Re: Photoshop Action
Re: Photoshop Action
- Subject: Re: Photoshop Action
- From: Stan Cleveland <email@hidden>
- Date: Thu, 23 Jul 2009 15:31:42 -0700
- Thread-topic: Photoshop Action
On 7/23/09 1:53 PM, "CYB" wrote:
> On the other hand you call my attention when you mentioned ³Cal Simone's
> PhotoScripter plug-in² and I don¹t have any notice on that !! So can you send
> me some info about it? Any way certainly I¹ll google it.
Hi Carlos,
Since you asked, I'll share a bit of scripting and personal history, at
least as I recall it. (I hope it's relatively accurate. I apologize up front
for any misrepresentations or slighted individuals.)
In 1998, Cal Simone's company, Main Event Software, released a plug-in for
Photoshop 5.0 (or later) that grafted an AppleScript dictionary onto the
program. The dictionary allowed one to:
Open and save documents in various file formats
Query and change image attributes, including size, resolution,
color space, and image file metadata information
Create new documents, layers, channels, paths and more
Fill, stroke, draw lines and make gradients; flip, rotate and transform
Create and apply new monitor (RGB), printing (CMYK) and profile setups
Perform Photoshop image adjustments; flatten layers
Apply Photoshop filters and effects
As I recall, without PhotoScripter the only available AS commands were
"open" and "do script", which would run an Action. PhotoScripter cost
something like $299 per seat and my company bought four copies, which we
still have on the shelf. The acknowledgements page of the manual reads like
a who's who of AppleScript history. Both Ed Stockley and Shane Stanley
[frequent posters on this list] were cited as beta testers.
Once Photoshop became scriptable via the plug-in, the graphics world had the
tools (along with QuarkXPress and FileMaker Pro) needed for publication
production. At the time, we thought it was fantastic! The release of
PhotoScripter ultimately led me to a become full-time scripter a year or two
later. Before that, about 25-50% of my time was spent scripting.
Also, as I recall, when versions 6 and 7 of Photoshop were released, Adobe
had made internal changes that broke some or all of PhotoScripter's
functionality. I know that my company stuck with using PhotoScripter with
Photoshop 5.5 for years, so as to not disturb the magic of that combination.
When Photoshop CS was released, Adobe included an AppleScript implementation
with a sizable number of commands. What couldn't be done with AS could be
done with javascript. Of course, that's still true to this day.
Upon the release of Photoshop CS, PhotoScripter became instantly obsolete.
The only other product by Main Event that I'm aware of was Scripter, which
was a script editor/debugger/code library that didn't seem to have wide
acceptance. The company folded, I believe, not long thereafter.
I did buy a copy of Scripter (also still on the shelf here), but never quite
made sense of the interface and gave up on it. Instead, I settled on Late
Night Software's Script Debugger as the better editor, which I still use and
love (especially the latest version, 4.5.3).
Well, that's enough from me. There is, no doubt, a lot more information on
the web that can be ferreted out, if desired.
Stan C.
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