I have discovered to my delight that you can integrate Lightroom and barcode based print asset management. This is a way to:
- automate the printing of labels for images without any rekeying of information, and
- automate the process of finding the image from which a print was made
Why do this? You may sell prints or just make them for your own pleasure. It is good practice to provide some labelling of prints so you (or the buyer) knows what they are looking at. It can be helpful to be able to quickly find the source image of a print. Of course you can just include the filename in the label and type it in to find the source image. But the labels produced look a bit messy with a sometimes arbitrary filename stuck in there. An option is to include a neat barcode on the label. You can then use your webcam to read the label and direclty insert the filename in the LR search field. Presto! Up pops the image from which the print was made.
Caveat: Apologies to Mac users, I have only worked this out on a PC. I’m sure there are substitutes for each of the things I’ve used.
What you need to do this [on a PC]:
- Lightroom (LOL) (BTW Jack Nack showed LR use way outpaces Aperture on the Mac – there is a reason guys – LR is better!)
- LR/Transporter (incredibly useful for many things)
- Excel (optional but part of my workflow)
- A way to print labels with barcodes. I use a cheap Brother label printer which comes with the P-Touch Editor software.
- A webcam
- Webcam barcode reader software. I use bcWebCam which is free
How I do it:
I’ll sketch how I do it with the specific gear I have and then suggest how you may get by with other gear.
Simplest workflow:
- Set up LR/Transporter to export a summary file from image exports that includes all the fields you may want on your label (including filename of course). Format for comma delimited a CSV file with a header line to define the exported fields. This is saved and reused as an export preset. Routlinely I can then select the images I am printing and export them to a dummy folder which I use for the purpose of transferring Image information.
- I use my label printer software with a template that merges the CSV file data onto a label, with the filename printed as a QR barcode. I generally put one label directly on the print reverse and, if framed, another on the frame rear. With high quality art prints I only do the latter to avoid any possibility of problems of with the adhesive discolouring the paper obverse. Here’s an example:
- Having previously installed bcWebCam, whenever I want to if I need to find an image that needs a bit of a search (only likely if I’ve not worked on it recently), I load bcWebCam while LR is running, place my mouse cursor in the search field in the library view (having selected the root of my catalogue), and hold the print label in front of the web cam. Presto! bcWebCam inserts the filename in the search field and up pops the image in LR!
In reality, I use excel as an intermediary to read the LR/Transporter data and reformat some items. Excel also lets me define how many of each label I want printed… The label printer software automatically reads the excel file as a database and allows printing of the required number of labels.
If you are interested in this solution you are likely to have tens or hundreds of thousands of images in which case camera generated filenames will not be unique. I add a month and year on import and conversion to DNG into LR to ensure filenames are unique. There are a range of other work-arounds that may suit your workflow better. But remember, you need something that LR will find in a single search. It may be you create a unique identifier in a EXIF or IPTC field – this will work too… Some smart bunny may point out to me there is some foolproof automatic unique identifier for each image built into LR which can be accessed and exported but I am not aware of it. I guess image creation time (to the second) comes pretty close but I cannot see how to search on this from a search field entry…
Where you may need to find some workarounds:
If you are on a PC, the one thing that is not available on the net is the barcode label printer. In the past I used to print labels on multi-label sheets with a laser printer. It’s not obvious to me how to translate the unique image identifier into a barcode for this approach but I’m sure this will be one. But I came to the conclusion that a dedicated “on demand” label printer would save a huge amount of messing around. I think the Brother model I use is about US$79 (A$99) which doesn’t exactly break any bank. And the continuous paper roll I use means labels end up about 2.5 cents a pop… What make this or even the more capable models (with auto-cutters) such a great deal is the P-touch sofware which does do all the linking of database to label and info field to barcode. This is worth the price alone I reckon. There are other free and for-fee webcam barcode readers out there too; the one I’ve noted works for me…
This may sound pretty complex to set up. But the reality is, once export, database and print templates are in place, it’s all automatic.
There was a bit of internet uproar (aka bloggers being bloggers) about a stolen/copyright-infringed Obama portrait from the campaign that was turned into a poster that was then widely printed and sold around the time of his inauguration. It all settled as the news spread that all the posters and financial gains were made by enterprising poster printers and street sellers cashing in on Obama-mania around the Inauguration, not the artist. The matter was pretty well left at that.
