(upbeat music)
- Welcome to another lesson,
and I'm so proud that you made it this far.
If you're directly jumping onto this video,
I'm still proud of you and still happy that you're choosing
to learn the things which interest you the most.
In this lesson definitely,
we're gonna talk about batch processing
and also share with you a UI tip at the end
that's gonna make your Photoshop life much simpler
and easier.
First of all, let's talk about batch processing.
What is batch processing you might ask?
Well, in terms of Photoshop and image editing software,
batch processing is simply processing
a lot of images all at once automatically.
And it is something I highly recommend
that you do not ignore.
Let's say you have five photos or even 300 photos,
and you wanna upload all of them to Facebook.
Now, keep in mind all of these photos
are 50 megapixels each.
It doesn't really make sense to upload them directly
to social media.
You have to optimize it.
Maybe resize it a bit.
Maybe add a little bit of sharpening.
Maybe add a little contrast, right.
Now you tell me,
does it really make sense to open each
of the photos one by one,
process it, export it,
it's gonna take a lot of time.
It's just not ideal.
There has to be an automated process for it.
Now you might say there is Photoshop action,
but still you have to open up each photo,
apply the action, export it and it can be a tedious process.
What if I told you there's a way in which Photoshop
can automatically open all of those 300 photos,
process them, everything automatic,
export them for you,
and all you got to do is to just apply a simple function
so that Photoshop can run through it
and get your images ready.
Then they all will be ready for export the way you want it,
and that's what we're gonna learn.
Now, there are several ways
in which you can batch process in Photoshop.
You're gonna learn two ways which just droplets
and image processing.
There might be some plugins to do that.
There also might be some extensions to do that,
but these are the two main ones
that you can use in your day-to-day Photoshop life.
So let's go ahead and get started.
Here we are in a typical day in our Photoshop world,
and usually we come across this all the time.
We have lots of images open,
lots of documents open,
and in every document we have done something or the other.
So in this document,
I've calibrated a little bit.
And in this document,
I've applied similar settings,
but these are a little different.
The curve is different according to the image.
And let's say,
I wanna export it all just for the web
or even just export it with these changes that we have made.
Now, does it really make sense to click on one document
and then go to File and then go to Save As,
or then go to Export As,
and do it repeatedly for each and every document?
It doesn't, right?
So here what you have to do,
let's see have a lot of documents open
and you have worked on all of those documents
may be added to your watermark,
maybe did some color grading a little differently.
So all you got to do
to export all of these open documents all at once,
and that's what we learning first saving
or exporting all the open documents.
Here's what you got to do,
go to File,
and then Scripts, Image Processor,
and here you are going to choose
which images you wanna process.
Definitely, we wanna process all of the open images.
Next, we will choose where do you wanna export it?
Where do you wanna save it?
So let's select the Folder.
Let's create a New Folder called Export.
Let's open that folder and hit OK.
Now we have determined where we wanna export it.
The third step here is File Time.
Choose what final times you want.
You can have JPEG.
You can also have PSD.
You can also have TIFF.
So if you choose and take all of these,
you will have the files saved
and all of these formats for you.
So I just want JPEG and here we have the quality.
So 1 is the minimum, 12 is the maximum.
So as you do increase the quality,
the file size would increase.
So you need to choose what works the best for you.
So I'm just gonna go with the highest quality.
Now, here is an essential checkbox
and that is resize to fit.
Do you wanna resize the images while you export it?
We'll get to that later for now.
For now, I just wanna export it just the way it is.
There's the fourth step where we talk about actions.
Again, We don't wanna play any actions to these.
If you want you can,
and you can check to include ICC Profile.
Now, all we gotta do is click on Run.
Now Photoshop will automatically export the images
that are open in the format of your preference
and whatever the preferences you might have chosen.
Now it's doing that in the background.
It has already done that.
So if I go to that folder,
let's go to the Export.
Have a look, there's a new folder inside of it called JPEG.
So if you open it,
have a look, all of these documents are exported as JPEGs.
That's how simple it is to export
or save all of the open documents.
Now you can also save it as a PSD
if you wanna work on it later,
you already know how to do that.
So instead of JPEG, have PSD checked,
it's all up to you.
Let's close it all by simply going to File
and then Close All.
I don't wanna save changes, Apply to all and hit No.
Everything is closed.
Now, let's talk about applying an action with it
and also resizing,
because this is a real world situation.
So here I have some photos of a beautiful lady
from her travel.
Now, we wanna optimize it for social media.
Now, if you go to Facebook Help Center
and find this article called
how can I make sure that my photos display
in the highest quality possible?
You would notice that it has given a dimension
for regular photos, which is 2048 pixels.
So we wanna make sure that the width is 2048.
We can add some color grading to it.
We can also add some sharpening to it.
