Adobe Photoshop CS5 for Photographers - Martin Evening [296]
1.
To begin with, I opened the image shown here, went to the Image menu and chose ‘Duplicate…’ to create a duplicate copy image, which is shown here on the left next to the original on the right. In this screen shot you can see a slight difference between the color of the sky. This is because I had applied the Customize Proof Condition shown in Step 2 to the original master image (seen here on the right).
2.
To soft proof the master image I went to the View menu and chose Proof Setup Custom… Here I selected a profile of the printer/paper combination that I wished to simulate, using (in this case) the Relative Colorimetric rendering intent and with the ‘Simulate Paper Color’ option checked in the On-Screen Display Options.
3.
I now had a soft proof prediction of how the master file would print that could be viewed alongside a duplicate of the original image. The goal now was to add a Curves adjustment layer to tweak the tones (using the Luminosity blend mode) and a Hue/Saturation adjustment to tweak the colors (using the Color blend mode). A few minor adjustments were enough to get the soft proofed master to match closer to the original (which I was comparing with the Duplicate image on the left).
4.
In this final version you can see the corrected, soft proofed master image. When this corrected version is sent to the printer, the print output should match very closely to what was seen here on the computer display. I recommend the correction adjustment layers be preserved by grouping them into a layer group. You should then turn the visibility off before saving and only switch the layers back on again when you need to make further prints.
Making a print
The print menu items can be accessed via the File menu and are fairly straightforward. We now have just two Photoshop Print options File Print… ( ), which takes you directly to the Photoshop Print dialog and the File Print One Copy command ( ). You can use ‘Print One Copy’ should you wish to make a print using the current configuration for a particular image, but wish to bypass the Photoshop Print dialog.
The big news is that the print workflow has been refined in CS5 to make the print process more consistently repeatable as well as more consistent between operating systems. To start with, the operating system ‘Page Setup’ option has been removed from the File menu and is now accessed solely within the Photoshop Print dialog via the Print Settings button, from where you can now manage all the remaining operating system print driver settings.
The net result is that by incorporating both the Mac and PC operating systems into the Photoshop Print dialog, this also makes the process of scripting and creating actions more reliable. Previously, the vagaries of the operating system print dialogs meant that it was not always possible to write print output actions that could work reliably on another system. With these new improvements to the Photoshop Print workflow, the Photoshop print process can be made more consistent.
Photoshop Print dialog
When you choose ‘Print…’ from the File menu, Photoshop takes you to the Photoshop Print dialog (Figure 13.1), where we shall start by looking at the printer selection, print scaling and output settings.
Figure 13.1 The Photoshop Print dialog, showing the Output settings mode options.
Printer selection and print scaling
If you have just the one printer connected to your computer network, this should show up in the Printer list by default (circled in Figure 13.1). If you have more than one printer connected you can use this menu to select which printer you wish to print to. Below this are the Print Settings and print orientation buttons. This is where you click to open the operating system print driver dialog for Mac or PC and select a paper size to match the paper or media you wish to print to. So for example, if you look