Disappearing Layers? It's magic.

Hello All,
I have a question/problem. I am creating a presentation in Flash and I have hit a wall. I am attempting an altered text effect, like Wargames. I have imported the text letters individually in png format. I have spaced them and they should be fine and look like a text bar is typing out my message. There are 2 lines and as the second line of text types out about halfway the beginning of the first line begins to dissappear. With each letter that appears a letter dsissappears from the beginning. Can anyone help me with this, I'm stumpted.

great.
now check the layer/timeline of one of the letters that disappear. there should be no keyframes beyond the first in which this letter appears and there should be a frame in that layer at the end of the timeline. fix whichever problem is causing your letter to disappear.

Similar Messages

Disappearing layers

I was working on a PNG in Fireworks (CS5.1) and started getting "An internal error occurred" -- the double error message. I shut down FW. When I went to open the file I had just been working on, the layers were missing. If I do these steps: File > Open and then select the file, I see the preview, which shows the entire file with all the images/pieces. But then when I actually open it, all the layers are missing.
Anyone know what's up with this?
Virginia

Hi, Linda! Thanks for the reply -
Unfortunately, I wasn't doing anything, really. Actually - I take that back...I was researching something online via Google and was visiting some sites, so I was alt-tabbing back and forth between Mozilla Firefox and Fireworks. That was it -- no new fonts or anything like that. I'm still able to see the complete file on a preview, but everything but a few layers disappears once I open the file.
I had to just start the whole thing over from scratch.
Hopefully it won't happen again! But if it does, I'd love to know why it did it that way.
Virginia

Disappearing layers in Final render

I have a layer of video that keeps diappearing from my final render. It doesn't disappear completly. Looks to be down to about 1% opacity. Only happens in my final quicktime render. Plays and looks fine in my comp and ram previews. All my other comps which are pretty much duplicates except swapping out 2 layers work just fine as well.
First image is my ram preview with the camera pushing past her. How it is supposed to look. Second is what actually renders out. It hits that frame right as the camera moves and she disappears. Layer order and z-position is not the issue. Any help is much appreciated.

Are you sure that you are previewing the Active Camera in the Comp?
If so then a screenshot of the entire timeline would be of much more use than these frame grabs.

Disappearing Layers After Latest PS Touch Update

After the latest PS Touch for Android update, the layers do not work properly anymore. Any effects applied to them, example - after reducing intensity to below 60% - the image disappears never to be brought back.
I have called numberous times on this and have been transfered to so many departments, then disconnected. This isn't very professional. Please allow people to get help for this product when needed.
I am using a Visio Tablet. This app worked perfectly prior to the recent updated (prior to the HDR filters, etc added).
Thank you

Sorry about the long delay as I had family and life to attend to.
Warunicorn, the FX was Basic>Lighting.
When using Lighting on layer 2 (after filling an empty layer with black) that when I move the circle cursor for the light (whatever it is called) even slightly the black fill disappears.
Here is the tutorial I followed: http://tv.adobe.com/watch/learn-photoshop-touch/using-lighting-effects/
Above is only one example as anty FX will do same.
Now what makes makes this app very frustrating and useless is that upon further inspection, any second layer with fx applied to it in which the fx intensity slider is adjusted, that layer's content (photo, etc) disappears and can not be retrieved with placing slider back to original positon,
In a nutshell I can not use this app as layers are not working correctly.
Please note I will NOT be adding snapshots as this app is simple enough to explain, nor do I have time.
Since I last posted:
Factory reset my device
Reformatted my sd card
Updated device to current settings
Redownloaded PS touch
Rebooted device
....and still having same issue.
This app worked perfectly prior to this last app update.

Magic wand selects everything. Help!

