PHOTOSHOP CS4 QuickSteps- P3 potx

The added benefit is that the image is still in RGB Color mode, which means not only that you’ll save on the black cartridge when you print to inkjet your inkjet printer will use all th

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In the Black And White dialog box, click the Preset drop-down arrow and

choose a filter, and then mix the channels so that they give you the effect you want You get a much better looking image than you do when traveling directly from RGB Color mode to Grayscale mode The added benefit is that the image is still in RGB Color mode, which means not only that you’ll save

on the black cartridge when you print to inkjet (your inkjet printer will use all the cartridges and not just the black one), but you can also add RGB color images to this apparently grayscale photo, to create stunning visual effects using Photoshop layers.

CONVERT AN RGB IMAGE TO INDEXED COLOR MODE

dialog box appears

colors to be used Photoshop shows you a preview of the image as it appears when converted to that number of colors

3 Choose the type of dithering you want Photoshop to use Generally, for photos, Diffusion type produces the most eye-pleasing color reduction

Use Scanners and Digital Cameras

Photoshop allows you to import images directly from scanners and digital cameras connected to your computer.

Scan an Image in Photoshop

To scan an image from within Photoshop:

1 Make certain the drivers are installed for your scanning hardware; the disc that came with your scanner will serve you well, but it’s usually better to download the latest drivers from the manufacturer’s web site The scanner could have been in

a warehouse for several months, and reputable scanner manufacturers offer easy installation files from their web sites Then, make sure the scanner is connected to your computer using either a USB or FireWire cable, and that it’s powered on Many

of the newer power-efficient scanners go into sleep mode after a period of inactivity

TIP

Scan the photograph using at least the resolution at

which it will be displayed The standard for displaying on

a computer monitor is 72 dpi If the photo will be printed,

scan at the same resolution as will be used when it is

printed (for example, 300 dpi) Scanning at a higher

resolution is acceptable; scanning at a lower resolution is

not Even so, more than 300 ppi is usually unnecessary

unless you’re planning to print an enlarged version of the

original material

32 Photoshop CS4 QuickSteps Creating, Importing, and Saving Images

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2 From the Application bar, click File | Import A submenu appears, listing the devices

from which Photoshop can import

devices physically attached to your computer The Mac OS typically uses TWAIN drivers for scanners, while Windows systems can use TWAIN or WIA support to get the data from the scanner into Photoshop Click the menu choice that applies to your

scanning device from the Import list, and then click OK WIA support for a Canon

combo scanner/inkjet is shown here

4 The combination interface and device driver displays options for your scan, as shown

in Figure 2-2:

• Click the type of image you want to scan: Color Picture, Grayscale Picture, or

Black And White Picture Or Text, for instance.

• Click Custom Settings to enter unique specifications.

allow you to adjust the brightness or contrast, resolution of the picture type, and the picture type

NOTE

If you’re scanning an heirloom black and white photograph,

you’ll get better editing results (see Chapter 9) if you

scan in color, RGB mode You’ll be surprised how much

visual content is disguised or hidden under years of

photographic emulsion aging

Figure 2-2: The scanning interface will lead you through

scanning your images.

TIP

If you scan to a file on your hard drive or network, open the

file normally in Photoshop

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SCAN LINE ART

Although most scanning software has a setting for scanning line art, you will get better results by scanning the image as a grayscale photograph:

2 Press ALT + CTRL +0 or double-click the Zoom tool to zoom to 100 percent.

Threshold The Threshold dialog

box appears

render your image in black or white, with the same apparent results as Bitmap mode, except the image retains its original color mode

Drag the Threshold Level slider

to the left to make lines lighter; drag

it to the right to make lines heavier (see Figure 2-3)

adjustment

clean up any extra spots and specks

You’ll learn more about converting and retouching images in Chapter 6.

Import Digital Photos

To import digital photos into Photoshop:

1 From the Application bar, click File | Import In the submenu that appears, choose

your camera from the list of devices

–Or–

NOTE

Although you can import scanner data directly into

Photoshop, you may or may not get more options and

better results using the scanner’s software—there’s

a 99 percent chance your scanner installed its own

interface when it installed the drivers Occasionally,

operating system support for scanning, be it TWAIN or

WIA, cannot call special effects and other options your

scanner is capable of that can be called directly through

the manufacturer’s provided interface Additionally, if

you have two dozen photos you want to scan, scanning

directly into Photoshop is a “one pop” deal; conversely,

if you use the scanner manufacturer’s interface, you

can scan one photo after the other without interruption

or pauses Images scanned directly through the

manufacturer’s software and saved to disk can be

opened in Photoshop just like any other photo you take,

or acquired through other means

TIP

If you transfer a photo from the camera to a file on

your hard drive or network, you can open the file

normally in Photoshop

Figure 2-3: You can scan a line drawing and change the line weight using Photoshop.