That's up to us.
We'll get to that later,
let's do something simple.
Let's open one of the photos in Photoshop.
For example, let's create an action first,
and I'm assuming that you might
have some action already in place.
If you don't you can create them.
This is just for demonstration.
Now let's open up actions by going to Window and Actions.
If it's not already open for you,
let's create a new set called Grading.
You can name it whatever you want.
Now, inside of that,
let's create a new action
by clicking on the plus icon right over there.
And we're just gonna add a simple Warmth.
Let's name it Warmth.
Let's start recording.
So a simple action and that is adding a color lookup table,
a simple Crisp_Warm that's it with an opacity of about 25.
Let's go ahead and stop the action.
This is what we just did.
And now we wanna export all of these images
with this little warm applied and also resized.
And here's how we would do that.
You might already have guessed it.
Let's close all of it.
We gonna go to the same image processor
by going to File, Automate.
Now, keep in mind,
you don't have to have any documents open in Photoshop
for this to work.
File Automate and not automate, sorry,
Script's, Image Processor.
Now let's select the folder.
In this case, we're gonna choose Travel Photos folder.
So in here, have a look.
In this Travel Photos folder,
we have those photos
of that beautiful lady enjoying her vacation, hit OK.
So we have that.
Now, where do you wanna export it?
I wanna export it in the same location for convenience
because last time we exported it in a custom location,
so you can choose whatever you choose
so you can export in the same location.
Also, one more thing,
if you have this checked called Include All sub-folders,
if there are other folders inside of that folder,
which also has images,
those would be included too.
If you have that unchecked,
if there are other folders inside of that,
with more images, it won't be processed.
So it's up to you.
Let's save it in the same location.
If you choose to save it in a custom location,
you can choose to keep the same folder structure.
If you have multiple folders with multiple images, anyway.
So of course, if you're exporting for Facebook,
let's save it as JPEG.
Also, we wanna check Resize to Fit.
Now, this is something which we need to learn
and try to focus here,
try to follow along what's these values.
This might sound like a simple width and height,
but it is actually the maximum values of width and height
that is allowed while export.
What does that mean?
Let's say I set the width to about 10 pixels.
And you have an image with a width
and height of 10,000 by 10,000.
So it has an upper limit for the width to 10 pixels,
not fill, not change the aspect ratio.
It's gonna squish down the width to 10 pixels.
And according to that,
the height would also change according to the aspect ratio
of the image to 10 pixels.
Now think of these as upper limits,
even though the height is set to 10,000 right now,
the upper limit of the width is 10,
and that is going to be a bottleneck here,
making sense?
Let's take another example.
Let's, set the width to about 500
and the height to about 10.
Let's say you have an image which is 400 by 400.
Now, if the width is under 500, that's fine.
It's not gonna change the width,
these are the upper limit.
It's gonna be okay with 400 as the width,
but then Photoshop will look at the height,
the height upper limit here we have set it to 10.
So it's gonna set the height from 400 which outside
of the limits to 10 and as a result,
the width would also turn into 10
if it's a square aspect ratio,
making sense?
So these are the upper limits.
With Facebook, we want the width to be limited to 2048.
The height can be anything.
Let's put a very high number here like 10,000.
Now we wanna save it as JPEG quality 12,
you do wanna resize it.
Of course, we also do wanna run an action here.
So let's check that and it's inside Grading
and the Warmth is the action that we wanna apply
and only got to do now is just simply click on Run,
set back, relax, and enjoy a cup of coffee
or whatever choice of drink you like.
Well, I like some Coke sometimes
and sometimes other kinds of soft drinks,
but anyway, it's done.
Now, let's open up the same folder.
Inside of the same folder we have a JPEG folder
and here you have all of these images.
And if you check by right clicking on it
and going to Properties,
let's look at the Details.
Have a look in the dimensions section.
It is 2048 pixels wide,
and it is true for all of these,
and in all of these that warmth has been applied.
Pretty cool, isn't it?
Now let's take this a step further
and let's make it even more automatic
and simpler with droplets.
Now, droplets are an incredible feature in Photoshop
that you can use to process all of these images
without even opening Photoshop.
Yes, you heard it right,
and this is how to first create it.
Yes, we have to create that application kind of thing first.
So to create it,
first of all let's open any one of these photos,
I have a series of photos here.
Let's open that and let's create an action first.
Let's create an action for uploading it to the web again.
And I'm just gonna create a new set called Social.
Now in this action,
we're just gonna add some sharpening,
do some resizing and you can apply whatever effect you want.
This is just for reference.
So inside of that,
let's click on plus,
and let's say I wanna create an action for Facebook.
Let's hit record.
The very first thing that we wanna do here
is to resize it.
To resize it, we're going to go to Image
and then Image Size.