Hi,
I'm using Illustrator CS6 and I haven't been able to use the magic wand tool. I have Photoshop CS6 and the magic wand works perfectly in that program. The problem is that I mainly use Illustrator to work and if I try to open the image in Photoshop the colours don't fill properly (white fuzzy edges) so it's not really a solution for me to just use photoshop instead. I'd really like to get to the bottom of this. I've looked through dozens of forums and tutorials and can't find anything that solves my problem.
The images I'm working with were created by myself from scratch using illustrator. I was working on a multilayer image, and I selected the option to use all layers in the magic wand tool option bar but it didn't work. So, I flattened all layers so that I would be working on a single layer image and still nothiing. The image has been fully coloured using live paint. I want to be able to quickly change the colours in the image without having to reselect and colour every portion. I worked with a limited colour palette of maybe 10 colours, so really this image should be perfect for magic wand. I have set the tolerance at zero for fill colour. The other options are deselected. If someone could help it would be much appreciated. It's very frustrating!!
Thanks!
Shira

The magic wand does not select objects it selects the color. That color is placed in the swatch well at the bottom of the toolbar.
What you can do it use the selection tool (the back arrow at top of toolbar or the lowercase v on keyboard.) Select one of the colors you want to change, then in the top menu goto Select>Same>(choose an option) This will allow you to select all the same colored fills or strokes and change that color all at the same time. Just a matter of double clicking on that color swatch at the bottom of the toolbar to bring up the color picker or use the swatches in the top tool bar when the selection tool is active.

I'm lost in imovie

I've just started using it for a couple of different things, and i'm lost. I can't find any 'how to' to do what i thought would be straightforward but isn't.
I dont' even know how to ask my question, what i need is some kind of iMovie for Dummies that is available on the web, like right now, not something i have to buy, like a book, i don't mind buying one but i don't have time to wait for a book to get here. Are there any tutorials that start at the beginning?
I created a project tonight (for example), and i don't even know what that means, 'create a project.' When i first started working on this, i thought i knew what that meant, but now, I have about 15 projects in the Project Library, but most of them are blank, including the last one i recorded. Mysteriously, that one is now a Quicktime movie that i can play in the Quicktime player. I didn't make it a Quicktime movie. I guess i must've hit a button that did that. I was trying to cut half of the video off because it ***** and i wanted to make a new video without that sucky part, and i was trying to just copy and paste it. I did that with earlier videos but can't find the path i took to do that. I 'shared' a couple other ones as Quicktime movies from the Share menu and happily was able to get the .mov file onto my desktop--that's something i can understand, a discrete file. but this last thing i recorded, i tried just selecting the frames i wanted to turn into a finished product but i couldn't do anything with them. I couldn't drag them to that window were you drag stuff, i couldn't copy and past it anywhere. I copied it and then i selected 'New Project' but creating the new project didn't produce something i could paste those frames into. Then, right after that, while i was groping around and trying to do what i was trying to do, i ended up in another project, just because i clicked on it in the Project Library, but when i tried to go back to the one i was working on, it's nowhere to be found, not in the Project Library, not in that lower big window where all the frames are, where it was before it disappeared. And then, magically, i found a KB sized link to it in the Movies folder, which opened it in Quicktime. But it's still unedited and i still want to get rid of those frames i don't want.
I tried importing the movie back into iMovie but it's grayed out in the window where you choose what you want to import.
I just don't get iMovie. I tried using the Help file but no luck. It presupposes that i know how to do the basics, which i unfortunately don't.
What would be straightforward to me would be to hit record, then hit stop/capture, and save the movie, and it would be a movie file that i could then edit and save again, etc. I sort of did that on some earlier projects but dont' know how i did it. I shared on in You Tube and then made another edited version of it, and sent that one to You Tube and removed the first one. But this time, i can't remember how i edited that earlier one, and when i did it, it was just by groping around.
Is there a How To beginners tutorial for this program? Any idea why this project i'm working on is not showing up all of a sudden? The name is in the project Library but it's just dark, nothing there. But it is some kind of quicktime file, somewhere. Is there any way i can edit this? I mean, just cut off the part i don't want? i can't get it back into iMovie so there's not much else i can do on this project at this point.
sorry i don't have a clear question. All i know how to do is describe what i'm trying to do, and what has seemed to happen that's not working for me.

Judy444 wrote:
.. Is there a How To beginners tutorial for this program?
here: http://www.apple.com/findouthow/movies/
and the built-in Help of iMovie (as any other Apple app) explains a lot..

"Notes" on my iPad

Having trouble with "notes" on my ipad. Yesterday I had 2 notes"folders" that just disappeared then 2day they magically reappeared. What could be going on?