34 Photoshop CS4 QuickSteps Creating, Importing, and Saving Images

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The Adobe Photo Downloader will automatically retrieve your photos

if the card reader is connected to the computer (see Figure 2-4)

3 Select one or more photos, complete any settings, and click the

appropriate button (OK, Get Photos, and so on) to import the photos

into Photoshop The exact appearance and operation will depend on your camera

Download Your “Negatives” to Bridge

Adobe Bridge can act as a host for downloading raw image files from your camera or memory card reader Bridge also offers more options for downloading—such as auto-naming your files and selecting only the ones you want—than the software that came with your camera Once you’ve powered up your camera and connected its cable to your computer, and your computer acknowledges the connection:

1 Click the Get Photos From Camera icon

This displays the Adobe Bridge Photo Downloader dialog box Click the

Get Photos From

drop-down list to choose the right connection to your camera or card reader

Bridge acknowledges device drivers, what you’re actually seeing on the list, regardless of whether the device is connected at the moment or not!

2 Click Browse to locate a destination for your

images You can also create subfolders in case your camera’s images were taken on

several dates: click the Create Subfolders

drop-down list to specify the format for the date the subfolder(s) are labeled with

Figure 2-4: The Adobe Photo Downloader will automatically retrieve your

photos from your digital camera, store them in the folder you want, and

number and rename the files.

NOTE

If Windows users don’t have Bridge open when the

connection is made between the computer and camera,

a dialog box might open—one triggered by the camera

device—and you’ll be prompted with choices for what to

do with the newly discovered data You can then choose

Download Images Using Adobe Bridge CS4 from

the list

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the date taken Choose these options from the Rename Files drop-down list.

applying a template to all the images you download

choose a saved template for your downloaded images In future Bridge sessions, you can load the saved metadata, making cataloguing and copyrighting scores of photos a simple task This is covered more thoroughly in Chapter 3

CAUTION

You might see—as illustrated in these figures—that

some files that Bridge wants to download aren’t photos

Choose to download them anyway: they’re external

metadata files that should accompany your raw images,

similar to what Bridge writes to image file types that

cannot hold internal metadata

Click here to select template options External

metadata file

Allow Bridge to download it!

NOTE

Bridge handles more than just camera raw data If

you shot your photos using your camera’s JPEG save

settings, or TIFF, you can use Bridge, too, to download

and catalog your photos

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camera, this might take a while

When the images you’ve chosen have completely downloaded, they appear

in the Content panel, and you can confirm the hard disk location of the new images on the Folder panel.

Save Your Files

Photoshop offers you the option to save a photo in its original format, or as any other file type that is valid for the file’s color mode, bit depth, and anything

“special” about your editing work, such as transparency, alpha channels, and Photoshop effects.

SAVING AS DNG

The Save As DNG option lets you save an image from

your camera to Adobe’s file format for Digital Negative

(DNG) files The advantage to saving a camera raw file

as a DNG is that as an Adobe standard, the file will be

able to be opened with all the camera data at any time

in the future In contrast, because there are so many

different formats for camera raw files from different

hardware manufacturers, you’re not assured in the future

that a proprietary camera raw file can be opened The

disadvantage to saving as DNG is that Photoshop and

only a few other applications can read a DNG file

TIP

If you click Cancel while Bridge is downloading your

images, you’ll get an information box that tells you that

the images it has downloaded prior to the cancellation

have been successfully written to hard disk

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SAVE AN EXISTING FILE

To save changes to an existing file, click File | Save or press CTRL/CMD+S However, if you’ve added Photoshop-specific data to the file—text as editable

text, layers, shapes—that sort of stuff you’re best off choosing File | Save As

Otherwise, Photoshop saves the file using the Photoshop PSD file format

SAVE A NEW, RENAMED, OR REFORMATTED FILE

To save a new file or to save a previous file with a new name or file format (for example, to save a JPG as a TIFF):

