Hey all... this may just be symantecs or terminology, but why does anyone use masks? Doesnt creating a path layer with the pen tool away from the actual object layer allow you to do everything and anything with that path area? I.e., if you CNTRL+Click on that path layer, it will highlight the path area, and then you can go to any image layer you want and do whatever you want, from cropping, inverse cropping, create a layer of any color and opacity, or edit whatever is within that path area in any way PS allows you to... So in other words, is masking just another way to achieve the same result, or is there something the "mask" feature allows that what I mentioned above cannot do? Personally it kinda annoys me for the masking process to highlight areas while I am pathing, but maybe I am not even on the right track here, dunno... any elucidation would be awesome, because for some reason I "hear" more about masking than simple pathing and go.
The biggest difference is that paths are vector, and masks can be bitmapped. I have used both, but I use masks the most. I do gradients on masks the most. The fun part of paths is that you can import a vector mask from Illustrator (or another vector illustration program) or export a path to another program as a vector image. I use paths most when I want to take a B&W image and convert it to a vector for further editing and cleaning up in Illustrator. I hope this helps, this is just my experience and everybody uses the tools their own way. Best of luck as you use some of the greatest software ever written!
It seems from my further research that besides the vector vs bitmapped, the nice thing about masking is that you can use unique brushes and erasers that may be huge for some creative work. Of course I use the simple mask to do gradient work all the time, and I hardly even think about it then, haha.... Otherwise, unless you have a real complex image of 10-20 layers etc., I was usually able to do most things by creating a path selection and then create multiple layer of the same image and go at it... maybe I think this way because I have worked in retail products too long, hmmmmmmmm.....