Now, you wanna make sure that it maintains the aspect ratio.
Also re-sampling, let's set it to automatic.
If you have a smaller image,
you wanna make sure that it's just expanded to 2048.
Let's set the width to 2048 and hit OK.
All right, that's the first step.
If you just click on that arrow,
it says accurately that we had set the width to 2048,
which is correct thing.
Let's continue.
The second thing which we wanna do here
is add a little contrast
and we can do that simply by adding a levels
or a curves adjustment layer.
And let me share with you one more fun way
of adding contrast.
And that is just add any adjustment layer,
which by default it doesn't do any change to the image.
Like if you add a curves and don't do anything here,
it won't do any change to the overall image.
Or if even if you add levels,
unless you change the sliders,
it won't do any change.
So choose any adjustment layer like that
and just change the blend mode
to something like Overlay or Soft Light.
That way you automatically add a little bit of contrast,
but I feel again this is too much.
So we're gonna go with about 40%.
The next thing we're gonna do is simply add
a little sharpening.
So press Ctrl + Alt + Shift + E
to create a stamp visible layer.
Let's go to Filter, Other,
and then High Pass,
let's choose 1 or 2 or 1.5, hit OK,
and change the blend mode from Normal to Overlay.
So some sharpening, you know,
some contrast and resizing.
Now another thing to have in the action is the save command.
Yes, you have to have that inside of the action.
You're just gonna go to File and then Save a Copy.
Now, this was an older version of Photoshop,
I have asked you to choose Save As,
but in this case,
we have to choose Save a Copy,
and this is how the newer version of Photoshop works.
And let's choose that and you can save it anywhere
and choose whatever name you want.
I just am choosing this folder in random,
make sure it is JPEG.
Click on Save.
Make sure quality is 12 maximum
and you can choose the quality according
to your preference, hit OK.
It is saved.
Now that is also recorded here.
Let's stop the action.
Let's make sure it's recorded properly.
So we wanna save it as a JPEG,
see it as a recorded.
That's the most important thing,
make sure this is recorded properly
and location is saved here,
but then again it doesn't really matter
because once we create a droplet,
we can change the location.
Now, we are ready to create our first droplet.
Let's go to File and then Automate,
choose Create Droplet.
Let's walk through all of these.
First of all,
where do you wanna save that application
or the droplet in?
Yes, that's kind of an executable application.
So let's choose a folder
and we can have it in the same folder.
Let's name this Facebook Processing and click Save.
Now we have to choose which action do we have to play here.
So it is in the Set Social
and Facebook is the action that we just created.
Now in here, the first checkbox
is override action open commands.
So if you do check that,
Photoshop tells you what's what?
It tells you that when this option is on,
source files will be open from the source folder only
by open steps in the action.
So only if the action has open steps,
it'll open otherwise it won't.
We don't have any open steps in the action
so we have to keep it unchecked.
It says that.
If there are no open steps,
no files will be opened.
So we don't want that.
We do wanna include all the sub-folders
because if inside a folder we have another folder
so and some other images,
we do want to include that.
If you don't wanna include that have that unchecked.
The third one is Suppress File Open Options Dialogue.
If there's a specific option
that shows up file opening the file,
if you check that this droplet
will automatically suppress it.
If there's a Color Profile Warning
while playing a particular action
or opening a particular file
or any color profile warnings during the image,
if you do wanna suppress it,
you can check that,
but I don't wanna do that.
We want to Stop for Errors, create now.
Destination is the most important thing,
let's choose where we do want to export all
of these processed files.
So let's click on Choose
and create a New Folder named Facebook Exports.
Let's select that folder,
click on Select Folder.
Now we have another checkbox
called Override Action "Save As" Commands.
If you have a checked,
it's gonna use the save as command inside of the action,
which we do want because we created a saving step.
Because we wanted to have the choice of the format.
We wanted to have some other choices.
So we did create a save command in the action, hit OK.
So we want to use that command.
Now, how would the images be named?
This is the name format,
you can choose your format accordingly.
First, we want the original image name.
So you're gonna choose Document Name.
And then we want to have written here as Facebook Export.
And lastly, you can have the extension.
If it's JPEG, it's going to be JPG.
If it's GIF, it's gonna be GIF.
You get the point whatever you chose
while we were creating the action.
So the final name would look like this,
MyFile, which would be the original file name.
So if your final name is let's say, DCIM001,
it would be DCIM001-Facebook Export dot
whatever extension you chose.
If you chose JPEG,
it's gonna be JPEG.
Set the Starting Serial to 1,
and if you also want Mac OS and Unix compatibility,
you can have them checked.
Right now I'm working on Windows.
So windows is checked by default.
If you're working on Mac,
Mac would be checked by default.
You get the point, hit OK.
Now with that, the droplet is created.
