Digital Printmaking for Photographers

Where We've Come From with Digital Imaging

After getting a BA in Computer Science, writing software for Apple for 10 years and now using and teaching Photoshop for 20 years, I've learned how to focus on what is important within this digital world. Part of this experience is also learning what to ignore and not waste your time and/or money on. My focus is on capturing quality images and using Lightroom and Photoshop to create amazing prints.

When digital cameras first came out, and before Photoshop was even a shipping product, I had Photoshop at Apple and I used the first digital cameras, scanners and printers for Apple's advanced technology projects. In those early days, computers were slow, digital cameras expensive with poor quality, and digital printers were not up to snuff. I've lived through their evolution and experienced the progress. In the early years, everyone waited for the next version and the next improvement because one really needed those newer versions and the improvements in technology. Even then there was lots of marketing noise in the digital world and each new version was always going to "Solve all your Problems".

Now we've come to the place where digital cameras, Photoshop and digital printers can do way more than film and traditional photography. Now we're at the point where the next version and the new toy often does more than you need. Do you really need that more expensive camera, that $30,000 digital back, a new printer or even the next version of Photoshop? I believe in spending what is needed to get the quality you want for the size images you are going to make. Many people who take my workshops spend way more than I do on cameras and equipment. They don't need a lot of it and they often don't know how to use their toys. I'll show you how to take great pictures and make amazing prints even if you don't have a $30,000 digital back. If you do have one, then we'll show you how to make even bigger more amazing prints.

What this Workshop Covers

This course goes through many printing examples where extensive Adjustment layers with layer masks are use to improve the color and impact of a print. We will be using Photoshop CS3 or CS4 and Bridge or Lightroom. Barry will project examples from his computer and calibrated projector. You will be learning how to use Barry's Color Correction Template actions to automate your learning of Photoshop workflow. Barry uses these same actions because they make color correction and masking within Photoshop faster and less tedious.

We will be using the Epson 2400, 7600 and 4000 printers which we have on site. In our studio we also have film scanners if you need them. These courses highlight using the Epson printers with Ultrachrome K3 inks and various profile editing techniques to get the best quality and to have the prints match your monitor. Differences in print dialog settings between the newer 28800, 4880, 7880 and 9880 series Epson printers and the 2200, 4000, 7600 and 9600 series will be covered. The workshop fee includes your letter size test prints and two 24" wide final 7600 prints per student. We also have Canvas available to print on.

Barry's "Winter Kayak in Gibsons", available at Spirit of Place Gallery
This is a panorama of 4 images. We'll go through making panoramas using Photomerge and also manually.

Whiskey Slough, Pender Harbour

On the 2nd, 3rd or 4th morning or afternoon, depending on the weather and tides that week, we usually go out for a photo shoot for two to four hours. There are lots of great places to shoot within 20 minutes to an hour from our Gibsons, BC studios. A digital camera is great for these shoots since you can then work on the images right away if you got some good shots. During these shoots, we can answer any of your camera questions and Barry will discuss his favorite digital camera Raw format shooting techniques. In Gibsons, B.C., we are at the entrance of the "Sunshine Coast", Canada's resort area having breathtaking views of snow covered mountains, many waterways with hundreds of islands, harbors and boats, sea birds, beaches, hiking, sea kayaking and some of the world's best skiing and scuba diving spots. You should plan to spend several days shooting on your own either before or after the workshop. If you want to do this, we can give you directions to many great locations. It's not hard to convince Barry to go along on a photoshoot, especially if it's to a location where he hasn't been before or at a time when the light and colors will be just right.

This workshop will cover the following topics and much more: It will cover these topics in some cases working with my images that are not in Photoshop Artistry and also using your own images. In this very in depth course, you will get much more of a chance to use what you learn while working with your own images. Some of the topics covered in the course, including the Photoshop Artistry chapters you should read to prepare for each topic, will include:

General Issues: tips and tricks with the Photoshop CS3 or CS4 Tool, Layers, Channels, Info, Picker, Navigator, History, Actions, Batch Processing and other palettes. Taking advantage of the color correction and measurement features in Photoshop CS3 or CS4. (Chapter xxii, 2)

Setting System and Photoshop Preferences: Setting up your system and Photoshop's preferences for the most effective use of Photoshop, understanding and benefitting from the new Photoshop color managment features, a standard RGB workspace and better RGB to CMYK conversions, and standardizing Photoshop preferences and systems within an organization. (Chapters 3, 15)

Color Space Usage and System Calibration: monitor, scanner and output calibration using ICC profiles and all of Photoshop's color model and calibration support; understanding Color Spaces, Device Characterization and Color Management to correctly deal with camera, monitor and printer calibration for predictable input and output to the web, desktop and high end digital printers as well as CMYK print. Using Photoshop to tweak Epson canned or custom printer profiles to improve their color and better match your monitor. (Chapters 14, 15, 16)

Organizing, Archiving and Automating Digital RAW files using Bridge or Lightroom: Digital cameras allow you to create so many more images much more cost effectively than film. Here you learn how to archive all those images. How to organize them and more quickly process them with CS3 or CS4 Bridge or Lightroom and Photoshop CS3 or CS4. Batch Actions is also something you will learn about in this workshop. (Chapter 11)

Overview of use of File formats and Correction Tools: Which file formats to use for what purpose, when and how. Why some color correction tools are more advanced than others, when and why to use each. (Chapters 10, 12)

Evaluating Levels Histograms for Raw Shooting, Scanning and Color Correction: Shooting in RAW or Scanning to produce a Master Image that can then be resampled to accomodate all the sizes, RGB film and printer output, Video and Web screen use and CMYK print output uses you may have for that image. Simplifying bits, bytes, resolution, dpi, percentage, and all the file size jargon. Using levels and histograms to evaluate and improve your scans with any scanner. Getting the best results from RAW captures and how to embed RAW files in your layers using Smart Objects. The advantages of doing 16 bit per channel verses 8 bit per channel Captures and color correction. (Chapter 16)

