The Contact Sheet II and Picture Package features are two common tasks that are tedious to perform manually. You can use these features to create documents of thumbnail images of groups of files and print multiple copies of a single image on one sheet, much like the picture packages of 5 x 7s and wallet prints you order from school photographers. Both features make use of the same Photoshop scripting/macro facility called actions. Indeed, if you wanted to take the time, you could create a Photoshop action that performs much the same function as the Contact Sheet II and Picture Package features. However, creating these actions is a bit tricky, and why would you bother? The programming wizards at Adobe have done all the work for you.
Cataloging with Contact Sheets
If you’re not steeped in photographic darkroom lore (and fewer of us are, in these digital days), the term contact sheet might be fuzzy to you. A traditional photographic contact sheet is made by placing one or more negatives on a piece of photographic paper that is held in tight contact with the paper while a light exposes the light-sensitive surface of the paper. A special frame or a piece of glass mates the negatives and paper for the exposure. The original purpose of contact sheets was to show the photographer a small image of each picture in a set of negatives so they could be compared, perhaps cropped with a grease pencil right on the contact sheet, and the images to be printed could be selected. Contact sheets also made a convenient way of filing away images as a sort of hard copy catalog.
Understanding the benefits of Contact Sheet II
Today, we have more sophisticated ways of previewing and cataloging digital images, including many different image-cataloging programs, such as Adobe’s own Photoshop Album application. Nearly every digital camera comes with one of the cataloging programs. Even so, the Contact Sheet II automated tool in Photoshop has some useful features:
- Prepares Photoshop documents so that you can store them, share them with others in digital form, or print them for distribution.
- Works faster than database-type catalog programs that require you to enter keywords to sort and locate images.
- Creates ad-hoc catalogs adeptly. Just copy the files you want to include to a folder and fire up the Contact Sheet II tool.
- Allows you to specify the number of rows and columns in your contact sheet, filling a sheet with only a few images (if that’s what you want) or packing dozens of them on a single contact sheet.
- Automatically creates multiple sheets if all the selected images won’t fit on a single sheet.
Using Contact Sheet II
With Contact Sheet II, you can create contact sheets that have many thumbnail images on a single page. You can print the contact sheets or browse through them electronically. To create a contact sheet catalog of your own images, follow these steps:
1. Copy all the files you want to include in your contact sheet into a folder on your hard drive.
2. Choose File-->Automate➪Contact Sheet II.
The Contact Sheet II dialog box appears. Note that you can find both the Contact Sheet II and Picture Package commands on the Automate menu in the File Browser. This makes for easy and quick visual selection of images to catalog or package.
3. In the Source Images area, click the Browse button (Choose on the Mac) and navigate to the folder containing the images you want to include.
From the Use pop-up menu, you can also choose Selected Images from File Browser or Current open documents.
4. Choose the Include All Subfolders option if you want to include images contained in folders nested within the main folder you select.
In the Document area, you have several settings that you can use to control the size and type of thumbnail you create.
5. Choose your desired unit of measurement from the Units pop-up menu. In the Width and Height boxes, enter the dimensions of the contact sheet document.
Choose the default setting of 8 x 10 inches if you plan to print contact sheets on standard-sized paper.
6. Adjust the resolutions settings.
A setting of 72 pixels/inch works well for contact sheets if all you want is a quick-and-dirty look at them. Use a higher resolution if you want a sharper contact sheet.
If you’re showing the contact sheets to a client or you want the individual images to look crisp and clear, choose a higher resolution. Also, if you want the thumbnails to be larger (with fewer per page), choose a higher resolution and adjust the number of columns and rows in Step 10.
7. Choose a color mode from the Mode pop-up menu.
RGB works best in most cases. However, if your images happen to be black-and-white photos, you can create smaller, more compact contact sheet files by selecting the Grayscale option. Check your printer documentation to see the color mode recommended for printing color images.
8. Select the Flatten All Layers check box if you want to create a contact sheet with a single layer in which all images and their captions (if any) are merged.
This option significantly reduces the contact sheet’s file size — which is a very good thing if you have several images in the contact sheet. Otherwise, the file can be huge!
If you do not select this option, you’ll end up with larger contact sheet files, but you have the additional flexibility of flattening the thumbnails yourself later both with and without captions. Or, you can make certain layers invisible or visible to show or hide some of the images. You can now start adjusting the layout. A preview window at the right side of the dialog box shows roughly how the contact sheet will be laid out.
9. Select the Across First option from the Place pop-up menu to orient the thumbnails in rows. Select the Down First option to orient the layout in columns.
10. In the Columns and Rows text boxes, enter the number of columns and rows.
The more rows and columns, the smaller each thumbnail image. Beneath the small layout preview on the right side of the dialog box are the number of pages in your contact sheet, the total number of images, and the largest possible size of each image. If you choose a small number of rows and columns to produce fairly large thumbnails, you get an effect much like Picture Package (described later). For example, choose 1 Column and 2 Rows to create a contact sheet with two images, each 4.6 x 5 inches. If you plan to print such a maxi-thumbnail contact sheet, you’ll probably want to choose a higher resolution (such as 144 pixels/inch) to allow sharper thumbnails. Select the Auto-Spacing option to have the default distance of .014 inches vertically and horizontally between each thumbnail option. Deselect the option to enter a custom distance. Select the Rotate For Best Fit option to have Photoshop rotate the thumbnails if necessary to accommodate a better fit based on your specifications.
11. Choose the Use Filename as Caption option to identify each image easily.
You can also select the Font and Font Size from the option lists.