Are you using iCloud to sync your notes? If so, could be related to the notes being synced and/or wifi connection being disrupted during editing or syncing. Thats just a guess though. Make sure you backup and sync to a computer regularly.

Contact Sheets / Proofing and useful Aperture RAW Conversion

All,
I wanted to appeal to all of you pro photographers out there to share about how you handle the proofing stage (contact sheets) with your clients. I'm curious about how you all make this process as efficient as possible.
Ok, say you have taken 1000 pictures for a wedding or some other event (forget the accuracy of that number, its just a round number for discussion sake). You need to present your photos to your client, but you need to present a subset of the 1000 photos for a few reasons:
1) Not all photos you are going to take are going to be great. I've heard a general quote by some pro photographers that their "keeper ratios" (the percentage of pics that are really good from a shoot) run around 10%-20%. Fair enough, I don't want to debate this percentage, but it gives us a target number of 100 photos to present to a client from a 1000 picture shoot.
2) Your client is probably not going to be happy if they have to sift through 1000 photos. I recently had a friend who paid several thousand dollars for a wedding photographer who sent them 1000 photos to choose from. They weren't particularly happy with this, and told the guy there was just too many to choose from. Personally, I felt that this was putting part of the photographer's responsibility on the client, but whatever.
Ok...so for the sake of the example here, we have to get 1000 photos down to 100 photos, so the client can choose what 50 (for example) they want to purchase and have printed, put in their photo book, slide presentation, etc.
Sorry for the long intro, but here is the issue at hand: we want to work quickly for the client, and get them their 100 photos as soon as possible. We also want to put our best foot forward, and give them high-quality photos. But at the same time, we want to work efficiently, and if possible not spend time doing final retouching on photos that the customer doesn't want, but rather focus this time directly on the photos the customer does want.
I have two questions from this which pertain to Aperture's RAW conversion and workflow:
1) Do you do any significant adjustments on photos for the contact sheets you present to clients (the 100 photos now)? Is it just a quick exposure adjustment, or are you retouching all 100?
2) Despite Aperture's RAW conversion problems and other adjustment glitches, is it sufficient quality in your opinion for a contact sheet?
My purpose in asking these questions is that perhaps the Aperture RAW conversion issue can be mitigated if we can get to the point of customer contact and review using Aperture-only conversion and adjustment tools, and then isolate photoshop use for only the final, significant edits. The problems with Aperture's RAW conversion are well-documented, but the question is, could it still be sufficient for small-scale proofs, understanding that for large-scale, high-res images, it won't be suffcient.
Your opinons are valued!
Brad
Powerbook G4-1.33GHz-17" / Powermac G4-1.4GHz Mac OS X (10.4.2) PB: 1GB RAM, Radeon 9600-64MB / PM: 1.25GB RAM, Radeon 9000Pro-128MB

">-DELETE project from Aperture because I can't use the app for the delivery
of finals:
Forgive me if I've forgotten the detail you may have posted elsewhere about this. I have seen you mention this several times, but I am really interested in the specifics behind the problems you have encountered. I have some needs in finishing that are beyond just regurgitating a photo. I'll be basically augmenting my photo with text, borders, special effects, etc. for more professional presentation, and the ability to market a photo in different ways. This is one reason I cannot discard Photoshop from my workflow. Anyway, let's assume for a moment I'm able to do all my editing in Photoshop, and those PSD files are sitting within Aperture. From there, what problems am I going to encounter? I'm tapping your brain here, as the time I have spent in Aperture has been primarily oriented toward everything prior to the finishing stage. "
Hi Brad,
If I've imported images into Aperture that have previously been worked over in Photoshop, none of the layers I may have created in those files will be available to me from within Aperture. This does not break but severely sprains the functionality of Photoshop. I'm keeping the images around because I think I or my clients will need them later, so what might I do with them?:
1) If I'd like to do more work on them I either have to abandon access to the previously created layers and their magic, or export the file from Aperture, work on it outside, import it back into Aperture. Every time I want to work with those layers I have to do the same dance.
2) If I'd like to send jpg or tif versions of those files anywhere I can choose to use the tools within Aperture or Photoshop to do so. Aperture's tools for these conversions are simply not of professional utility: no compressed tifs, no layered tif support, no quality choices for jpgs and no jpg previews. And in either case, using Aperture or Photoshop, the conversions are created OUTSIDE of Aperture and not managed by it.
3) When I decide to archive my older projects I'm faced with the incredible limitation that Aperture will not allow me any remote search of any archive that is not "live" within Aperture. Not even Spotlight will search Aperture libraries!!!!!
So moving already created projects into Aperture has absolutely no advantages and a number of problems, any one of which might be a deal-killer by itself.
If I'd like to use Aperture to manage work that I create going forward I've got those limitations already listed above, but I CAN access layers in PSD that are created from within Aperture. I cannot make layered duplicates of those files in order to work on versions of those images so once again the Photoshop workflow is hobbled.
All of this makes it a bad idea for my projects to make anything but a brief trip in and out of Aperture for sorting/proofing.
Regards,
fp

