On this third and last part of the series, I will be discussing the workflow on how to post-process the pictures you have taken using Adobe Photoshop Elements. This will not be an in-depth tutorial on how to use Photoshop Elements but rather a guide on the specific features of this program that you can use for post-processing the pictures.

In addition to this, I will also be discussing file-size reduction concepts and techniques in order to make your pictures web-upload friendly. This means they can quickly be opened, viewed and downloaded from a web browser. Click any of the images for a zoom view.

Post-processing Workflow

Open the picture inside Photoshop Elements (File> Open).

Duplicate the Background layer of the picture (Layer> Duplicate Layer). This will bring out the Duplicate Layer dialog box. Click OK to duplicate the Background Layer.

Turn on the Grid (View> Grid). This will show gridlines on the picture.

Click Image> Transform> Distort. You will then see a bounding box around the picture and “handles” on its corners.

Click and drag the appropriate “handles” while simultaneously pressing the CTRL key to align the edges of the scrapbook layout to the gridlines. Pressing the CTRL key will ensure that you smoothly move the “handles.” Once you are satisfied that the scrapbook layout is properly aligned, press the Enter key or click the Check Mark on the lower left hand of the picture to commit the operation.

Turn off the Grid (View> Grid). Afterwards, click the Crop Tool.

Click and drag around the picture to place the Cropping bounding box. Click the “handles” to adjust the bounding box to your desired size around the scrapbook layout. Once you are satisfied with your adjustments, press the Enter key or click the Check Mark on the lower left hand of the picture to commit the operation.

This will remove the space outside the bounding box.

Duplicate again the Background copy layer (Layer> Duplicate Layer). In this 3rd layer, you will be applying the enhancements to the picture. The 2nd layer will serve as the backup for the cropped picture. If you do not like the enhancements made to the 3rd layer, you can just delete it and make another copy of the 2nd layer.

To enhance the picture, you can use the following features from the Enhance menu item.

* Click Auto Levels (Enhance> Auto Levels).

* Click Auto Contrast (Enhance> Auto Contrast).

*Click Auto Sharpen (Enhance> Auto Sharpen).

File-Size Reduction Workflow

The picture I am currently working on is about 5.5 megabytes in file size. Now this is not web-upload friendly. To make the picture web-upload friendly, you need to reduce it to less than 1 megabyte. Around 200 to 400 kilobytes is the ideal range. In order to accomplish this, you need to reduce the image size of the picture since this has direct correlation to the file size.

Current digital cameras may take a photo that is around 3000 pixels wide and 2000 pixels high at least. Its resolution will be around 180 to 300 pixels/inch. To make it web-upload friendly, you can reduce the resolution from 72 to 100 pixels/inch and the image size to around 600 to 800 pixels wide.

To make this happen, you will be working with the Image Size dialog box
(Image > Resize >Image Size).

If the Resample Image is not selected, select it and in the drop-down menu beside it, Bicubic should be selected.

Reduce first the resolution of the picture. I normally use 100 pixels/inch. Pictures optimized for web viewing can work to as low as 72 pixels/inch. Once you change it, you can see that the Pixel Dimensions also change.

If you would like to further reduce the Pixel Dimensions, you can change the Width to around 600 or even lower depending on the requirements of the web gallery you will be uploading the picture. If you change the Width, you will notice that the Height also changes. This happens because the Constrain Proportions is enabled. You need to make sure that this is always enabled to make sure that whenever you change either the Pixel Dimensions’ Width or Height, the other one will also change.

Click the OK button. You will notice that the picture is smaller than before.

To view the real size of the picture, double click the Zoom Tool icon.

To save the picture, click File> Save As.

This will bring out the Save As dialog box. For format, the Photoshop (*.PSD;*.PDD) is initially selected. This is the default format for Photoshop files. This is selected by default if your picture has more than one layer. Now to make your picture, web-upload friendly, you need to select JPEG (*.JPG;*.JPE;*.JPE) from the drop-down menu.

After you clicked the OK button, the JPEG Options dialog box will come out. To further reduce the picture’s file size, change the Quality value to 10. Make sure also that the radio button Baseline Optimized from the Format Options is selected. This optimizes the colors of the picture. Afterwards, click the OK button.

As you can see, the original image is around 5.5 megabytes. After going through the file-size reduction workflow, it is now only 293 kilobytes. You can now upload this to any web gallery, and when it is viewed online, it will still be pleasing to look at.