12. Click OK to create your contact sheet. If you change your mind, press the Esc key to quit.
Photoshop creates as many pages as necessary to include all the selected images according to your specifications. This can take a few minutes.
Cataloging with Contact Sheets
If you’re not steeped in photographic darkroom lore (and fewer of us are, in these digital days), the term contact sheet might be fuzzy to you. A traditional photographic contact sheet is made by placing one or more negatives on a piece of photographic paper that is held in tight contact with the paper while a light exposes the light-sensitive surface of the paper. A special frame or a piece of glass mates the negatives and paper for the exposure. The original purpose of contact sheets was to show the photographer a small image of each picture in a set of negatives so they could be compared, perhaps cropped with a grease pencil right on the contact sheet, and the images to be printed could be selected. Contact sheets also made a convenient way of filing away images as a sort of hard copy catalog.
Understanding the benefits of Contact Sheet II
Today, we have more sophisticated ways of previewing and cataloging digital images, including many different image-cataloging programs, such as Adobe’s own Photoshop Album application. Nearly every digital camera comes with one of the cataloging programs. Even so, the Contact Sheet II automated tool in Photoshop has some useful features:
- Prepares Photoshop documents so that you can store them, share them with others in digital form, or print them for distribution.
- Works faster than database-type catalog programs that require you to enter keywords to sort and locate images.
- Creates ad-hoc catalogs adeptly. Just copy the files you want to include to a folder and fire up the Contact Sheet II tool.
- Allows you to specify the number of rows and columns in your contact sheet, filling a sheet with only a few images (if that’s what you want) or packing dozens of them on a single contact sheet.
- Automatically creates multiple sheets if all the selected images won’t fit on a single sheet.
Using Contact Sheet II
With Contact Sheet II, you can create contact sheets that have many thumbnail images on a single page. You can print the contact sheets or browse through them electronically. To create a contact sheet catalog of your own images, follow these steps:
1. Copy all the files you want to include in your contact sheet into a folder on your hard drive.
2. Choose File-->Automate➪Contact Sheet II.
The Contact Sheet II dialog box appears. Note that you can find both the Contact Sheet II and Picture Package commands on the Automate menu in the File Browser. This makes for easy and quick visual selection of images to catalog or package.
3. In the Source Images area, click the Browse button (Choose on the Mac) and navigate to the folder containing the images you want to include.
From the Use pop-up menu, you can also choose Selected Images from File Browser or Current open documents.
4. Choose the Include All Subfolders option if you want to include images contained in folders nested within the main folder you select.
In the Document area, you have several settings that you can use to control the size and type of thumbnail you create.
5. Choose your desired unit of measurement from the Units pop-up menu. In the Width and Height boxes, enter the dimensions of the contact sheet document.
Choose the default setting of 8 x 10 inches if you plan to print contact sheets on standard-sized paper.
6. Adjust the resolutions settings.
A setting of 72 pixels/inch works well for contact sheets if all you want is a quick-and-dirty look at them. Use a higher resolution if you want a sharper contact sheet.
If you’re showing the contact sheets to a client or you want the individual images to look crisp and clear, choose a higher resolution. Also, if you want the thumbnails to be larger (with fewer per page), choose a higher resolution and adjust the number of columns and rows in Step 10.
7. Choose a color mode from the Mode pop-up menu.
RGB works best in most cases. However, if your images happen to be black-and-white photos, you can create smaller, more compact contact sheet files by selecting the Grayscale option. Check your printer documentation to see the color mode recommended for printing color images.
8. Select the Flatten All Layers check box if you want to create a contact sheet with a single layer in which all images and their captions (if any) are merged.
This option significantly reduces the contact sheet’s file size — which is a very good thing if you have several images in the contact sheet. Otherwise, the file can be huge!
If you do not select this option, you’ll end up with larger contact sheet files, but you have the additional flexibility of flattening the thumbnails yourself later both with and without captions. Or, you can make certain layers invisible or visible to show or hide some of the images. You can now start adjusting the layout. A preview window at the right side of the dialog box shows roughly how the contact sheet will be laid out.
9. Select the Across First option from the Place pop-up menu to orient the thumbnails in rows. Select the Down First option to orient the layout in columns.
10. In the Columns and Rows text boxes, enter the number of columns and rows.
The more rows and columns, the smaller each thumbnail image. Beneath the small layout preview on the right side of the dialog box are the number of pages in your contact sheet, the total number of images, and the largest possible size of each image. If you choose a small number of rows and columns to produce fairly large thumbnails, you get an effect much like Picture Package (described later). For example, choose 1 Column and 2 Rows to create a contact sheet with two images, each 4.6 x 5 inches. If you plan to print such a maxi-thumbnail contact sheet, you’ll probably want to choose a higher resolution (such as 144 pixels/inch) to allow sharper thumbnails. Select the Auto-Spacing option to have the default distance of .014 inches vertically and horizontally between each thumbnail option. Deselect the option to enter a custom distance. Select the Rotate For Best Fit option to have Photoshop rotate the thumbnails if necessary to accommodate a better fit based on your specifications.
11. Choose the Use Filename as Caption option to identify each image easily.
You can also select the Font and Font Size from the option lists.
12. Click OK to create your contact sheet. If you change your mind, press the Esc key to quit.
Photoshop creates as many pages as necessary to include all the selected images according to your specifications. This can take a few minutes.
Creating Contact Sheets, Picture Packages, and More in Photoshop
![Creating Contact Sheets, Picture Packages, and More in Photoshop]()
Reviewed by Pepen2710
on
5:18:00 AM
Rating:
No comments:
Post a Comment