If you find yourself performing repetitive tasks over and over (and over) in Photoshop, setting up a batch process is the way to go. Basically you ‘record’ your actions and then ‘play’ them on a group of files at once. This can be useful if, for example, you have 500 digital pictures you need to resize.

For a quick guide on how to set this up, check out this page which gives a brief overview of the function and shows how you can create your own batch processes. To see a batch in action, check out this video which shows a demonstration of a group of images being watermarked at once.

In general, the ability to perform batch processes (or macros) is extremely powerful, so if your application offers this feature, take advantage.

What is a "cloud" application?

It’s any application that has the power of a desktop (as in installed locally to your computer) app – except it’s all on the web.

You probably use cloud apps already and probably didn’t even realize it. Do you use Gmail, Yahoo! Mail or Hotmail? That’s all in the cloud.

But this is about Photoshop, the famous high-priced image editor.

Except this one is free – and it’s still Photoshop.

Photoshop Express is an Adobe product available here:

https://www.photoshop.com/express/landing.html

As with most cloud apps it does require you to register an account in order to use it.

Here’s a quick overview. (Click each image to enlarge)

Above: The sign-in screen. If you don’t have an account you can sign up from there.

Above: The landing page. I have no images in here yet so I click the "Upload Photos" button at the top left.

Above: I cancel the upload on purpose because – LOOK AT THAT ON THE LEFT – there a Flickr login (as well as Photobucket and Picasa too!) Nice. I choose Flickr since I use that already.

Above: I’ve validated my Flickr account and loaded in an image – direct from Flickr. Very cool. Now I can start editing.

Above: I chose the "Crop and Rotate" tool and selected a portion of the image.

Above: I clicked the top right green check arrow to see the edit I just made.

From here I can either continue editing, save it, do whatever I want, etc.

Seriously.. this is frickin’ cool.

This is what cloud apps are supposed to be like. Simple, friendly, powerful, and of course – free.

Adobe Photoshop Express is without a shadow of a doubt one of the best cloud apps I’ve ever used.

Try it out – you will love this.

While there are a myriad number of digital photo hosting sites out there (and you probably can’t go wrong with any of them), one you might want to take a look at is Adobe Photoshop Express.

Photoshop Express offers what you would expect from an online photo host such as album creation, sharing and a massive amount of free storage. One feature I found most intriguing, however, was the ability to manipulate your photos online without the need for any software. This touch up feature is ideal for only the casual photo taker as you don’t have to invest any time in “preparing” your images to be uploaded. You can do many things from applying color filters to smudges, all of which you can sample in their test drive.