harnessing the power of...

imaging made easy

harnessing the power of Photoshop

creating & using actions & droplets to minimize

repetitive tasks

with Beth Beighlie

The Harvard Medical School is accredited by the Accreditation Council for Continuing Medical Education to provide continuing medical education for physicians.

The Harvard Medical School designates this live activity for a maximum of 1 AMA PRA category 1 Credit ™. Physicians should claim only the credit

commensurate with the extent of their participation in the activity.

I have no financial relationship with any commercial entities producing, marketing, reselling, or distributing health care

related goods, products or services.

actions & droplets

• resize images

• change file formats

• rotate images

• streamline other common image file edits

what do they do?

download Research Imaging Handouts at http://it.med.harvard.edu/pg.asp?pn=ris_handouts

actions

• an action is a series of commands recorded for playback on a single image file or a batch of image files

• actions must be run from within Photoshop

defined

droplets

• a droplet is a small application that applies an action to one or more images

• droplets can be run without Photoshop started

defined


batch commands

• batch commands run actions on a folder of image files

• batch commands must be run from within Photoshop

defined

modifying numerous images

• identify images that need the same modifications

• gather COPIES of images into a To Be Processed folder (source folder)

• create a Processed folder (destination folder)

how to prepare



• plan an action that modifies images that need similar types of edits

• record the action

• write the droplet

how to prepare


• work on copies of image files

• work from a Source folder

• send modified files to a Destination folder

minimizing risk


creating an action

view the Actions palette

getting started

creating custom actions

by default, new actions will be stored within

Photoshop’s Default Actions Set

• create your own Action Set for storing actions you’ve written

Action Sets


getting started

if this is your first custom action, create a New Set

creating Action Sets

getting started creating New Actions


creating Actions

give New Action a sensible name & store it in the set

you just created

naming & storing

!"#$#%&'()**+,-(.,/0

this action will rotate the image clockwise, set the resolution at 100 dpi and set the file type to JPG

creating Actions

after clicking Record, every modification will be saved

in the New Action

recording


creating Actions

Action dissected

understanding the steps

Action name

open image file

rotate image clockwise

size to 100 dpi

save as JPG

turning Actions into Droplets


Droplets future access

•  If you plan to write other Droplets, consider creating a folder that contains all of your home made tools

Droplets functionality

•  Override Action “Open” Commands: If your Action has an ‘Open…’ Command as its first task, check this off. If there is no ‘Open…’ Command, leave Override option unchecked

•  Include All Subfolders: This option is up to you…

•  Supressing Dialogs and Warnings is OK

•  Set: & Action: Select the Set & Action you want to Play


Droplets managing results

•  Destination: To avoid overwriting the original images, save the resulting files in a destination folder (do not choose None or Save and Close)

•  Choose: navigate to the folder that you want to save the processed images in

•  File Name: it’s up to you- keep the existing file name, add serial numbers, or date, or not. ABSOLUTELY INCLUDE THE EXTENSION

•  Override Action “Save As” Commands: if your Action has an ‘Save As’ Command within it, check this off. If there is no ‘Save As’ Command, leave Override option unchecked

•  Compatibility: Check them all

•  Stop for Errors: Yes

Droplets just use it!


questions? comments?

Beth Beighlie

[email protected]

432-2323 it.med.harvard.edu

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