Swipe between pages in Safari not working properly

Lion works perfectly so far, the only known issue I have is that Gesture in Safari to go Back or Forward does not work properly: Swipe between pages (Scroll left or right with two fingers).
it means I see the previous page under the actual page, but the task would not complete and it's like something blocking it to turn the pages. I hope you understand what I am saying. Anyone with the same bug? Any solution?
I've restored safari, cleaned the history and Reset it, restart computer, unselected the gesture option in Preference and activate it again, with no luck.

I've had the same problem as feri. Dylanksf described the behaviour best - when two-finger swiping forward and back in Safari, the page moves slightly to the side, then acts as if it "catches" on something before moving further. The result is it's nearly impossible to swipe back and forward (although the 3-finger swipe still works). I don't have Flexiglass installed.
Usually I'm able to solve the problem by doing the following: (1) open system preferences and select "Trackpad"; (2) go to the "More Gestures" pane; (3) toggle the "Swipe between pages" checkmark and settings; (4) put the settings back to how you want them.
On some occasions, however, this doesn't seem to work. In that case, go back to the main System Preferences panel, choose "Universal Access", select the "Mouse & Trackpad" pane, and click on "Trackpad Options...". Then toggle the checkmark beside "Scrolling" off and back on, and make sure scrolling is set to "with inertia". This managed to solve my problem when the method above didn't work, and also resolved an issue I was having where the scroll bars were failing to automatically disappear when using the magic trackpad.

Replacing sky... I did search back posts...

First off I'm clearly a beginner with this software. This shouldn't be so hard because I've done it once before but sadly I didn't save the directions I found online. Today I've tried a bazillion directions including this forum and I'm clearly doing something wrong.
I have a pix of a house and a pix of a beautiful sunset and I want to replace the dull sky on the house pix with the sky from the sunset pix. First I tried this method:
http://www.digital-photography-school.com/how-to-replace-a-sky-in-photoshop
but when I take the eraser and erase the parts of the sky that overlap the house if I go above the roof line of the house it erases the sky too. Hey as a kid I was never good about coloring in the lines so this method just isn't working.
So I thought this method where you select the sky with the magic wand and delete it would be far easier:
http://photographyofgrace.com/Filehost/Downloads/ReplacingASkywithPSE7.pdf
However..... If you go to page 3 of this tutorial you will see that one of the layers had the magic wand used, they selected the sky, deleted it and now its transparent, i.e. has the checkerboard pattern where the sky use to be. The checkerboard pattern is both in the big pix and the little one to the right in the layers area. Well here is my problem, when I do it I can see the checkerboard pattern in the small pix on the right in the layers area but when I click on that layer in the big picture there is no checkerboard pattern. Doesn't matter what order the 2 layers are in (i have the original layer which is locked and the background copy which has the checkerboard pattern on it and its unlocked) When I click on the copy which on the right is checkerboarded (transparent) its NOT transparent in the big picture.
So when I take my pretty sunset picture and try and drop it in to the house with the checkerboard sky it just covers the whole thing, its not filling in just the transparency its just covering the entire house.
I'm almost in tears, I've read everything I can, followed the directions on about 10 tutorials on this and not once can I make this magic wand method work. I'm in tears and have been trying to make this work since 11 am. Again the eraser method is too hard with the lines of the house and trees and I keep erasing the darn sky.
Can someone please help me do this.
Thanks for ANY help.
Susan

