How to Launch Camera Raw from Adobe Bridge Preview Mode

My lady and I made a quick visit to our town lake a few evenings ago. We don’t do this much, but when we do, I’ll tell you – it’s beautiful. We are very fortunate that we only have to travel about four miles to see something so striking.

While we were there, she snapped a few photos. There is the lake you see above as well as a smaller one that is followed by a water fall. There’s also an old wood mill that’s no longer used. All really great areas for photography.

Laura took a few photos and then she handed the camera to me. I took a few photos as well. Mine had more to do with people and boats and hers had to do with natural beauty.

When we got the photos home, I decided to download them from the camera to my computer. When I had them where I wanted them, I viewed them using Adobe Bridge. Then, after I selected one to work on, I went through my typical routine. I clicked the Open in Camera Raw icon in Bridge to launch Camera Raw, where I did my editing.

Here’s the thing – sometimes, I work with different sized windows. If I know I’m going to limit my editing to simple operations such as increasing or decreasing exposure, contrast, vibrance and things like that in the Basic panel, I’ll keep the Camera Raw window rather small. After all, I don’t need to have a great view of the intricacies of the photo and I generally like to see other applications on my computer while I’m editing my photography. Of course, if I were editing a photo and removing spots and making very detailed adjustments, I would keep the application as large as possible. But, even when the window is small, I like to have a large view of my changes, if that makes any sense.

To clarify, I’m going to give you an example of how I go about having a reduced sized application with a large view of what I’m working on.

My Photos in Adobe Bridge

To start off, I’ll give you a screenshot of some of the photos we took of the lake last week. I’m showing you the thumbnails in Adobe Bridge.

As you can see, the screenshot includes the center and the right panels. Also, I’ve already selected my example photo.

Full Screen Preview Mode in Bridge

No matter the size of the Bridge application that’s open, you can select one of the thumbnails and preview the corresponding photo so it takes up the entire size of your monitor. To do this, simply press the Space Bar on your keyboard. When I do this, the preview is giant because I’m currently working on a 27″ monitor. By the way, to scroll through the photos of a series, simply press the left and right arrows. To close the large preview, press the space bar again.

In my case, I’m going to leave the giant preview open. This will allow me to see any changes I make to the photo.

Keyboard Shortcut to Launch Camera Raw

Now that I’ve got the full size preview open, I can launch Camera Raw by using a keyboard shortcut. This shortcut is Command (Mac) or Ctrl (Windows) and the letter R. So it’s Command+R or Ctrl+R. When I use this shortcut, Camera Raw opens up right over the preview. Here, take a look.

Inside Camera Raw, I can edit to my heart’s content.

Closing Camera Raw & Applying Changes

Once I’m finished with my photo edits inside Camera Raw, to apply the edits, all I need to do is press the Done button that’s located down in the lower right corner of the application. After I do this, the application will close, leaving me with the full screen preview of the image once more. I’ll notice an immediate blip and the preview will update itself with my modifications. To open Camera Raw again, if I’m not happy with the changes, I’d simply use the shortcut again. And then press the Done button. Over and over again until I’m finished editing.

I know this was a lot to say to cover one easy keyboard shortcut, but I felt that once you understand a real-world use for it, you might be able to find more uses for it in your own workflow. After all, we all edit our photos differently and what I use, you may not.

If you have any questions, please ask them in the comments section below. I’d be happy to help any way I can. Thanks!

If you’d like to learn more about working with Adobe Bridge and Camera Raw in general, please take a look at these very informative posts:

Working With Camera Raw In Adobe Bridge vs Photoshop – Photoshop Essentials

Camera Raw, Bridge, or Lightroom? – Scott Kelby’s Photoshop Insider

Top Five Tips for Bridge CS6 and Adobe Camera Raw – SLR Lounge

Adobe Bridge & Camera Raw – 100% Previews – Computer Darkroom

5 Starter Steps to Batch Processing using Adobe Bridge – Digital Photography School

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