Adobe Bridge

Adobe Bridge

Adobe Bridge is a new stand-alone program (accessed via the File > Browse menu in Photoshop) that comes bundled with Photoshop CS2 and is designed for browsing and organizing your images (similar to the File Browser that was available in previous versions of Photoshop). With it, you can view thumbnail size previews of your images, sort and rotate them, and apply a variety of automated features. Bridge is so useful and offers so many options, I almost never use the Image > Open command to access the files on my hard drive. Instead, I choose one of the following ways to open Bridge:

·         File > Browse.

·         Type Option-Command-O (Mac) or Alt-Ctrl-O (Windows).

·         Click on the new Bridge icon on the far right of the options bar.

Bridge is organized into four panes, three across the left side and one on the right as shown in Figure  below. The left side is divided into tabbed "palettes" that act much like the normal palettes in Photoshop, except they are stuck together. You can drag the name of a tab onto another palette grouping to include that palette in the group. You can double-click on a tab to collapse that area so it takes up minimal space, and you can drag the dividing bar between palettes to control how much space one area takes up as compared to the others.