Your first tutorial link is not doable in Elements as it uses a couple of methods that are not available in Elements...in particular blending via the layer's style panel to bring back in the underlying image using the brightness stops to define what comes through.
If you have a blown out (white) sky you can use that to your advantage. I used Photoshop so my screen grabs will look different than an Elements user interface but I only used methods that are possible using Elements.
1. Open your image and open an image with the sky you want to add.
I'll use a couple of my photos for the example.
Start photo....dreary winter sky.
Here is the shot with the sky that I want to use.
2. (A.)You want the start photo active for this first part so make sure it is the document that you are currently working on.
    (B.)Go to the menu bar and choose Select<All. This will select the entire image.
    (C.)Go to the menu bar and choose Edit<Copy. This will copy the entire image into your clipboard.
3. (A.) Create a solid color fill adjustment layer over your start photo. (Don't worry about color. It's not going to matter.)
    (B.)Alt click on the solid color adjustment layer's mask. This will make your document go white as the focus will be on the adjustment layer's mask. (If          you are on a Mac, you will Opt click instead of alt click.)
    (C.)Go to the menu bar and choose Edit<Paste. This will paste your image into the mask.
*Shortcuts:
Ctrl + A on PC; Cmd + A on Mac = Select All.
Ctrl + C on PC; Cmd + C on Mac = Copy.
Ctrl + V on PC; Cmd + V on Mac = Paste.
Note: You will see a grayscale version of your image. (Masks only "see" grayscale" so the colors are converted to their brightness values.) Above is my start image pasted directly into a mask.
4. With the mask still the focus, call up the levels command. You can call it up from the menu or use the shortcut. Ctrl + L on PC; Cmd + L on Mac. The goal is to push the image using the levels command to pure black and white.
Here I have pushed the image as solid black and white as I dare without losing detail,
Note: I am using a red color fill adjustment layer so it's visual obvious that I am looking in the mask. (Using a black or white solid color adjustment layer can lead to confusion because if you click away from the mask for any reason the focus moves back to the image.)
5. Now, you will need to paint out any items you did not get using the levels command. You can lasso and fill, use a paint brush with black, or use the gradient tool as I used to eliminate the snow covered ground where I do not want my new sky to appear. (Note: If you haven't guessed white paint can be used to include more items to be included. Gray areas will be semi-transparent. Think feather and transition.
Above I used a black foreground to transparent gradient to the mask to include the ground.
6. Switch to your sky photo then copy it into your clipboard.
7. Paste your sky photo into the document you are working. It should be at the top of the layers stack. If it isn't at the top of the stack in the layer's palette, drag it to the top.
8. Your sky layer should be directly over the solid color adjustment layer. You are going to create a clipping mask by clicking on the new sky layer and pressing ctrl + G. If on a Mac, you will press Cmd + J.
*Additional info on clipping masks a.ka. clipping groups.
http://www.photokaboom.com/photography/learn/Photoshop_Elements/layers/layer_groups_clippi ng_masks/1_layer_groups_clipping_masks.htm
Here is the result with the sky clipped above.
9. Optional: To give more umph to the image.
   (A.) Create a composite of everything you have done so far. Create a blank layer at the top of your layers stack and press ctrl + shift + alt + E if on              Windows. If on Mac, the shortcut is cmd + shift + opt + E.
   (B.) Change the composite layer's blend mode to either overlay or soft light and adjust the opacity to taste.
The above has the contrast and blending I wanted but seems a little dark for my taste. I'll use blend modes to take care of that.
Optional Step: Since it turned out a little darker than I wanted I made another composite of what I have thus far using Ctrl + Shift + Alt + E. That's Cmd + Shift + Opt + E if you are on a Mac. I put this composite into Screen blend mode and put it's opacity at 63%.
Note: If that would have been a body of water instead of a field with snow behind the trees, I would have added some sky reflections...

How do I subtract a background form star images?

I am taking night sky star images through a telescope with Canon Rebel.
If I invert the image I see a gray background that is the light pollution here in Chicago.
How do I select this background and subtract it from the image to get rid of the light pollution &
leave just the stars on a white background?
If I do that to several images, how do I then add them?

