Edit selected photos with".  Move your mouse onto it, and your editors will appear as a submenu.  Choose Bridge from the submenu.

And two related questions:

--Under Edit->Preferences->Launching, I have selected Photoshop.exe as the default application.  Can I give myself a selection to choose from, or can I only specify one.  If a selection, how?

See #2 above.

--What is a 'photoshop droplet'?

It is a Photoshop action that has been turned into an application that you can drop files onto which will execute that action in Photoshop on the set of files that have been dropped onto it.  In the case of droplets in Photo Mechanic, Photo Mechanic will "drop" the selected photos onto the droplet you choose so that you can automate Photoshop from within Photo Mechanic.

HTH,

-Kirk

[Bob Baron]

Kirk,

Thanks very much for the very quick and helpful reply.

I've got one follow up question that may well indicate my lack of experience, but I am learning: If I drag & drop a selected group onto Bridge (or use 'edit selected photos with' Bridge), I would think I would want to put them into a blank/empty Bridge window for processing, but would want to leave them in their original folder when I am through with them.  When I tried following your advice  I wound up having to create a new folder to get the images into and opened in Bridge, and they seemed to be 'permanently' 'moved' to this new folder. 

I'd appreciate your further advice on this point.

Many thanks,

--Bob

[Kirk Baker]

Kirk,

Thanks very much for the very quick and helpful reply.

I've got one follow up question that may well indicate my lack of experience, but I am learning: If I drag & drop a selected group onto Bridge (or use 'edit selected photos with' Bridge), I would think I would want to put them into a blank/empty Bridge window for processing, but would want to leave them in their original folder when I am through with them.  When I tried following your advice  I wound up having to create a new folder to get the images into and opened in Bridge, and they seemed to be 'permanently' 'moved' to this new folder. 

I'm sorry I couldn't give you a definitive answer.  My installation of Bridge keeps crashing at launch.  I couldn't try out my advice to you because of that.  I'm surprised that Bridge wouldn't just open the folder containing the photos that were dragged and dropped onto it and then just show them preselected and ready to process.

What is causing the images to be moved?

-Kirk

[Bob Baron]

I'm sorry I couldn't give you a definitive answer.  My installation of Bridge keeps crashing at launch.  I couldn't try out my advice to you because of that.

How inconvenient!   

I'm surprised that Bridge wouldn't just open the folder containing the photos that were dragged and dropped onto it and then just show them preselected and ready to process.

It just adds them to the folder that is open.  Apparently, unless I am missing something - which is entirely possible - you cannot open Bridge with a blank window.  It has to have a folder open.

What is causing the images to be moved?

I have no idea how it works, but (if I understand your question) it appears the act of moving the images from PM to Bridge causes them to be appended to the active open folder.

Thanks,

--Bob

[Kirk Baker]

I'm surprised that Bridge wouldn't just open the folder containing the photos that were dragged and dropped onto it and then just show them preselected and ready to process.

It just adds them to the folder that is open.  Apparently, unless I am missing something - which is entirely possible - you cannot open Bridge with a blank window.  It has to have a folder open.

Can you close the currently open folder in Bridge?

What is causing the images to be moved?

I have no idea how it works, but (if I understand your question) it appears the act of moving the images from PM to Bridge causes them to be appended to the active open folder.[/quote]

It sounds like it takes the drag and drop as a copy/move operation.

So if you use Bridge as one of your editors and use the "Edit selected photos with->Bridge" on the thumbnail's contextual menu does that work any better?

-Kirk

[Bob Baron]

Can you close the currently open folder in Bridge?

Sort of: insofar as I have figured out to this point, if you close the currently open folder in Bridge you are just taken up one step in the tree.

Put another way, Bridge seems to require that 'a' folder always be open.

If that is clear.

It sounds like it takes the drag and drop as a copy/move operation.

So if you use Bridge as one of your editors and use the "Edit selected photos with->Bridge" on the thumbnail's contextual menu does that work any better?

No, I did not use the drag & drop, I used the "Edit selected photos with->Bridge" and that appeared to cause a 'move' operation.

--Bob

[Kirk Baker]

Can you close the currently open folder in Bridge?

Sort of: insofar as I have figured out to this point, if you close the currently open folder in Bridge you are just taken up one step in the tree.

Put another way, Bridge seems to require that 'a' folder always be open.

If that is clear.

It sounds like it takes the drag and drop as a copy/move operation.

So if you use Bridge as one of your editors and use the "Edit selected photos with->Bridge" on the thumbnail's contextual menu does that work any better?

No, I did not use the drag & drop, I used the "Edit selected photos with->Bridge" and that appeared to cause a 'move' operation.

Then, unfortunately I can't think of a way to communicate to Bridge to open up a folder and then select a set of photos.

-Kirk