There must be a better way to view digi kits when scrapping (?)

[Scrapper007]

I have tried ACDSee and Picasa for my digi supplies but both programs were way too slow for me (and crashed half the time). I am now using Windows Photo Gallery. The drawback to this program that I can see so far is that I tag items and the tags don't "stick". The next time I open Windows, the tags aren't there. :(

Another dilemma I have is that when I scrap, I keep Windows Gallery open too, but minimized so that I can have it open next to the page I am creating and see both...although my digi stuff, I only see in a single column (I must scroll down to see it all). I'd love to be able to see everything at once. If you switch back and forth between two full screen windows (Photoshop and whatever you use to organize your stuff), how do you drag you papers, elements, etc. onto your page?

Should I just get two screens??

[KateD]

I use Windows XP and Vista and if I drag an item from one window onto the Photoshop "tab" on the explorer bar at the bottom of the screen, it'll switch to PS and I can then move the item into PS and drop it there.

[luckyme]

I scrap using PS CS4 and organize my digi suppliesin ACDSee. I have a wide-screen monitor so I can open both programs at once. (I use Windows 7 which has the neat feature where you can fling a program into each upper corner of the monitor and they lock in place taking up 50% of the screen.)

Honestly though, most of the time, I just open up my PS, then start flinging elements onto the page. Once I feel like I have enough, I minimize ACDSee and start playing with my PS file, doing rough shadowing, resizing and adjusting layers up and down until I'm happy. If I run into a rut, I go back to the ACDSee folder and see if there's something else to use.

I set up "hot keys" in ACDSee to quickly open an element in my PS program. (For me, the + sign and home keys both work, but you can customize it to something else.) It's quick and easy to do...

[*Celeste*]

i have windows 7 and flinging my windows is not locking them 50/50
love the hot key tip - must try that!

[jorgies5]

I have tried ACDSee and Picasa for my digi supplies but both programs were way too slow for me (and crashed half the time). I am now using Windows Photo Gallery. The drawback to this program that I can see so far is that I tag items and the tags don't "stick". The next time I open Windows, the tags aren't there. :(


That is weird because I use Windows Photo Gallery to tag everything and that doesn't happen to me. The tags are still there when I open it again. When I first started using WPG, I found that it only worked if I had all of my files in the "Pictures" folder. Later, someone told me there was a way to change that (I don't remember how but it was in this forum if you want to search). I have just left all my digi scrapping files in my Pictures folder and it works perfectly.

Hope you get it figured out.

[luckyme]

i have windows 7 and flinging my windows is not locking them 50/50
love the hot key tip - must try that!

I was going from memory and you're right, it's not quite 50/50 on mine either... more like the ACDSee is 50% and the PS takes up about 70% (so overlapping by about 20%). I think it's larger because of all the 'palettes' I keep open and locked in a pane to the side (styles, actions and layers). It's handy to be able to have both open and visible, but like I said, I tend to just fling stuff on my PS page and then minimize ACDSee and go back to it when necessary...

[Chantal Miller]

I use windows explorer and cs4. I have my thumnails/previews at Extra Large for papers and wordart and Large foreverything else. I must say though, I usually prefer the place function from within PS except for alphas

[DeepGirl]

I use FreeCommander - very happy with it :)

[adrianka]

I use ACDSee. I just tag the preview according to various criteria, and some elements if they stand out to me for some reason (like, I'm addicted to newsprint, so I tag all newspring ellies and others).

Tried all the rest of the programmes, didn't like them, but that's subjectvie. I noticed that Photoshop has a tagging function in Bridge, have you tried that one? Seemed nice to me, but I have no experience with it and I'm so used to ACDSee that I didn't fee like trying.

[ColleenSwerb]

Sometimes I browse my stash using Windows explorer. I never remember that I can drag them into PS from there, so I always just navigate to the right folder within PS. I open everything in PS and then drag and drop them onto my layout file individually.