Welcome back to another very exciting tutorial here at the PhotoshopTrainingChannel.com.
My name is Jesus Ramirez and you can find me in Instagram @JRfromPTC.
In this video, we're going to talk about LAYER COMPS in Smart Objects.
Layer Comps allow designers to create multiple compositions or comps of a design.
Using Layer Comps, you can create, manage, and view multiple versions of a design in
a single Photoshop file.
With Smart Objects, the power of Layer Comps becomes even more powerful.
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Okay, let's get started.
So, we're going to work with this file here; it contains the layers.
This is just a background and a foreground named "Logo," but nothing is on that layer--that
layer is empty.
Also, if you'll notice, this layer here is a smart object.
So, if I double-click on it, a new tab opens and we have two objects in the smart object.
We have a logo and a sale label, and they're both currently disabled.
I'm going to go ahead and close this tab and we still have that logo smart object selected.
And in the properties panel, if you don't see that, you can go into Window, Properties.
We have this dropdown here that reads "Don't Apply Layer Comp."
But, if I click on that dropdown, I have different Layer Comps here, so we have one titled "Logo
- Bottom Left," "Logo - Bottom Right," "Bottom Left with Border," and we have the "Sale"
label.
So, how does this work?
Well, I'm going to go back into "All Disabled" and we're going to open up the smart object.
And in this smart object, we're going to see how this works.
I'm going to double tap on the Hand Tool just so we can fit everything to screen and we
have the logo and we have the Sale.
So, a layer comp allows you to control the visibility position and layer styles of each
layer and save them and bring back that instance whenever you need it.
So, the way it works is by first, going into Window, Layer Comps, and we can move a layer
to a different location.
We can bring down the Opacity and we can double-click on it to apply a layer style.
So, let's apply a drop shadow and move it over to the side.
Bring the Opacity to 100% so that we can see it and press OK.
Now, I can create a new Layer Comp and I'll just call this Layer Comp "Tutorial."
This is the Layer Comp that we're creating in the tutorial.
Also, notice that we're applying the Visibility, Position, and Appearance, which is the layer
style to this Layer Comp, and press OK.
Now, if I select "Logo - Bottom Left," obviously, the logo goes back to the bottom left.
Bottom Left with Border, it might be a little hard to tell in the video but there is a white
border around that logo.
"Logo - Bottom Right," "Sale," and way at the bottom here, "Tutorial," we have the one
that we just created.
So, I'm going to click on "All Disabled" because I have a Layer Comp that disabled everything.
And, by the way, I want you to notice the icons at the right of the Layer Comp.
They tell you what they control.
Notice that for most of these, they control Visibility, Position and Layer Styles.
Some of these don't have the Layer Styles control and that's okay because these particular
Layer Comps don't have any layer styles, so that's okay.
So, with our new tutorial Layer Comp, we're going to go back into the original file we
are working with, but first, I'm going to set it to "Disable."
Then I'm going to close the tab, save it, and when we come back into the Properties
Panel on this dropdown, we're going to have a Layer Comp titled "Tutorial."
If I select it, we're going to see that the logo goes into that same position with the
same visibility, with the opacity reduced and with the layer style applied--the Drop
Shadow.
So, this is the power of using smart objects with layer comps.
So this could be very useful in many areas, for example, if you have a social media account,
maybe a Facebook cover photo that has your logo and it moves into different locations
depending on the contents of the background, this could be a way of saving you some time
because whenever you put in a background, you can quickly come into the dropdown and
select the different versions of your logo with the different positions, visibility and
layer styles that you may have or, of course, you can create one that doesn't have anything.
So, what do you think about Layer Comps and smart objects?
Did you know these features existed?
And if you didn't, do you think you'll be using this technique in the future?
Let me know in the comments below.
Also, let me know if you have any cool tips and tricks with Layer Comps and smart objects.
And that's it for this tutorial.
I hope that you enjoyed it and that you learned something new.
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Thank you for watching and I will talk to you again soon.