Adobe Photoshop CS2 One on One – Deke McCelland
Photoshop CS2 Workflow – Tim Grey
My Edits - Ron
Outdoor Photographer – Rob Sheppard
Camera Raw - Rob Sheppard
The Photoshop CS2 Book for Digital Photographers – Scott Kelby
Rev. 1.20
Import Images Into iView
Open iView
Locate and select images.
a. Click on “File”, “Import Items”, “From Disk/Camera”
b. Import the files, it may take a while (notice “rotating circle” on bottom left)
c. “Backup” the new images
d. Use Organize View in iView, File Browser (Photoshop Elements) to review thumbnails and discard the obviously bad images (Chapter 2).
e. Use a Preview View in iView to review your images more closely; discarding images that you don’t feel are worth keeping and identifying those that are your favorites or “Hero Shots” (Chapter 2).
f. Evaluate your favorite or “Hero Shots” in great detail to make sure they are worth the effort of a complete image-optimization workflow (Chapter 2).
Rename the Images
a. Select All images to be renamed
b. Click in iView, Action, Batch Rename
c. Fill-in, Subject (text), Date (Capture Date), Number From (0), # (6)
Edit the Image
a. Click the image in iView
b. Rght click the image to display “Helper Applications”
c. Click on Adobe Photoshop (CS2 (if available) or Elements)
Camera Raw Processing
Workflow
a. Analyze the Image for Any Major Problems
b. Rotate the image upright.
· Perform basic rotation to place the image in the proper orientation (Chapter 4).
c. Crop the image
· Perform basic cropping and rotation to eliminate unwanted pixels around the periphery of the image and to fix the horizon if crooked, respectively (Chapter 4).
d. Tonal Adjustments (Adjust the highlights, shadows, and midtones (BEST to use Photoshop “Curves” or BETTER to use Camera Raw “”Brightness” or LASTLY to use Camera Raw Brightness “Auto”).
· Exposure (Highlight Levels) is computed in f-stops. Pg. #81. Hold Alt/Option while clicking on slider to preview clipped pixels. Non-black pixels indicate clipped highlights
· Shadows (Black Levels) It is measured in luminosity values, where 0 indicates black. Pg. #81. Hold Alt/Option while clicking on slider for nonwhite pixels represent clipped shadows.
· Brightness (Midtone Levels) Values below 50 compress shadows and expand highlights, thereby lightening an image. Pg. #82.
e. Color Adjustments (Set the White Balance controls).
i. By default, the White Balance option is set to As Shot, which refers to the default calibration settings for the specific model of camera.
ii. The Temperature value compensates for the color of the light source, as measured in degrees Kelvin. The closest thing to neutral light is direct sunlight, which hovers around 5500 degrees.
iii. Tint compensates for Temperature by letting you further adjust the colors in your image along a different color axis. Positive values introduce a magenta cast (or remove a green one); negative values do just the opposite.
iv. Select the eyedropper icon and click a color in the image that should be white or neutral gray. Perform a basic color balance adjustment to deal with any color cast in the image (Chapter 5).
f. Adjust the Contrast and Saturation values.
i. The Contrast (leave at default) slider expands or compresses the histogram to increase or decrease the contrast between pixels. As always, the Saturation value increases or decreases color purity. Increase both values by 10 each, making the Contrast value +21 and the Saturation value +10.
ii. Perform a saturation adjustment with Hue/Saturation (Chapter 5).
iii. Clean up dust, scratches, and other blemishes by using the Clone Stamp and Healing Brush tools (Chapter 6).
g. (Noise Prrocessing) Advance to the Detail tab.
i. Click the Detail tab to switch to a panel of three new slider bars. We’ll use these sliders to sharpen the focus of the photo and smooth away noise artifacts.
1. Saturation should be no more than 10
2. To best judge the details in your image double-click the zoom tool icon in the toolbar to zoom in to 100 percent. Then press the spacebar and drag the image.
h. Set the Sharpness, Luminance Smoothing, and Noise Reduction values.
i. Set all to 0. Will set these parameters in PhotoShop.
ii. If you plan to make significant changes to an image particularly changes involving masks, filters, or layers (see Lessons 7, 8, and 9, respectively) should leave all three values set to 0 to avoid overly harsh edges and increased noise down the road.
iii. If you don’t anticipate making any major edits to a photograph, sharpening inside Camera Raw is safe. To ascertain the best setting, first crank the Sharpness value up to 100 so you can see the image noise at full volume. Then use Luminance Smoothing and Color Noise Reduction to smooth out the rough patches.
i. Examine the Lens, Curve, and Calibrate options.
i. Probably won’t ever use them. So I suggest leaving the options in the Lens and Calibrate panels unchanged. The Curve panel is another matter. I disagree with Adobe’s reasoning that every image needs an extra boost in contrast, and that this boost should be tucked away in a hidden recess of the software. Terminate the boost, Click the Curve tab and change the Tone Curve setting to Linear.
