July 2, 200818 yr In photoshop, when you create a smart object, it saves it as a .psb file. Does anyone know where the .psb file is saved when you create the smart object? Does it somehow embed it in the actual .psd file or does it put it somewhere else? It would be great if you could tell it to do it outside the file and link it to several .psd files. Similar to the "link-file" in Indesign. I have a feeling no one is going to know what I'm talking about.
July 2, 200818 yr Hy TFM, This isn't like placement in InDesign, where it places a proxy and updates the content if the original file is edited. Smart objects cannot reference external files but you can manually replace the layer contents if you have made changes to an original file. From this article (refers to PS CS2).
July 3, 200818 yr Author So according to that its not an external file.. but it says To work on the individual layers again, you'll have to select "Edit Contents," which opens a separate working document. Which leads me to believe that there is a separate file. because when you open it (by double clicking the smart object layer) it's labeled as "layer name" ".psb" which is a photoshop file format for larger photoshop files. When you modify and save this, file it updates in the original document as would indesign.
July 3, 200818 yr Well ... it's not quite external ... here's why (just a guess with some tests) ... I tested this just like you did, double clicked the smart object (the window title shows the file name) .. so it's some sort of external pointer BUT what makes it not 100% external is this: If you delete the external file ... the smart object is still there. If you update the external file EXTERNALLY (heh, using another software) that doesn't get reflected in the PSD. So here's the guess: PS saves a copy inside the PSD ... which if modified internally can be also updated (if you save it) externally. Hope that makes sense.
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