Workflow

Four Photoshop Tools That Cut My Portrait Cleanup Time in Half
Video Tutorials

Four Photoshop Tools That Cut My Portrait Cleanup Time in Half

There’s a category of retouching work that never makes it into anyone’s portfolio but eats up a surprising chunk of billable hours. Background clutter. Stray wires. A parking cone that somehow wandered into the corner of a lifestyle shoot. For most of my career I handled these the same way everyone else did: Clone Stamp, Patch tool, Content-Aware Fill, rinse and repeat. It worked, but on a heavy e-commerce day it could chew through an hour before I’d even started the actual color work.

Blending Photos and Graphics in Photoshop: What Aaron Nace's Workflow Taught Me About Working Smarter
Video Tutorials

Blending Photos and Graphics in Photoshop: What Aaron Nace's Workflow Taught Me About Working Smarter

Client work has a way of pushing you into techniques you’d never have explored on your own. Ad agencies started asking me for portraits with a graphic, illustrated feel about two years ago, and I spent an embarrassing amount of time cobbling together workflows from scattered forum posts. So when PHLEARN released their Graphic Portrait Pro tutorial, hosted by Aaron Nace, I watched the whole thing twice before breakfast. Not because the concepts were brand new to me, but because seeing six complete workflows in one place, with all the source files included, is the kind of resource that would have saved me weeks of trial and error.

Photoshop's Updated Remove Tool Is the Closest Thing to Magic I've Added to My Workflow
Video Tutorials

Photoshop's Updated Remove Tool Is the Closest Thing to Magic I've Added to My Workflow

I track time obsessively. Not in a vague, “I should be more productive” way, but in a literal spreadsheet-with-color-coded-columns way. So when a tool promises to save hours on a task I repeat constantly across client work, I pay attention immediately. The Remove Tool in Photoshop has always been solid, but the latest update pushes it into genuinely different territory. Instead of painting over distractions manually one by one, Photoshop can now scan your entire image, identify what doesn’t belong, and remove it all in a single operation.

How to Record Complex Multi-Step Actions
Actions

How to Record Complex Multi-Step Actions

Recording a simple Photoshop action is straightforward — hit record, do your steps, hit stop. But complex multi-step actions that work reliably across different images require planning and a few techniques most people skip. Plan Before You Record The biggest mistake is hitting the record button and figuring it out as you go. Complex actions need a written plan. Open a text file and list every step in order. Note which steps need user input (like selecting an area) and which should run automatically.

Building Custom Photoshop Presets That Actually Save You Time
Workflow Optimization

Building Custom Photoshop Presets That Actually Save You Time

Building Custom Photoshop Presets That Actually Save You Time I’ve watched a lot of creators accumulate hundreds of presets they never use. Their Curves panel becomes a graveyard of “maybe someday” adjustments. Here’s the thing: custom presets only work when they solve actual problems in your real workflow. Let me show you how I build presets that stick around and actually get used. Know What Problem You’re Solving Before you save anything, ask yourself: “Am I doing this adjustment sequence more than twice a month?

Building Cinematic Worlds: A Matte Painting Workflow That Actually Works
News

Building Cinematic Worlds: A Matte Painting Workflow That Actually Works

I’ve been diving into matte painting techniques lately, and I’ve noticed something frustrating: most tutorials skip over the structural stuff. They show you the final result, but not the why behind the layering decisions and compositional choices that make a cinematic environment actually feel believable. That’s why I got genuinely excited learning about how professional concept artists like Killian Prevost approach this discipline from the ground up. It’s not just about beautiful renders—it’s about building a repeatable, organized workflow that scales whether you’re creating a game environment, film concept, or personal illustration.

Automating Photoshop with Scripts: The Workflow Game-Changer I Wish I'd Known Earlier
Workflow Optimization

Automating Photoshop with Scripts: The Workflow Game-Changer I Wish I'd Known Earlier

I spent three years doing the same tedious tasks in Photoshop before I realized how much time I was actually wasting. Resizing images, applying the same adjustments, renaming layers, exporting to multiple formats—it added up to hours every single week. That’s when I dove deep into Photoshop automation scripts, and honestly, I’m kicking myself for not starting sooner. The Difference Between Actions, Presets, and Scripts Before we get into the heavy lifting, let me clarify something that confused me at first.