Every coin has two sides. For every Yin, there’s a Yang. Every minute of having a blast on the set comes at the cost of countless hours of Photoshop editing and rendering. Luckily, a professional photographer usually has artistic Photoshop actions at his side.
These bad boys can do real magic with photos in but a handful of clicks allowing the creators to focus on the artistic aspect of their work instead of worrying about the technical aspects.
Call them a real-life cheat for photographers, if you will.
Artistic Photoshop actions: pros and cons
Photoshop actions are an amazing thing if you just want to sit down and bring your artistic vision into life through a series of convenient means and available resources.
Think about it – there’s a bundle of amazing effects you can slap on one of your pics as easily as you try out a quite face in Snapchat.
That said, not all is gold that glitters.
Most actions can and will cost you an arm and a leg because, very much like expensive toys, they are sold separately from the cool accessories. You’ll spend more time downloading styles and backgrounds that you would have on working with the photo.
The typical number of effects you’ll get from an average, run in the mill action isn’t anything to write home about as well.
How About Bundles?
Photoshop actions bundles are an amazing solution to solve most of the cons we’ve talked about before. Think about it – you get to keep the creative freedom without spending neither too much nor too much money on downloading separate effects.
Most of the bundles come at a very affordable cost where you can get your hands on anything from 10 to 100 effects for twenty to fifty dollars.
PhotoWhoa’s Artistic Photoshop Mood Effects Bundle
Speaking of bundles, Photowhoa, an amazing resource and knowledge base for professional photographers and digital artists is offering their own amazing set of creative effects for as little as $24.
The bundle includes a total of 30 actions for those of you in the mood of “drawing” digital art.
What’s meant by that is that the actions are designed to give your works a hand-drawn-slash-painted look. Some of the most prominent effects include:
- Blue Line
- Saturday Morning
- Ink
- Watercolor
- Cosplay
- Concept art
- Medium pencil
- Hard Shaded Pencil
- and Story Book
Where the actions shine brightest
PhotoWhoa’s artistic bundle from Pencil Pixels is your golden ticket into the world of pencil drawings and graphical art. Most of its utilities in any combination are best used for adding the notes of drama into your works.
The bundle’s effects are particularly simple in use. Their UI/UX design is a simple, intuitive drag and drop bar you can use to customize depth, color, the thickness of the lines, and the textures in but a handful of clicks.
The odds are you won’t even use your keyboard shortcuts because you’ll never need them.
Simplicity
Simplicity is probably the strongest suit of this actions pack.
- You don’t have to manipulate the layers of the original visual to output stuff as JPEG
- You can duplicate as many layers or elements as you need
- The color options are amazing – you get to pick the depth, transparency and pre-masking, all in a single click
- The bundle works with portrait photography like oil and fire. It doesn’t just add a flair – it ignites the whole piece in passion. All you have to do is to slap on the effect.
Features and compatibility
What do you need to run the bundle? Mac OS X or a decent version of Windows and Photoshop CS2 – CC 2019 would be a great start.
Then you’ll need the bundle itself. It is composed of 2 volumes of scripts, each holding 30 effects.
The bundle comes with a detailed manual describing everything you need to know about the installation process and ongoing work with the actions in great detail.
Best use
As it was mentioned earlier, the artistic bundle is mostly fitted for portrait photography. Highlighting one’s face, expressions, features, and emotion is where the bundle truly shines!
Customer support
Great customer support is one of the bundle’s strongest suits. How often do you hear from the client manager within 24 hours of sending a request? By that, we don’t mean “hear from” alone. The support team gets back to you with a ready solution.
On the downside, the only way of reaching them is through email.
Enough said!
If you are a beginner photographer lacking the experience and Photoshop skills, or if you are a seasoned veteran looking to simplify and streamline your workflow, this bundle of Photoshop Mood Effects has something amazing to offer. Give it a shot!
View Artistic Actions Bundle Here >>
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