I had to convert your GIF file to JPG before it would open in Elements.
http://www.pixentral.com/show.php?picture=14OEMmCPymKUzAVYQl4EwfKrHQ0j1
Open picture file
Duplicate background layer, work on background copy layer
Shut off visibility of background layer by clicking on its eye icon in layers palette
Access magic wand tool. I used tolerance=32, but experiment with other values.Leave contiguous and use all layers unckecked.
Left click, hit delete on keyboard.
Go to Select>deselect. May have to use magic wand again in other stray areas
Open blank, new layer, and place between background and background copy layers
Make blank layer active, go to Edit>fill layer>white

Manually deleting podcasts -- unintuitive, or is it just me?

I've got my iPod set up to manually synch d/l'd podcasts. However when I want to perminently delete an episode, the behavior seems a little inconsistent and unintuitive;
- If I go to...
Devices => [owner's]iPod => Podcasts
...and then highlight the device and selecte delete, the episode disappears temporarily but then magically re-appears after I re-synch. Huh?! Why on earth would that be the behavior? If I take the trouble to purposely delete it, it's because I want it GONE.
- If I go to the same location and un-check the checkbox next to the episode, absolutely nothing happens, even after I hit the synch button. What is this feature for anyway?
- Seems like the only way to perminently delete a single episode manually, is to uncheck the checkbox next to it in Library=>Podcasts then hit the synch button.
Maybe I'm just dense, but why does figuring this GUI out constantly feel like an exercise in trial-and-error?

It does take some getting used to for the quirks.
In this case, unchecking in iTunes is the way to go. As long as iPod is set to sync only checked items.
Manually managing podcasts is problematic at best. Most reliable is to set iPod and iTunes to keep all episodes then uncheck/check or delete files from iTunes to manage iPod contents.

Reminders app - memo to Apple

When you create these new apps, you should make it possible for users to remove them.
When I need a reminder, I just use the alerts on my calendar. There may be a lot of useful apps, but not for everyone all the time.
Borrow an idea from Barnes & Noble Nook, you can archive books to save them, without having every unused item visible on your device. Same could go for these built-in apps. I have an iPhone and iPad. This applies for both.

Thank you for the reply Don. I actually tried that, and a lot more. None of it made a difference until I tried what I was dreading...RESTORE! I did a restore, clicked "New Phone" and now everything is back to normal. Even my calendar events that all disappeared from my phone magically returned!
Now the only problem I'm having is wrestling with two appleIDs as are many others.
I'm glad your fix wasn't as involved as mine.
Take care!

Recommend a Photoshop CS4 book?

Can anyone recommend a Photoshop CS4 book?
Ideally "Mid to Advanced" level.
I am particularly interested in pre-press techniques (as opposed to a book for photographers) – such as repair and restoration etc.

For restoration and retouching:
http://www.amazon.com/Adobe-Photoshop-Restoration-Retouching-3rd/dp/0321316274/
For pre-press color correction:
http://www.amazon.com/Professional-Photoshop-Classic-Guide-Correction/dp/032144017X/
For LAB color correction:
http://www.amazon.com/Photoshop-LAB-Color-Adventures-Colorspace/dp/0321356780/
The last two are by a controversial author who is slagged regularly for his over-elaborate and archaic workflows. But he does come to the subject from a pre-press perspective (true GIGO). No book that I've found comes close to explaining what one is doing when they color correct better than Professional Photoshop. Of course after reading and practicing some of Dan's techniques, the sliders in ACR and color balance adjustment layers seem like magic.

Remaining Order Plan.....No SAP Notes Please....

