Tips on editing photos.....with the prospective of printing them some day

[ilia_isakov]

<p>Hi, so I'm doing editing to my photos, sometimes it takes hours to do one photo. But i am editing them for a certain viewable size on photography websites. I know that once I will print these photos, things may be off. My question is this, what do I have to keep in mind when I make destructive changes to a photo, assuming I will print it someday at 8.5 by 11. I know there will be general tweaks before printing, but certain things cannot be brought back after editing. To start, can someone center my perspective on resoloution and color.</p>

<p>Question: What are some techniques people employ when preparing a photo for future printing. <br>

In what resolution, Image size, color space, and overall perspective do people edit photos. Please share how the working process for online viewing is different from the working process to printing quality prints of that image differ. And......can the two be combined to save time.</p>

 

[Spearhead]

<p>What software are you using?</p>

[AlanKlein]

<p>Never edit the original photo.</p>

[Charles_Webster]

<p>I use Lightroom, so no edits are ever destructive, and all are reversible. That said, the only differences between my editing for web or print comes at the end when I do sharpening and noise reduction.<br>

When I'm working on images for web presentation, I can apply less sharpening and noise reduction than for print. And I don't have to be as careful to balance sharpening and noise reduction to avoid blotching when the output is for the web.<br>

If I want to crop differently, for example to fit a particular paper size, I make a virtual copy in Lightroom and crop and process that for print.<br>

<Chas><br /><br /></p>

[craig_shearman1]

<p>1) Never, ever work on the original file. Always work on a copy.<br />2) Do everything full-size, high resolution. Make a web-quality copy only after everything has been done.</p>

[Leonard-just-Leonard]

<p>as everyone said, DO NOT touch the original... in fact I have recently started by backing up the images to an external driver before I even look at them. that makes it physically impossible to accidentally mess things up beyond repair.</p>

<p>for me I immediatley crop / size to 12 x 18 for a couple reasons. big enough to see properly and the aspect ration is good to print 4 x 6 at the local Quicky Mark or make bigger for framing.</p>

<p>I will use that 12 x 18 as it is, or name it as TEMPLATE once the photoshopping is done. If further cropping etc is done I can always revert back to the template since I can rarely remember how I made any photoshop adjustments years later.</p>

<p>to make is web-able ( if there is such a word ) just save as and only change the resolution.</p>

<p>no fancy tricks here, just been there, done that mistakes and lessons learned.</p>

[Spearhead]

<p>All these warnings make no sense if Ilia is using Lightroom or Aperture. None of this matters until someone knows what software is being used. Lots of answers without data is not very useful.</p>

[bob_bill]

<p>When I am preparing an image for output, it is either web or printing. I take the finished image and for web, run it through nik's sharpening program sharpening for web and save it marked web. Both the web and finished image are saved. If I later decide to print, i sharpen the original in nik for print utilizing the printer, paper and size. Then last step, hit my function key that adjusts the brightness of the print to my brighter monitor. I like my monitor brighter than what it should be to match the print. If you never dropped your monitor brightness out of the box, Try a new layer in photoshop, set to screen and adjust the opacity to say 20-30% and it should get the print brightness pretty close. Remember, a monitor is back lit and a print is the light reflecting off the surface of the print. The print has a much higher resolution than a monitor and likely a larger color gamut(range of color). Hopefully you are shooting in pro rgb, the widest color space and processing in 16 bit. Check the blue note at the bottom of your photo opened in camera raw and click on it if you don't see both. This will start you out with the greatest information which will maximize your print. Also, you have to keep in mind the viewing distance since a smaller print is meant to be viewed closer than a huge wall print, you will sharpen more for the smaller print. Contrary to what the pixel peepers do here, a huge print should be viewed at about twice the length of the diagonal of the print, not the length of their nose, so it doesn't have to be sharpened as much as a small say 4x6. Nik sharpener plug in takes care of that. I don't know how saving images is handled in Lightroom, but the sharpening principles apply to both. <br /><br /><br /></p>

[Peter_in_PA]

<p>IF your software is "destructive", stop using it and get Lightroom (or Photoshop and work on a copy, although you can make non-destructive adjustments there, too)... no, seriously... actually, if it is, ONLY reduce resolution on a copy you make of your final output. And never "work on" a jpeg image, only use that for final output to screen or what-have-you.</p>

<p>Please don't over-sharpen.</p>

<p>Please don't abuse the whole HDR thing. there are some cartoonish looking photos out there that people think look great.</p>

<p>Please calibrate your monitor if you're really serious.</p>

<p>And above all, PLEASE try hard to take awesome photos and expose them well so you don't have to do too much of that pesky post-production.</p>