So if you open that folder,
have a look at this droplet.
It's like an another application of its own.
And this is just a sample eventually saved.
Let's delete that.
Now, let's say we have a group of images inside a folder,
and I named a Droplet.
We want all of these images to be processed
without even opening Photoshop.
Let me just go ahead and close Photoshop.
Photoshop is not open, have a look.
None of the Photoshop's versions are open.
And here we have a folder that we wanna process.
You wanna upload it to web or social media.
All you got to do is to drag all that folder
and drop it onto this.
That's it.
It will automatically open Photoshop for you.
I didn't do anything else.
It will automatically play that action,
export the image,
where we chose it to export
and everything would be done automatically.
So that's an amazing batch processing technique.
Let's see what Photoshop does.
It's opening all of those photos one by one
and processing it.
Let's wait for it.
Now in that folder inside of Facebook Exports folder,
have a look.
All of these are processed
and look at the naming we chose.
We chose the original file name dash Facebook Export dot
the extension, of course.
So have a look.
This has been sharpened.
The contrast has been added
and definitely this has been resized.
The same things have been done with all of these images.
Now let me share with you a workflow tip
that's going to make your Photoshop life easier to navigate.
So have a look at this photo.
Let's say we want us to apply a soft blur effect.
We press Ctrl or Command + J and then we went to Filter,
we have to find where the blur is
or which blur we wanna apply a Filter, Blur Gallery.
And inside of that,
we have to choose Field Blur,
and then we can choose whatever we want.
Here in the middle,
we've want zero blur and then as it goes to the top,
we want to add a little bit blur
or you can also use Iris Blur here.
So what I'm trying to say here is that,
first of all, let's go to Iris Blur,
and let me show you this effect.
It's a very nice effect.
Let's bring these points closer to her eyes and the face,
and you can add a very nice soft blur effect here.
Anyway, so whatever effect that you like and like to apply,
it's sometimes hard to find in the menus.
Let's say, this is the effect that I wanted to apply,
and I applied it.
So it's hard to find where the blur is.
It's hard to find some times where the Irish Blur is.
So instead of having to go through all of that menus,
you don't have to have all of that in the very first place.
Also, you can use highlights for the functions
that you use the most and the way to do it,
it's simply going to Edit and then Menus.
Now, in here, let's say inside a filter,
I never find myself using Adaptive Wide Angle,
you can click on the eye to hide it.
It won't show up.
Also, I personally don't find myself using Lens Correction.
I usually do that in Camera Raw or Lightroom,
whichever raw processing software I'm using.
And then I don't really use 3D.
And then let's assume that inside of blur,
I don't really use the regular blur,
like who uses the regular blur?
Nobody, it has no setting,
not even Blur More, Box Blur.
We do use Gaussian Blur.
We do use Lens Blur, Motion Blur,
sometimes Radial Blur,
sometimes Shape Blur we don't use,
it's very, very rare.
Smart Blur, like what is even this thing?
It's feels like I'm hearing it for the first time.
Surface Blur is very important.
So now only these which are turned on will show up.
Now on top of that,
let's say I use Gaussian Blur the most.
I can even highlight that.
So you can click on None and choose a color for it.
Let's go for Red, hit OK.
Now what will happen is if I go to Filter,
Adaptive Wide Angle and the other filters
that we had just hidden, just don't show up.
So you don't have to scroll through all of that.
I just did one or two for you,
you can just hide all of the features
that you just don't use.
Then if you go to Blur,
all of the useless ones are gone,
and the ones that we use the most is highlighted.
So it just makes it so simpler.
You don't have to scroll through all and find it
and then click on it.
It doesn't seem like much,
but it really makes the process easier and faster.
I hope you enjoyed this lesson,
I hope you learned something from batch processing
and also this highlighting
and hiding menu system techniques
that we just learned.
Now when it comes to batch processing,
again, sky is the limit,
you can create as advanced actions as you like.
Just make sure that the actions that you do create
can be applied to a lot of images.
No matter what you do,
we do have to be mindful of the images we use
and the actions we use.
You cannot have a group of images,
but one image is extremely bright
and the other is extremely dark,
and you're applying an action where you apply
just one kind of curve to it.
So it just won't fit right in all kinds of images
that you're editing in a group.
Maybe for a session where most of your images are dark,
you apply different kinds of action,
maybe in a session where most of your images
are a different way,
maybe horizontal or vertical,
or even a little brighter,
you can apply a different kind of affection,
you get the point.
Be mindful of what groups of images you
are throwing into that droplet.
I hope this video helped you,
I hope you learn something new,
I hope this encourages you
to experiment and play with your own images
and try out batch processing.
Thank you so much again for watching,
I'll see you in the next lesson,
until then stay tuned
and make sure that you keep creating.