Preparing Files

Preparing Digital Files for Competitions

Note: Work on a copy. Resizing an image is not reversible.

DIGITAL IMAGE FILES SUBMITTED FOR CLUB PROJECTED DIGITAL IMAGE (PDI) COMPETITIONS OR USED TO REGISTER ENTRIES FOR PRINT COMPETITIONS SHOULD CONFORM TO THE FOLLOWING PARAMETERS:

Colour Space: sRGB
Image Dimensions:

“Landscape” format - Maximum 1600 pixels wide by maximum 1200 pixels high.

“Portrait” format - Maximum 1200 pixels high.

File Format: JPEG
File Name: Must contain the Image Title and the Author’s club membership number (not their name) in the file information fields, i.e. “Blue Boy_123” (image title, underscore, membership number)

For more details and how to prepare digital files for club competitions using Adobe Photoshop, Adobe Photoshop Elements and Adobe Lightroom please see below.

Digital File Preparation using Adobe Photoshop or Adobe Elements:

Landscape Format: The maximum permitted width of an image is 1600 pixels and the maximum permitted height is 1200 pixels.
Portrait Format: The maximum permitted height of an image is 1200 pixels.

Note: The dimensions for a perfectly square image will be 1200 x 1200 pixels.

NB: references to “file size”, “resolution” (“dpi” or “ppi”) are NOT relevant here, you are measuring in pixels only.

How to resize a JPEG Image:

Select your image. Create a copy to work on. Resizing an image is irreversible.

2. Photoshop users go to Image>Image Size.

Photoshop Elements users go to Image>Resize>Image size.

The Image Size dialog box will appear on screen.

3. At the bottom of the Image Size dialog box, tick all three boxes – “Scale Styles”, “Constrain Proportions”, and “Resample Image”. In the dropdown box select “Bicubic (best for smooth gradients)”

4. In the Pixel Dimensions section at the top of the dialog box, in the dropdown menus, select “pixels”.

For a “landscape” image enter the width as 1600 pixels. The height will automatically adjust, maintaining the proportions of the image, but before clicking OK, check the height. If the height is more than 1200 pixels, then go back and enter the height as 1200 pixels this will reduce the width to something less than 1600 pixels, but again maintaining the proportions of the image. Click OK.

For a “portrait” image enter the height as 1200 pixels. The width will automatically adjust, maintaining the proportions of the image. Click OK.

(Note: The dimensions of a perfectly square image will be 1200 x 1200 pixels)

How to change the Mode of an image:

From the Image menu, choose Mode.

2.Tick on both RGB and 8 bit/Channel so that a tick appears to their left. These may already be ticked and will not, therefore, need changing.

How to convert your image to the sRGB colour space profile:

In newer versions of Photoshop go to Edit>Convert to Profile as this produces the best result, if a change is required. In older versions of Photoshop go to Image>Mode>Convert to Profile. The Convert to Profile dialog box appears. At the top of the box, the Source Space, Profile needs to be sRGB IEC61966‐2.1. If it is not, then a different profile may be attributed to the image. If the Source Space is not sRGB IEC61966‐2.1 then select that profile from the Destination Space, Profile drop down box and click the OK box, top right, to convert the colour space. Click OK.

In Photoshop Elements set up Colour Management by going to Edit>Color Settings and select ‘Allow Me to Choose’. That allows you to choose sRGB when opening untagged files. Alternatively, go to Image>Convert Colour Profile and choose ‘Convert To sRGB Profile’. If that option is greyed out, you would think that the file must already be sRGB, but this is not necessarily so you must still check the colour space when saving your image as a JPEG file - please refer to section 4 “How to save your image as a JPEG file” below.

How to save your image as a JPEG file:

From the File menu, choose Save As. The Save As dialog box appears.

2. Select the folder you want to save to. Type in your File Name (Image Title).

3.Check that the Format/Save as Type field is set to JPEG.

4. Check that the colour space is sRGB IEC61966‐2.1 – You’ll see this towards the bottom of the dialog box under “Save Options”.

5. Click the Save button, this will open the JPEG options dialog box. Set the amount of compression to apply to your image, set the quality to 12 (Maximum), this will ensure you will retain the quality of the image. Finally make sure the Format Options is set to Baseline (“Standard”). Click OK.

Digital file preparation using Adobe Lightroom

With your image/s selected in Lightroom (note any number can be processed at the same time) from the menu select File Export.

2. Using the following image to create the settings you see below:

Note: If, on the first time you do this you make all the selections and choose Add at the bottom of the left-hand column, then the settings will be saved under a name of your choice and you can simply select that pre-set the next time and the settings will be there ready to use.

Export Location: If you leave this as “choose folder later” you can simply select where to save the files each time you use the pre-set.

File Naming: This assumes each image has had its own title entered into the IPTC Metadata Title field and that your club membership number is 78.

Video: No settings required as we don’t need this.

File Settings: Choose the settings for the image. Image quality is the only thing that will make the physical file size smaller. For the best quality choose 100. A setting of 75 is still very good and will reduce the physical file size considerably.

Image Sizing: The largest width the projector can show is 1600 pixels x 1200 pixels high. Enter the setting as above. The resolution setting will not affect the size of the file and can be set to anything.

Output Sharpening: A matter of personal preference and this will depend on what other work you may have done of your image already.

Metadata: Another personal choice.

Watermarking: Please do not include a watermark for club entries.

Post processing: This setting allows the software to do anything at the end of the export. Selecting the option to display the files allows you to check the export has been completed to your satisfaction.

IMPORTANT NOTE. Any member wishing to register entries for any club competition who does not have access to a computer and/or is unable to resize or re-name their images as required above should contact the competition secretary who will be more than happy to help.