Today’s Question: I understand (I think) the logic of the somewhat new “Save a Copy” command, and I’ve gotten used to using it. However, I don’t like that it adds “copy” to the end of my filename, and sometimes I forget to remove it. Is there a way to prevent that text from being added in the first place?
Tim’s Quick Answer: Yes, you can stop Photoshop from appending “copy” to the end of a filename when you use the “Save a Copy” command by turning off the “Do not append ‘copy’ to filename when saving a copy” checkbox in Preferences.
More Detail: The “Save a Copy” command in Photoshop is relatively new and aimed at helping ensure (among other things) that photographers don’t inadvertently save their layered image files in a format that doesn’t support layers, losing all those layers in the process. The “Save As” command will therefore only allow you to select file types (such as TIFF or PSD) that support all the features you’ve used for an image. If you want to save in a file format (such as JPEG) that doesn’t support things like layers, you need to use the “Save a Copy” command.
As noted in today’s question, by default when you use the “Save a Copy” command, the filename will be updated to include “copy” at the end. You can certainly remove that text manually in the “Save a Copy” dialog, but there’s also an option to disable this behavior altogether.
To get started go to the Edit menu on Windows or the Photoshop menu on Macintosh and choose Preferences or Settings followed by “File Handling”. In the “File Saving Options” section turn on the “Do not append ‘copy’ to filename when saving a copy” checkbox. Close the Preferences dialog, and from that point forward the “copy” text will no longer be appended to the filename when using the “Save a Copy” command.
Note that in most scenarios when using the “Save a Copy” command there isn’t any real need to append “copy” to the filename. That’s because when using the “Save a Copy” command you’ll generally be creating a file in a different file format, which means the filename extension will be different from the primary image file. That will generally ensure unique filenames, though you can always modify the default filename if needed or preferred.
