Smart Objects In Photoshop, important Photoshop lesson

Smart Objects are layers that contain image data from raster or vector images, such as Photoshop or Illustrator files. 

Smart Objects preserve an image’s source content with all its original characteristics, enabling you to perform nondestructive editing to the layer.

Methods for creating Smart objects.

• Choose File > select open as Smart Object, select a file, and click Open.
• Choose File > Place to import files as Smart Objects into an open Photoshop document
• Choose Layer > Smart Object > Convert to Smart Object to convert a selected layer into a Smart Object. 
• Right click the layer of the picture and select Convert to Smart Object.  
• Drag PDF or Adobe Illustrator layers or objects into a Photoshop document.
• Paste artwork from Illustrator into a Photoshop document, and choose Smart Object in the Paste dialog box.

Duplicate a Smart Object

In the Layers panel, select a Smart Object layer, and do one of the following:

• To create a duplicate Smart Object that is linked to the original, choose Layer > New > Layer Via Copy, or drag the Smart Object layer to the Create A New Layer icon at the bottom of the Layers panel. Edits you make to the original affect the copy and vice versa.
• To create a duplicate Smart Object that isn’t linked to the original, choose Layer > Smart Objects > New Smart Object Via Copy. Edits you make to the original don’t affect the copy.

A new Smart Object appears in the Layers panel with the same name as the original and “copy” as a suffix.

Edit the content of a Smart Object

1- Select the Smart Object from the Layers panel, and do one of the following:

• Choose Layer > Smart Objects > Edit Contents.
• Double-click the Smart Objects thumbnail in the Layers panel.

2 - Click OK to close the dialog box.

3 - Make edits to the source content file, then choose File > Save.

Replace the contents of a Smart Object

1 - Select the Smart Object, and choose Layer > Smart Objects > Replace Contents.

2 - Navigate to the file you want to use, and click Place.

3 - Click OK.

Convert a Smart Object to a layer

Converting a Smart Object to a regular layer rasterizes the content at the current size. Convert a Smart Object to a regular layer only if you no longer need to edit the Smart Object data. Transforms, warps, and filters applied to a Smart Object are no longer editable after the Smart Object is rasterized.

* Select the Smart Object, and choose Layer > Rasterize > Smart Object.

NOTICE

If you want to re-create the Smart Object, reselect its original layers and start from scratch. The new Smart Object won’t retain transforms you applied to the original Smart Object.

Thanks

MR