Overall Color Correction: using Levels, Hue/Saturation and Curves for color correction and sharpening for quality output to desktop and high end digital printers, CMYK separations and film recorders; setting highlights an shadows, correcting neutrals and colors, adding total and selective saturation, improving off colored originals. (Chapters 17, 19, 20, 24)

Creating the Master Image: The optimal steps and color correction techniques for moving your image from initial capture to a final master image which you can then resample and customize for your different final screen, film and print output situations. Includes discussions about preparing the file to get the best results on Epson, HP and other digital printers. (Chapter 17)

Selective Color Enhancement: using 16 bit Layers, Adjustment Layers, Masks and other advanced techniques along with Levels, Hue/Saturation and Curves to change and enhance colors of selected items; using Color Range, Replace Color and Selective Color to match and improve colors. Making final improvements to specific off-color and dark areas using manual and automated mask selections, Adjustment layers and Hue/Saturation tricks, dealing with out-of-gamut colors when converting to Printer profiles or CMYK, and the details of using the Unsharp Mask, the Noise Reduction and Smart Sharpen filter and the Sharpen Only Edges BH actions to sharpen an image. (Chapters 21, 22, 24, 27, 29)

In the above Mono Lake image, you see the original scan of this image to the left. The dried bush towards the bottom didn't have the dramatic lighting I wanted. In the middle, you see the layers palette I use to improve this image and you see the completed image to the right. You'll learn how to use adjustment layers and masks, burn-and-dodge layers and other techniques to create final versions of your images with similar high quality.

Combining Two or More Captures or Scans to Improve Dynamic Range: Using layers and layer masks to seamlessly combine two different captures or scans of the same high-contrast original or two bracketed originals of the same scene. As and example of this, see the Ship Rock images below. One capture would be to get shadow detail and the other to get highlight detail. You'll learn how to align and color correcting this difficult yet exciting type of image with multiple linked adjustment layers. (Chapter 26)

For my ship rock corrections, I first applied two different Levels adjustments to the original 16 bit scan. One to bring out foreground details and the other to bring out sky details. These created the two layers of this image you see in the above Layers palette. This image was created before Photoshop CS so 16 bit layers were not allowed. That is why I had to first apply the two different Levels adjustments to the original 16 bit scan, then convert each of those to 8 bit, then add the rest of the Adjustment layers you see above. The process would be similar to this when combining two bracketed photos. In the above series of images of ship rock, the top two images are the foreground image before and after the color correction Adjustment layers ForegroundOverallCurve and ForegroundLocalCont are applied to it. The two images below the Layers palette are the Sky layer before and after the Grouped Adjustment layer SkyOverallCurve is applied to it. The Adjustment layers Overall Hue/Saturation, Horizon Merged Spotted and Burn&Dodge are applied to both the Foreground and Sky layers. The layer mask to the right of the Sky layer in the above Layers palette controls which parts of either the Sky or Foreground layers end up in the final composite. Finally you see my completed Ship Rock Fire Sunset image just above this text. In the Digital Printmaking for Photographers workshop, you'll learn how to apply these types of corrections to your images.

Complex Color Correction and Retouching: Doing overall and final color correction and retouching of images that have serious saturation and color problems, using one or more good channel and the Channel Mixer to fix the others, using layer masks and adjustment layers to tweak color between several layers, retouching using blend modes to balance colors, sharpening, and final spotting. (Chapter 24, 25, 29)

Bland-and-White, Duotones, Tritones and Quadtones: Using Barry's Grayscale Template Action script to automate the process and give you the most control anywhere in converting your color images into black-and-white. Also, using Curves to create Duotones, Tritones and Quadtones from black-and-white and color images; converting these duotones to RGB, CMYK and Multichannel for different printing, web and multi-media situations. (Chapter 23)

Working With Larger Images: setting up the Mac or PC, peripherals and Photoshop's preferences to get high performance and accuracy with larger images and complex projects. Using DVD and CD burners and other archiving techniques to backup your digital image creations. We will gladly help to answer your equipment questions.

What to Bring

You will bring your Portable computer, or desktop system if you are driving here, that already has Photoshop installed. During the workshop, we'll most efficiently set up your Photoshop, Bridge, Camera Raw and Lightroom, if you have it. For sorting and organizing your images you can use Bridge, which comes for free with Photoshop, or you can pay extra to get Lightroom.

You will need to bring your own images to work on during the course. We will help you figure out how to solve any problems you've been having with your print making so please bring any scans or raw captures that you've already made or files you have printed, as well as print samples. We can then look at and discuss any problems you may be having and improve your work during the class.

If you are bringing a PC portable, please bring your own monitor calibration hardware/software. I have Spyder monitor calibration sensors but only have Mac versions of their software. I have hardware/software to calibrate Mac monitors. Digital Cameras shooting Raw format seem to be most common for workshop students these days but we are also still quite comfortable with film. If you don't have your own quality scanner, we recommend you get scans of the images you want to work on before coming to class. Please bring these with you to class or bring unedited RAW files from your digital camera. You can do some scans here with our scanners but please also bring at lease 10 prescanned or RAW images to avoid having too much of your couse time spent scanning.

Give Us a Call

If you are interested in taking this workshop in either location, please call us at 604-886-2214 so we can discuss your particular interests and needs to be sure this class will meet them. We can then also fit you into a course with people who have similar interests where we can focus and get the most accomplished for each student. I'm sure we will all learn from each other in this type of course. I look forward to hearing from you.