Choose which filters to load...

[theKeeper]

Did you know?...
That when Photoshop's startup screen is showing, if you press and hold the Ctrl+Alt keys (MAC: Cmd+Option), Photoshop will stop before it completely loads up, and ask you to choose which plugin folder you would like it to use for the current session.

This has great significants to those of us who have a lot of filters and can't get them all to show up at the same time in the filter menu; or have a filter menu that's just WAY to long when opened. Using the above technique will allow you to group your filters into separate folders -- like according to what they do & how often you use them -- and only load that specific group each time we use Photoshop.

What to do...
Just create a new folder within Photoshop's main folder, name it whatever you like (don't call it "Plugins" though), and move whichever filters you want grouped together into that folder.
NOTE: be careful though, some of the larger 3rd party 'plugins' (not the smaller 'filters') have hidden files that need to be kept with the plugin. Unhide your systems files before doing this, and hide them again afterward.

Definately a time saver -- Photoshop will load quicker -- and our Filter menu will be easier to read. [excited]

 

[Erik]

Another tip in this direction: I made some separate folders outside Photoshop, in fact: even on another partition, and put my Plug-Ins in there, each one his own.
Then I created shortcuts to them and now I can place these shortcuts, if needed, into the Photoshop Plug-in folder.
This way, other software like Painter (Classic, came with my Wacom) can easily find them too and my C: drive never gets too fat.

Must admit though that I more and more use PS and forget about the plug-ins.

 

[theKeeper]

Ooo hey... very smart idea Erik.
I wasn't aware that PS would even react to a short-cut, let alone actually read & following it to it's destination.

Very cool, thanks! [excited]