Hi Everyone,
    I want someone who really understands Remaining Order Plan to validate if my understanding of it is correct or not. If it is not correct, I would like someone to explain it. I am not finding satisfactory answers from any SAP PS consultant yet, on Remaining Order Plan. Whenever, I ask this question, they say, they will get back with the answer and the next thing you know is that they have disappeared into Aladdin's Magic Lamp.
    I understand that,
    Assigned = Actual Costs + Commitment + Remaining Order Plan.
    I believe that Remaining Order Plan, basically is the value, that is deduced when we assign activities to WBS elements, and arrive at a certain figure called Planned Costs. At this point, All WBS elements have the status CRTD, .i.e., created.
     So at this stage (CRTD Status), I believe that, Assigned = Planned Costs, or we can also say that,
                                                                        Rem Ord Plan = Planned Costs.
     Now, Once we have released the WBS Elements, Actual Costs are going to be incurred, and we are gonna have additional commitments, apart from planned commitments, (realizing that we missed some commitments we had to assign while creating the plan during CRTD Status).
      So, Now during (REL Status), i.e., Released Status, the formula for Assigned would look like this.
       Assigned = Actual Costs + Commitments + Remaining Ord Plan.
Now, Referring to the Assigned Formula, in both the CRTD and REL status, lets analyze how Remaining Order Plan behaves.
     In the Released Status, if Actual Costs = 0 &
                                          Commitment = 0 &
                                          then,
                                          Assigned = 0 + 0 + RemOrdPlan.
                                  ==> RemOrdPlan = Plan Costs
                               Hence, Assigned = Planned Costs.
       As real costs are incurred (i.e., Actual & Commitments), values move from RemOrdPlan to Actual & Commitments Columns, or say they are apportioned appropriately to these two columns, and what is still remaining of the Planned Costs we would term that Remaining Order Plan.
        Suppose, Actual + Commitment = Planned Costs, at some stage in the project, It means, we havae reached the threshold value of the Planned Costs, and the combination of both Actual + Commitment, can cross the planned costs. ( not in all cases, but maybe in some cases, as no one can plan a project ideally anyhow ).
        Once the threshold value of Planned Costs has reached, it would mean that RemOrdPlan is completely apportioned appropriately to both Actual and Commitment Columns. Hence, the Assigned column would look like this...
        Assigned = Actual ( % of Rem Ord Plan) + Commitment ( Remaining % of Rem Ord Plan ) + 0.
        Here, 0 means, zero value in Remaining Order Plan, as it has distributed its values to Actual and Commitment in a certain percentage depending on how the project was executed.
Now, During one of the projects, I have noticed that,
if Planned costs was 100,000 during CRTD stage, they were distributed, in a certain percentage like say,
            10 % to Actual & 25% to Commitment. Hence, 65 % is still left with RemOrdPlan Column.
           Hence , Assigned = 100%,
            The problem is that, When you see, the System status, it shows, ISBD, Insufficient Budgeting, even if there is the same 65% amount available in the RemOrdPlan column. My argument, is that, when RemOrdPlan is something still consumable, how can the system show insufficient budgeting, ISBD status, when there is still 65% in Rem Ord Plan, and that same amount available in WBS element, (via budgeting transactions).
              Moreover, the Available Column should show the same amount as RemOrdPlan, that is 65% of the amount, but it does not. Because, in reality, RemOrdPlan is what is available, and still left to be consumed, until it becomes zero. I think, this concept is confusing all the project engineers who are SAP PS, users.
                 Please, can anyone throw more light on the above arguments.
Regards,
Owais.....

Dear Owais,
Let me try to explain my understanding about availability control and residual order plan =) hope it'll help
The problem is that, When you see, the System status, it shows, ISBD, Insufficient Budgeting, even if there is the same 65% amount available in the RemOrdPlan column. My argument, is that, when RemOrdPlan is something still consumable, how can the system show insufficient budgeting, ISBD status, when there is still 65% in Rem Ord Plan, and that same amount available in WBS element, (via budgeting transactions).
Status ISBD is set for any activity which is relevant for availability control which increase the assigned value not actual value.
If you include the activity group 02 (Orders for project) in your availability control setting then any increase you make in order plan value will trigger the availability control ergo it will set the ISBD status if the value exceeds the tolerance limit even it's still a plan value, not an actual value yet
Moreover, the Available Column should show the same amount as RemOrdPlan, that is 65% of the amount, but it does not. Because, in reality, RemOrdPlan is what is available, and still left to be consumed, until it becomes zero. I think, this concept is confusing all the project engineers who are SAP PS, users.
IMO, if the system shows the 65% of the amount in Available column, user will assume that that amount is free to use while in fact the value is already 'reserved' only for material/activity which has been planned, user can't post any cost outside what has been planned
Please correct me if I'm wrong =)
Regards,
-K-
Edited by: Kealin F on Mar 30, 2009 5:54 AM

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