2. Apply your settings to the other images.
3. Restore the Auto Exposure settings.
a. Although the white balance, contrast, saturation, and sharpness of the three images look great, the highlights in the second and third photos have become far too bright.
4. Adjust and crop the second image.
5. Save your settings.
a. My rule of thumb is this: If you spend more than five minutes working on a computer, you should save your work. You never know when the Bridge or your computer will crash and you’ll have to do all that work again. In the case of Camera Raw, you save your work by clicking the ® arrow below the histogram and choosing Save Settings.
b. You can likewise access and apply saved Camera Raw settings directly from the Bridge. Select one or more Camera Raw files, right-click any one of them, and choose your saved settings file from the middle of the pop—up menu. The thumbnails will update to reflect the new settings. The settings will also appear by default the next time you enter the Camera Raw interface.
6. Modify the bit depth and image size.
a. The four pop-up menus below the image preview are complex and obscure. There’s not much chance you’ll want to change any of them - except one. That one is the Size value, which you may on occasion want to increase by one increment, as we will in this step.
b. In almost all cases, you’ll set the Space option to the current RGB working space, which is Adobe RGB (1998). The main reason to change this setting would be if you intend to convert your image to 16 bits per channel. If that’s the case, ProPhoto RGB provides a wider range of colors than Adobe RGB or any of the others. So assuming you performed most or all of the color corrections in the previous steps, the Depth option is best left set to 8 Bits/Channel.
c. Size is the setting I most often change.
i. In other words, the camera captures a scant one-third of the colors that it eventually delivers. So stepping up to the next larger size - 2304 by 3072 (7.1 MP) + in the case of the first image, Max asleep 01. dng—requires that the Camera Raw plug-in create just 20 percent more pixels than the camera invents automatically. Add the fact that you’re scaling the image down from billions of colors to millions, and the interpolation (the amount of new information added) is negligible.
ii. You can extract, say, a 7-megapixel image from a 5-megapixel camera with a surprising amount of success. Figure 3—41 shows a detail from a stepped-up version of the DNG image compared with a similar detail from an image shot at the same time and saved in the JPEG format. The comparison isn’t entirely fair because the DNG image has been corrected and the JPEG image has not. But the fact remains, increasing the Size value by one increment can result in a more detail-rich photograph.
d. The Resolution value is easily the least important option in the Camera Raw window. It affects only the print size; In other words, the Resolution value is little more than a preference setting.
i. So if you up sample one image, Camera Raw assumes you want to up sample the next one as well.
7. Select the images and click OK.
a. Click the Select All button or press Ctrl+A to highlight all thumbnails in the vertical filmstrip. Then click the Open 3 Images button in the bottom-right corner of the Camera Raw dialog box, or press the shortcut Ctrl+O. The Bridge hands off all three images to Photoshop, along with the color, brightness, and focus adjustments that you specified in the preceding steps. Photoshop then dutifully processes the files and opens each in an independent window. The photos are now ready for further adjustment and modification.
8. Advanced Adjustments In Photoshop
a. Perform advanced tonal adjustments by using Curves, a dodge and burn layer, and blending modes on separate layers (Chapter 7).
b. Perform color adjustments targeted to specific color values by using Hue/Saturation, Curves, and Selective Color (Chapter 8).
c. Perform targeted color fixes and saturation painting (Chapter 8).
d. Create and save selections that isolate areas you would like to target adjustments to (Chapter 9).
e. Make targeted adjustments to specific areas of your images by both creating selections and painting on masks (Chapter 10).
f. Perform any creative adjustments you like (Chapter 11).
9. Workflow Wrap-Up
a. Save your master image file in the Photoshop PSD or TIFF file format (Chapter 12).
b. Find ways to automate tasks that you are performing repeatedly in your work- flow so you can work more efficiently (Chapter 13).
c. Prepare your master image files for output so they can be shared with others (Chapter 14).
See Page 168 (The Photoshop CS2 Book for Digital Photographers)
a. .JPG and .PDS Procedures Pg. 149 - 162
Setup (One Time)
· Camera
1. Set Auto Rotate: OFF (on)
2. Set Color Space: sRGB (aRGB)
3. Set White Balance: Daylight (numerous, Auto WB works best with .JPG only)
4. Set Image Size: Raw (Raw + .JPG or .JPG)
5. Set ISO: Lowest Usable
· Photoshop CS2 (Or Photoshop Elements)
1. Set Save: .PSD (.JPG or ?)
2. Set Black Eyedropper: 20
3. Set Mdtone Eyedropper: 133
4. Set White Eyedropper: 244
· Adobe Camera Raw
1. Set Space: sRGB
2. Set Depth: 8 (16) bits
3. Set Sharpening (Detail Tab): 0
4. Set Color Noise Reduction (Detail Tab): 0
5. Set Size: +1
6. Set Resolution: 240 (300)
7. Set Auto: Off (Clicked)
8. Set Preview: On (NOT Clicked)
9. Set Warnings: Off (Clicked)