The contact sheet exercise was a very beneficial way to get to know many of the tools of Photoshop. The purpose of the contact she is to represents what is called a proof sheet in photography where there are rows of images laid out to be judged for print quality. In manual development, these photographs are first represented with negative strips of film, that sheet is then developed to get an overall sense of how each photograph will turn out. The contact sheet is used as a great point of reference when developing film. This assignment was not quite like the process of developing film with a proof sheet. Instead, we chose different images to manipulate with a variety of tools and lay them out in order to show the effects manipulating the image with each particular tool.
We started off by changing the dpi of each image to see how it effects the quality. Dpi refers to dots per image, and it relates to the quality of an image. We discussed that images on different platforms hold differing dpi standards. For example, magazines images typically have 300 pixels/inch, while the standard images typically have a resolution of 72 pixels/inch. Print typically has 600 dpi and color print has a dpi of 1200. To change image dpi we clicked view – image size, and a window pops up where you can manipulate the dots per image. As we noticed with this first row of the contact sheet, when we reduced the dpi of the image, it became blurry because pixels become more spread out.
In the second column of the contact sheet we learned how to manipulate the format/mode of an image in order to change its color scheme and quality of shading. During this section, we discovered that there are two different types of image color schemes. RGB is the color mode that used for images on the web because it gives more of a crisp, vibrant look to the image colors. CMYK is the color mode used for printing ink. With CMYK we found that the image had slightly duller color and edges. We each chose an image that was particularly colorful for this part of the exercise because it made it easier to notice the differences between formats. We then made the image black and white by clicking on the channel mixer and selecting monochrome. We made sure to select black over white on the left side of the screen. We were then able to manipulate the image on the RGB scale to determine where we wanted the most shading or contrast but utilizing the curves tool. We then selected image- mode- gray scale and chose; duo tone where we were then able to select two colors the be represented in our image. In this row, we are able to see a dramatic change in image color format.
We then worked on manipulating image orientation by utilizing the crop tool. In this section we saw how an image can be effected by is framing into portrait, square, and landscape. To do this we selected the crop tool. Once the “marching ants” popped up, we used the corner anchor points to adjust and crop the image from the outside. We noticed that by adjusting the frame of the image, it helped serve a purpose in drawing attention to different parts of an image.
We continued using the crop tool in the next row where we learned how to crop from the inside of an image in order to changed the framing from wide angle to closeup. Each time we cropped into the middle of the image, once cropped the image remained the same size but appeared to be zoomed in on a particular aspect of the image. The smaller we made the crop box, the more zoomed into a closeup the image became. The repeated this four times in a zoom-in sequence.
In the third next row we learned how to utilize the crop tool to manipulate the content as well. To do this, we all selected an image and chose to zoom so far into one characteristic of the image so that the zoomed in image becomes an abstraction. In the representational photograph, the image looks like the subject it represents. I chose a photograph with pumpkins. But then, as we cropped from the inside of the image onto a particular aspect of the image, it became more of an abstraction. This is because we chose to zoom in on one feature of color or texture that is unidentifiable of what the image represents when held out of context away from the representational image.
Finally, we utilized the Photoshop filter gallery to manipulate an image. We started off with a ‘journalistic’ image that represents the original image before manipulation. Then, we had fun selecting different filters that made the image artistic. This was the most enjoyable part of the assignment for me because it is a simple tool to use but its effects can really work to manipulate the look of the image. I chose to use the filter of mosaic tiles, ink outlines and glowing edges of an image of actress/singer Zooey Deschanel.
Once all the images were created, we selected Tools- Photoshop- Contact Sheet II. This was a simple way to create a single platform with all the images laid out. The contact sheet assignment was very beneficial to someone like me who is a new user of Photoshop and just getting to know the program and its functions.
Digital Communications 