2 Type a file name in the File Name field.

NOTE

Part of metadata is image orientation Most cameras are

smart enough to discern whether a photo is supposed

to be in portrait or landscape orientation However, you

might have taken a photo whose content is ambiguous,

such as a shot straight down to capture pebbles or sand

If a thumbnail is incorrectly oriented, click one of the two

Rotate 90° buttons The orientation will be written to the

file as metadata so that it will display correctly now and in

future sessions

38 Photoshop CS4 QuickSteps Creating, Importing, and Saving Images

How to…

• Use the Bridge Workspace

• View and Write Metadata

Working with Metadata and

Sidecar Information

• Create Labels

• Batch Rename Files

• Use Image Stacks

• Open the Camera Raw Editor

Defining the Properties of

a Processed Raw File

• Work with Camera Raw

Editor’s Tools

• Refine Images with

Other Adjustments

Chapter 3

Using Adobe Bridge and the

Camera Raw Editor

If you’re using a digital camera that saves to the Raw file format, this chapter gets you up and running on how to process Raw photos before performing any edits in Photoshop As you’ll see, you can adjust exposure, color temperature, and a host

of other parameters, much in the same way you might push-process traditional, physical film, modify its exposure during printing, and so on This chapter also shows you how to use Adobe Bridge to tag your images with identifying information, organize your images, and preview a collection of images.

Work with Bridge

It’s easy to take hundreds of photos in a single session with digital cameras

Suppose you’re looking for a specific photo you want to color correct and

print today Adobe Bridge is the best start to sorting through a collection of photographs, which you can do without launching Photoshop Bridge can

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display every type of media that Adobe programs support It displays all sorts

of bitmap image formats, can play movie files and audio files, and enables you

to browse PDF documents in its Preview panel Files that aren’t supported show

up with an icon instead of a thumbnail preview Bridge connects user content to the appropriate Adobe application.

Use the Bridge Workspace

You can perform scores of useful tasks

in Bridge’s workspace, an interface that’s not visually intimidating Figure 3-1 shows the interface after

a folder has been loaded: the callouts describe the default workspace areas, discussed shortly.

USE FOLDERS AND FAVORITES

The Folders panel looks and acts exactly like a folder window you navigate using your operating system, except files within folders are displayed in the Content panel, not in the Folders panel The current folder you’re viewing is also at the end of a hierarchical directory tree at the top of the interface, enabling you to navigate

up and down the directory tree without using the Folders panel.

CAUTION

Executable files (program files) will indeed launch if

you double-click their icon in Bridge’s Content panel,

so exercise caution

Figure 3-1: The user interface to Adobe Bridge has areas for viewing images and information, and offers common tasks via the menu, context menus, and tools.

Favorites and Folders

Directory

Filter

Metadata and Keywords

Collections and

Smart Collections

Content panel views

40 Photoshop CS4 QuickSteps Using Adobe Bridge and the Camera Raw Editor

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When you first open Bridge, you have a Favorites list, and by default it’s populated with system folders such

as My Pictures and My Documents Conveniently, you have a directory tree above the Favorites and Folders grouped panels, plus folder navigation icons

Regardless of whether the Folders panel is hidden by the Favorites panel, it’s always easy to navigate to a desired folder.

• To switch back and forth between the displays you’ve used, click the back arrow and forward arrow buttons above the directory tree

• To select a folder and display its contents, click a folder icon on the tree

• To see a list of subfolders within a folder, click the “greater than” icon that separates the folders on the directory tree

• To go to a recently accessed folder, click the Go To Parent Or Favorites icon.

Once you have the contents of a folder displayed in the Content panel, it’s easy

to add images to the Favorites panel and to open them:

• To add one or more images to the Favorites list, click the thumbnails in the Content panel, and then drag them onto the Favorites list

• To add noncontiguous images to your Favorites, press CTRL / CMD and click the filenames in turn; to select contiguous thumbnails, press SHIFT while you click the first and last filenames in the list

• To open a Favorites image in Photoshop CS4, double-click its filename or icon

USE COLLECTIONS AND SMART COLLECTIONS

Collections and Smart Collections are Bridge methods for organizing your

photos, but they differ in the way they work and the way you set them up

A Smart Collection is created by conducting a search based on criteria you define (explained in the steps to follow) and Smart Collections dynamically update whenever you’ve added photos to a folder that matches your search criteria In contrast, you create a regular Collection by manually dragging image files into a folder you create.

NOTE

When you drag a file using Bridge, you aren’t moving

the physical location of files You’re simply making a

favorite image of yours easier to retrieve in future Bridge

sessions

Click to display folder list

Go back

Go forward

Go To Parent

Or Favorites

Directory tree

Reveal Recent File

or Go To Recent Folder menu

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