Mini Bridge In Photoshop CS5 Tutorial

Mini Bridge In Photoshop CS5

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Navigating Through Folders

In the top left corner of Mini Bridge, above the Navigation Pod, are some options that help us navigate easily through the folders on our computer. Use the Browse buttons to move back and forth through your folder browsing history, just as you would in your favorite web browser:

The Browse icons in Mini Bridge in Photoshop CS5. Image © 2010 Steve Patterson, Photoshop Essentials.com
Use the Back (left arrow) and Forward (right arrow) icons to move back and forth through your browsing history.

The icon to the right of the Browse buttons lets us quickly jump to any parent folder, or to any recently viewed folder or file. It also gives us another way to access our Favorites:

The Parent or Recent Files icon in Mini Bridge. Image © 2010 Steve Patterson, Photoshop Essentials.com
Quickly jump to any parent folder, or any recently viewed folder or file.

The Path Bar

One of the most helpful navigation tools in Mini Bridge, as well as in the full version of Adobe Bridge, is the Path Bar which runs along the top just above the Navigation Pod. The Path Bar shows us the complete path to our currently selected folder. For example, reading it from right to left, it's showing me that I'm currently viewing my Beach folder, which is inside my Places folder, which is inside my Pictures folder, and so on. Not only does the Path Bar display this information, but we can use it to jump instantly to any folder listed in the path simply by clicking on its name:

The Path Bar in Mini Bridge. Image © 2010 Steve Patterson, Photoshop Essentials.com
The Path Bar shows us the complete path to the folder we're in, and lets us jump to any folder listed in the path.

If, for some reason, you'd rather not view the Path Bar, click on the Panel View icon in the top right of Mini Bridge, then click on Path Bar to deselect it. Click it again later to turn it back on. You can also choose to show or hide the Navigation Pod and Preview Pod from here. We haven't seen the Preview Pod yet since it's turned off by default, so I'll select it from the list:

The Panel View in Mini Bridge. Image © 2010 Steve Patterson, Photoshop Essentials.com
Use the Panel View menu to show or hide the Path Bar, Navigation Pod or Preview Pod.

The Preview Pod

The Preview Pod appears to the right of the Navigation Pod, effectively cutting the width of the Navigation Pod in half, and displays a preview of the image that's currently selected in the Content Pod. Problem is, the preview is too small to be of any real use, so it's usually best to leave the Preview Pod turned off and let the Navigation Pod use up the space. As we saw earlier, a better way to preview images is with the Preview option in the bottom right corner of the Content Pod:

The Preview Pod in Mini Bridge. Image © 2010 Steve Patterson, Photoshop Essentials.com
The Preview Pod is great at taking up space but not much else. Best to leave it off.

To search for specific files, click on the Search icon (the magnifying glass) in the top right corner of Mini Bridge:

The Search option in Mini Bridge. Image © 2010 Steve Patterson, Photoshop Essentials.com
Click on the magnifying glass to search for files.

And finally, if you need access to advanced features in the full version of Adobe Bridge CS5, click on the Adobe Bridge icon to quickly jump to it:

The Adobe Bridge icon in Mini Bridge. Image © 2010 Steve Patterson, Photoshop Essentials.com
The full version of Adobe Bridge CS5 is always just a click away.

And there we have it!

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