This may be a longish question but it is causing me a major headache. I have over 1000 photos which I have selected to make up a family history in an "old fashioned" photo album. My plan is to put 5 or 6 related photos on a page (about 16" x 11") with some text information about the people on that page. I have collected all the photos I potentially want to use into a collection in LR using a combination of star rating and colour codes. The photos have come from a wide source area so there is no consistency in file numbers etc or of file type.
Now for the questions : I have used LR to select a page group and have opened them as layers in PS. From here I can add text as another layer, move the photos on the page etc - no problem so far. My first question is should I use a transparent background as the collage will eventually be combined and sent to a printer (commercial) to be printed?
Second question: How can I mark the photos in the collection to remind me that a particular photo has been used? I do not want to loose them from the collection in case I want to tweak the photo edit. It is taking ages going back and forth to check if a photo has been used or not.
At the moment the collages are being saved as a Tiff so that I keep the layers separate in case I need to adjust the position or size of an individual photo.
I have, being honest, tried some other collage software but none come close to allowing me the flexibility to do what I want other than a PS/LR combination.
I would appreciate any tips and suggestions as at my current rate I may be dead before I finish the project.
JJMack • Community Expert, Apr 29, 2019Apr 29, 2019
LR is not and Image editor so I would not try toe create your Album pages using LR. Photoshop can easily make your Album pages with Photoshop but it will be a lot of work and take time. One approach would be to create Photo Collage or Mockup Templates for your album Pages then to organize your image in folders in the order you want them populated into pages the to use scripts to populate your images into your album page templates.
If you're making a multi page book for printing, the first order of business is what app you will use to do that. Photoshop isn't the tool, InDesign is what is normally suggested, after using Photoshop as needed to prepare photos or do specialist visual effects.
You should not add book text in Photoshop unless you need special effects.
Perhaps wrongly I was going to get all the pages together and then shop around for a printing house so I had not considered what the actual printing process would be. I have not looked at InDesign so will do so.
The question remains as to how I mark the photos I have used without them disappearing from the collection.
Why not use PS for adding text? It seems great for allowing the text to be positioned where I want it and there can be several different text layers if I want bits of text in different places on the page??
Perhaps wrongly I was going to get all the pages together and then shop around for a printing house so I had not considered what the actual printing process would be.
A better way is to talk to the printer first and find out what they want before you put the pages together.
It's possible to make up each page separately, but you will then be paying a printing house to set the book for you. This is an option, but it may increase cost and limit your price.
People who use page layout tools tend to find Photoshop's text tools painful to be used on hundreds of pages. The job also has to be done very carefully or you can end up making poor resolution text which is unusable on the printed page (even though it looks great on screen) . Also, consider what would happen if you suddenly decide you need to change the font ! In InDesign, used properly with styles (very important), you can change the font everywhere in less than a minute. Using InDesign yourself needs training or you can end up in a pickle. Paying for setting the book might be cost effective for you.
PS. For working with images, the usual thing is to get them out of your catalog and make separate copies for your pages. Name the files carefully, so that you can immediately tell how it is used. For example, you might include the page number and image number in the file name. A subfolder per page may make sense for the level of photos you have. You may need to send the whole folder or collection of folders to the print house, so make it make sense to other people.
LR is not and Image editor so I would not try toe create your Album pages using LR. Photoshop can easily make your Album pages with Photoshop but it will be a lot of work and take time. One approach would be to create Photo Collage or Mockup Templates for your album Pages then to organize your image in folders in the order you want them populated into pages the to use scripts to populate your images into your album page templates.
Photo Collage and Mockup Toolkit
Photoshop scripting is powerful and I believe this package demonstrates this. Here is a video showing a 5 image collage PSD template being populated with images
The package includes four simple rules to follow when making Photo Collage Template PSD files so they will be compatible with my Photoshop scripts.
Size the photo collage templates for the print size you want - width, height and print DPI resolution.
Photo collage templates must have a Photoshop background layer. The contents of this layer can be anything.
Photo collage templates must have alpha channels named "Image 1", "Image 2", ... "Image n".
Photo collage templates layers above the background layers must provide transparent areas to let the images that will be placed below them show through.
There are eighteen scripts in this package they provide the following functions:
HelpPhotoCollageToolkit.jsx - Online Help
TestCollageTemplate.jsx - Used to test a Photo Collage Template while you are making it with Photoshop.
CollageTemplateBuilder.jsx - Can build Templates compatible with this toolkit's scripts.
