How to crop a sequence to scale????????

RKeaton

Okay, I've always wondered how this is done and I'm FINALLY getting around to asking. Hopefully someone has an answer for me.

I shoot lots of sequence when I do sports, usually surfing. The horizon is usually visible. Later in PS I often want to crop several images from a sequence (to get tighter) but I want also to keep them perfectly to the same scale. I also will rotate to get the horizon straight and want the horizon to be in precisely the same position relative to the frame in each shot of the sequence. Know what I mean?

So, how do I do this? I usually crop by pulling the crop frame across the entire image, then holding the shift key and cropping in, then letting go of the shift key and rotating to straighten the horizon. This method works fine. Only problem is when I go to the next shot in the sequence I don't know how far in to crop to keep it exactly the same and I don't know where to position the horizon to make it identical to the last image in the sequence.

Hopefully I'm not over-explaining a simple idea, but I'd rather be sure I'm making myself clear, just in case.

If there is PS tool that I'm not aware of that makes this process simple I'd LOVE to hear about it. I'm an idiot when it comes to layers, masks, photomerging and all that fancy stuff.

Thanks!

jfriend

RKeaton wrote:

Okay, I've always wondered how this is done and I'm FINALLY getting around to asking. Hopefully someone has an answer for me.

I shoot lots of sequence when I do sports, usually surfing. The horizon is usually visible. Later in PS I often want to crop several images from a sequence (to get tighter) but I want also to keep them perfectly to the same scale. I also will rotate to get the horizon straight and want the horizon to be in precisely the same position relative to the frame in each shot of the sequence. Know what I mean?

So, how do I do this? I usually crop by pulling the crop frame across the entire image, then holding the shift key and cropping in, then letting go of the shift key and rotating to straighten the horizon. This method works fine. Only problem is when I go to the next shot in the sequence I don't know how far in to crop to keep it exactly the same and I don't know where to position the horizon to make it identical to the last image in the sequence.

Hopefully I'm not over-explaining a simple idea, but I'd rather be sure I'm making myself clear, just in case.

If there is PS tool that I'm not aware of that makes this process simple I'd LOVE to hear about it. I'm an idiot when it comes to layers, masks, photomerging and all that fancy stuff.

Thanks!

In Bridge/ACR or Lightroom, you could apply the exact same crop and rotation from one image to the whole rest of the shoot. Then, go through each image and position (but not resize) the crop how you want for each individual shot. Then, they will all have the same scale and same rotation.

RKeaton

jfriend wrote:

In Bridge/ACR or Lightroom, you could apply the exact same crop and rotation from one image to the whole rest of the shoot. Then, go through each image and position (but not resize) the crop how you want for each individual shot. Then, they will all have the same scale and same rotation.

And how exactly would one do this? I need at least a detail or two.

I use Bridge, btw.

jfriend

RKeaton wrote:

And how exactly would one do this? I need at least a detail or two.

I use Bridge, btw.

Multi-select all the images in Bridge. Open them in Adobe Camera RAW. Select the first thumb. Fix the rotation. Set the crop size you want. Hit the select all button in the upper left corner. Hit the syncrhonize button in the upper left corner. Make sure that only the crop checkbox is selected in the resulting dialog. Hit OK in the dialog. Select each thumb individually and position the crop the way you want with the mouse (don't change it's size, just it's position). Hit Done in ACR.

All images have the same crop size and rotation.

If you are shooting JPEG, you have to configure Bridge to use ACR for JPEGs. It always works for RAWs.

RKeaton

jfriend wrote:

Multi-select all the images in Bridge. Open them in Adobe Camera RAW. Select the first thumb. Fix the rotation. Set the crop size you want. Hit the select all button in the upper left corner. Hit the syncrhonize button in the upper left corner. Make sure that only the crop checkbox is selected in the resulting dialog. Hit OK in the dialog. Select each thumb individually and position the crop the way you want with the mouse (don't change it's size, just it's position). Hit Done in ACR.

All images have the same crop size and rotation.

If you are shooting JPEG, you have to configure Bridge to use ACR for JPEGs. It always works for RAWs.

That was the sort of detailed response I was hoping for, however I still haven't managed to do it. The sequence I'm trying to crop is in jpeg. First question, WHY would I need to use ACR to work on jpeg files? That just doesn't make sense to me. I have to customize Bridge to allow Camera Raw to work with jpegs... just to perform a crop? There isn't a way to do this through PS?

Even though I don't think it makes sense I still tried the method you suggested and didn't see an option to configure Bridge to use ACR for jpegs. I opened Bridge and looked in both Camera Raw Preferences and Preferences (main) and didn't see any such option.

jfriend

RKeaton wrote:

That was the sort of detailed response I was hoping for, however I still haven't managed to do it. The sequence I'm trying to crop is in jpeg. First question, WHY would I need to use ACR to work on jpeg files? That just doesn't make sense to me. I have to customize Bridge to allow Camera Raw to work with jpegs... just to perform a crop? There isn't a way to do this through PS?

Even though I don't think it makes sense I still tried the method you suggested and didn't see an option to configure Bridge to use ACR for jpegs. I opened Bridge and looked in both Camera Raw Preferences and Preferences (main) and didn't see any such option.

I don't know how to do the same crop and rotation in Photoshop. It's trivial in Bridge/ACR or Lightroom and that's' who I do it so that's how I described it. Presumably, you can do it on Photoshop by making some sort of action that you apply to a batch of images, but I don't know how to do that. Maybe someone else can help.

The relevant preference in Bridge/ACR for JPEGs is Edit/Camera RAW Preferences/[X] Always open JPEG files with settings using Camera RAW.

But, a problem is that Bridge remembers what this setting was the first time it ever saw a particular directory and I don't know how to make it change that setting on a directory you've already seen.

Since you're using JPEGs and don't use ACR on them, maybe someone else can help you figure out how to make a Photoshop action that will apply the same settings to a bunch of images. I've never done it that way.

Here's a Google search on that question that has some hits that look helpful.

RKeaton

Thanks a lot for all your help. I'll let you know if I ever get it down.