Having not heard of him or his work before the Obama thing, I wasn’t ever expecting to hear of him again. Except now it seems Shepard Fairey does this ‘appropriating other people’s work’ caper regularly. Now fresh news of an image of young Chinese soldiers turned into a similarly styled poster by Ed Nachtrieb who says, ‘Shepard Fairey ripped off my picture first’.
This time around, the issue has been percolating and I’m trying to work out exactly where I stand on art appropriation in the modern day and what conventions or courtesies should be afforded to the originating artist. It’s certainly not a new issue, even Picasso said, “Bad artists copy, good artist steal.” Without appropriation, whole artistic movements would have been restricted to just one guy.
I keep coming back to the question, “Are photographers more prissy about their work than other artist?” or perhaps, “WHY are photographers more prissy about their work than other artists?” I’ll keep the religious debate over ‘real photography’ meaning film and vintage equipment for another post, except to say that the only ones fighting that one are snooty amateurs. This is an issue of copyrights and use of an image.
I see the issue of music samples, famously brought to court by the music industry suing rap and hiphop artists in the last decades, as analogous to what photographers have been doing since near the inception of the form. Somehow, it’s fine to photograph a dead bird on the edge of a fountain with sorrowful cherub statues looking down, but in the case of Fairey, taking an image, selectively cropping, squashing and posterizing in creation of a new piece, isn’t.
There is no right of recourse against a photographer including the sculptor’s artistic expression in the new work but translating an element of a photograph into a graphic image is disallowed. Declared replicas of famous paintings (and I’m not talking about devious forgeries) are frowned upon, presumably to protect the artistic expression of the originating artist but this sanctity isn’t afforded to the photographer’s victim while it is applied to the photograph taken. It all seems a little uneven.
I’m not particularly bothered by Shepard Fairey’s pieces, I think they can be protected as true art, fair use, and even political statements. On the other hand, I wouldn’t appreciate any of my images on Flickr taken, processed and printed on t-shirts in or near their entirety. I’d worry less if it were not the entire image, or if I were notified of the intent or show the result before publication. Is it time for copyright terms on photographs to be reviewed in a post-Photoshop world? Is attribution, without prior notification, enough?
Am I just being prissy too?
More:
Announced today, the most important shift in camera hardware since the release of the Hasselblad some 40 years ago.
RED Digital Cinema Camera’s have announced a new system that covers most camera types in use today from the prosumer low end HD video to the 6X17 wide format stills camera. All camera manufacturers will be hit with the magnitude of this new concept. Everything interchangable, all possible ergonomic configurations covered from a hand held stills system, shoulder mounted video, extreme high end feature film kit, and yes even 3D. This new camera system is the RED DSMC (Digital Stills and Motion Camera)
For most stills shooters a 24 MP stills camera that can take a Nikon or Canon lens is enough to get some interest. For video prosumer a fixed lens 2/3″ sensor shooting a 3K image is astounding. For those at the high end the options are equally staggering, a true 6 x 4.5 digital still camera at 65 MP or a file for feature film production at 9K and 50 fps.
This will sink in over the next few months as the options become clearer for those willing to add it all up. The big advantage they claim is RED have made obsolecence obsolete, and I am onboard as of now.
Get on to RED USER and see the rest of this story.
Could it be that Apple are about to release a Pro version of the popular 20 and 24 inch iMac?
With the ever increasing power available on the iMac platform and its use as a workstation in collaborative environments, it would make sense to release a brushed metal high end version for those applications.
A better graphics card, the ability to go with 4.0 GIG of RAM and the Pro Metal treatment would be a winner in my view.
Not long to wait, WWDC is on tomorrow with Leopard all over the place as banners.
More rumors at Roughly Drafted.
After the podcast last week Cameron had a look at CS3 and shot a few test images.
Here is one he attached to an email to PhotoGeek headquarters.
Hey just stuffing around with CS3 photo merge Oh my god! Took this pick just out the front all ten of em and put them through CS3 did not touch the files how good is it, camera set on AV and everything, imagine you put some effort into it.
Also a Photoshop instructional site has come to light with some fantastic video of CS3 and Photomerge possibilities.
We will continue our CS3 discussion on Wednesday’s show and discuss the ethical considerations of using technology such as Photomerge.
