See the PSD preview in windows folder?

[simple_chi]

I am used to using my Mac when working in Photoshop Elements. When I was in the file or folder view, I could see a tile image of my PSD file - so I could easily see what templates I wanted to use, or see small images of my finished projects.

On my PC, I seem to be just seeing a generic image showing that it's a PSD file - which is frustrating because I have to open it to see what it is. I have to assume that there's a way to have a 'preview' of the file - can anyone help me here?

Thanks,
Lynn

[sweetpeony]

Hi, Lynn. If you hover over the thumb, you'll see the image either below or next to the lineup of files. I don't know if there's a way to show the image in the thumb line up.

[esther_a]

That is why I always save my files as layered tiffs instead. Windows shows the previews of layered tiffs. I don't lose anything by doing that, and in fact the files are smaller.

[dugarner]

Esther---when you save as a layered tiff, is that in addition to your PSD file? Or do you simply open the tiff and continue working?

Since I work in 24X12, my PSD files are usually huge---often around 1/2 GB, so even if I had a thumbnail utility, it would crash my system because the thumbnails would be too big.

[esther_a]

I don't use PSD files at all now. From all I've read there is nothing lost in saving as layered tiffs instead. The files are about 70% as big or less. That is different from saving as a flattened tiff which some people mention they do instead of flattening to a jpg.

[carollee]

I don't use PSD files at all either, I just save straight away as a tiff file and all my layers are there. I've not lost quality, or at least I haven't seen any loss of quality.

[dorah]

What a great tip. I didn't realize that about tiff files. Guess who may be a convert.

[elseepe]

i'm going to have to give that a try. previews of layouts and templates would be a great bonus to switching to layered tiff files.

[elseepe]

I had to go and give this a try. When I saved as a layered tiff with no image or layer compression my tiff file was actually slightly larger than the psd.
I did a little googling and came across info advising using LZW image compression and zip layer compression. The file was about 54% smaller. Both previews are available in windows.
Just wondering what method you tiff users are using for compression. All the info seems to indicate that this is lossless compression. Any drawbacks? If not, I guess I'll be converting templates and in-work layouts. That preview is just so handy.

[dugarner]

Tiff is a lossless compression (if you choose no compression). I can preview my files from inside Elements when I choose "File: Open" and click once on the file I want to open. Otherwise, previews are too big for my system to handle. Since I can only upload JPEGs to be printed, as soon as a page is done, I save it as a flattened JPEG so I can see the preview.

Just one of those frustrating things with Windows!

[esther_a]

Oh, sorry, I forgot about the LZW compression. I did read that when I first started using TIFFs and have it selected by default.

[justmp]

Wow! This is all news to me! I'm going to switch to saving as TIFFs! Thanks ladies!