LayerToAlphaChan.jsx - Used to convert a Prototype Image Layer stack into a template document.
InteractivePopulateCollage.jsx - Used to interactively populate Any Photo Collage template. Offers most user control inserting pictures and text.
ReplaceCollageImage.jsx - use to replace a populated collage image Smart Object layer with an other image correctly resized and positioned.
ChangeTextSize.jsx - This script can be used to change Image stamps text size when the size used by the populating did not work well.
PopulateCollageTemplate.jsx - Used to Automatically populate a Photo Collage template and leave the populated copy open in Photoshop.
BatchOneImageCollage.jsx - Used to Automatically Batch Populate Collage templates that only have one image inserted. The Collage or Image may be stamped with text.
BatchMultiImageCollage.jsx - Used to Automatically Batch Populate Any Photo Collage template with images in a source image folder. Easier to use than the interactive script. Saved collages can be tweaked.
PasteImageRoll.jsx - Paste Images into a document to be print on roll paper.
BatchPicturePackage.jsx - Used to Automatically Batch Populate Any Photo Collage template with an image in a source image folder. Images Rotates for best fit.
BatchPicturePackageNoRotate.jsx - Used to Automatically Batch Populate Any Photo Collage template with an image in a source image folder.
PopulatePicturePackage.jsx - Used to Automatically populate a Photo Collage template Fill with the same single image and leave the populated copy open in Photoshop.
PCTpreferences.jsx - Preferences Use in several of the above scripts. Edit this file to change default settings and add layer styles.
BatchReplaceOneObject.jsx - Used to populate simple Mockup templates. Simple Mockup have one rule the top layer must be a Smart Object Layer it contents will be replaced and a Jpeg file saved.
BatchUpdateSmartObject.jsx - Used to populate simple Mockup templates like BatchReplaceOneObject script but can update more than a single smart object layer.
BatchMockupTemplates.jsx - Used to populate mutiple Mockup Template that need to be populated eith the same replacement image objects.
Mockup Support Added
I created my Photoshop Photo Collage Toolkit nine years ago and Avoided supporting Templates that used Smart Object layers to warp, to add perspective, to rotate, add any distortion to images. Because replacement Image file needed to have exactly the same Aspect Ratio, Size and Print resolution as the Object in the Template's smart object layers object. Lately there have been some threads in Adobe Photoshop scripting forums dealing with updating/populating products Mockups Templates that have prototype smart object layers that need to be updated to create the output mockup files. These were good threads and prompted me to do some thinking.
So like my Photo Collage Template design has four simple rules. I came up with four simple rules for Mockup templates. I find that I can easily modify Photo Collage Templates and Mockup Template files I download from the web so they comply with my Photo Collage Template rules or my Simple Mockup Template rules. Mockup templates may be far from simple the only simple part is they are easy to update. So I have add support to my Photo Collage Toolkit to support Mockup templates.
Simple Mockup Templates Four Rules
Simple Mockup Templates Only the Smart Object Layer on the top of the Template layers stack will be updated then a Jpeg file saved.
Only Photoshop Objects are support in the top smart objects layers. That is they can not be Object File that are not supported by Photoshop like Camera RAW Files or Illustrator file like .ai, .svg. I suggest these objects should be PSD or PSB that Photoshop creates. Avoid using PNG objects in Mockup template. For when replace content is used to replace .png objects within a .psd template which has your png's object the replace content operation is very slow.
The first None Smart Object Layer near the top of the layer stack Marks the end of Smart Object Layers the will be updated. Lower Smart Object Layers only update if they share top layers objects.
The Replacement Image Collection need to be in sub folders named obj0, obj1, obj2, .... objN. Each folder must contains the same number of replacement Image files.
It is a large download and some have had problems getting their heads around it. I use Windows so the script were developed on a Windows system. However they are JavaScripts and I was able to install them on my son's Mack some years ago. I do not have access to a Mac these days. My son is a Art teacher and his schools switch to using PC so he now has a Surface Studio 2 and an old Surface Pro 3. His wife is also a teacher and her school use Mac but her Mac air does not have Adobe software or space for it.
If you have any problems or questions Ask for help in Photoshop or Photoshop Scripting forums.
From time to time Adobe introduces bugs into Photoshop I try to keep the scripts so they will work in most version of Photoshop CS2 to CC 2019. I have removed many version of Photoshop from my machine. Currently I only have CS3, Cs6, CC 2014, CC 2018 and CC 2019 installed. All version of Photoshop have some bugs.
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