check back soon we may have something... or if you do find more information, please share it, i would love to hear how it goes. s

Is it possible to post your work in progress here to see exactly what your problem is?? I'm sure you can get the help you need. There are some very talented and knowledgeable people here willing to help.:)

Thanks guys, You've always made me feel welcome no matter which forum... s

Cantalope ... already married!! ;) s

Well Done Slynky!!! Don't let HIGHER education go to your head!! s

Question one: yes the step is necessary (it's a little more obvious on different textures but it's a good step to include) Question two: no this is somewhat misleading. You can just create the ALPHA channel directly in the channels tab. Click the "new channel" button at the bottom of the channels palette. Set your brush to 10% and your color to white. In channels "black" adds to the channel (mask) and "white" removes from the channel (mask). The lower opacity allows for a better transition. in the next step, if you don't turn off the "eye" of the alpha channel it will be difficult correctly gauage your adjutments (the RED mask gets in the way...). Hold down the CTRL key and click on the alpha channel name, you should see "marching ants" around the area you painted white. Now you can go to IMAGE --> ADJUSTMENTS --> HUE/SATURATIONS (or just CTRL+U) and slide around till you get an even HUE between sides...(more or less) Play around with it till you fell confortable :) hope this helps, let me know s

if the status bar indicates you have sufficent RAM to perform the filter function and the efficiency percentage is fine, then it sounds like a corrupted filter. Try to UNinstall and then REinstall it. hope it helps!! s

What would you like to learn about them?

Basically they store mask information. This lets you manipulate and isolate specific areas of your image. It's very useful when working with multiple layers. Especially if you don't want to do "destructive" editing to a part of the image (destructive editing is any pixel manipulation that alters the original ie... erasing, smudgeing, blur...)

On the Adobe site there is a great resource area (Expert Center) you just have to sign-up (it's free)

let me know if i can help with anything...
s

Where is your scratch disk set? If you are working on a large file you will need more space allocated. This is because Photoshop holds a heck of a lot stuff in memory (history,undo, current modification...) all this adds up and when you try to apply a memory intensive filter/plugin it may cause PS to "crap-out". Look at the lower left "status bar" area and set this to view Scratch size. This will show the amount of RAM currently available to PS. You can also check the Efficiency (this will show the percentage of RAM being used).

Give it a look-see before applying the plugin and see if this is whats causing the CO (crap-out;))

You may want to de-frag' your drive too, makes it easier on the PS scratch disk...

s

Can a "one-time" poster to the gallery "X" his mark too?

I spend most of my time in the 2D forum (comfort level ;)) but i READ everything here to gleen as much as possible (currently using photography as an additinal tool in composition...) before i embarrass myself by posting crap (or fluff which is just a nicer name for crap...).

I really enjoy the multiple points of views from different countries and different cultures.

Really i don't LURK, but i do LOOK ;)

s

Are you looking to IMPORT from FLASH or EXPORT to PHOTOSHOP???

Because unfortunately photoshop being primarily a raster based program there's no way to export or save as SWF.

Illustrator is primarily vector and is perfectly suited for FLASH.

If you were able to export anything from photoshop it would be the vector coordinates from the pen tool and possible the raster information as a bitmap...

As for IMPORTING anything from a SWF...

Good Luck,

The best way to get the effect you want is to do it by hand. Use different brushes and set the opacity to different values to achive it. I've done waterfalls by hand in PS and have been happy with the outcome. I've yet to be able to say that for any action or plugin.

Let me see if i can toss someting together...

PC, I agree with Bev, blood would be "expected". What if you did GROOVES leading from the fingers (as if it's scratching its way). If you use blood, it would have to be darker, more dried... but then we be getting even creepier! s

How big is the file you're working on?? whats your scratch disk like? is the drive "frag'd"??

Here's a couple of things to do for flaky apps:

1. install latest "service pack"

2. rename photoshops preference file (Prefs.psp - located in the Documents and Settings/[user profile]/Application Data/Adobe/Photoshop/[version]/Adobe Photoshop [version] Settings folder) to Prefs.old and restart PS (this re-creates the file)

3. Make sure your device drivers work with Win2k especially the scanner, and video card.

4. Toss your TEMP files! Excessive or outdated temp files can interfere with Windows' performance.

5. ScanDisk and Defrag your drive.

6. Make sure your Scratch Disk is sufficient to handle storing data temporarily and to perform the computations (like cropping...).

7. Look at your "System Log" and see if there are some software conflicts.

8. Re-install Photoshop :(

Somethings bound to work...

s