Exercise 6: Photoshop Research

What should your PPI be for printed media? Why?
High quality images for printing are usually 300ppi or higher. When printing, quality should higer in priority than file size. The value for PPI determines how many pixels you would like to have per inch.

What should your PPI be for the web or emailing? Why?
For the web or emailing, images should be optimized for use on a computer monitor. Typically, monitors display at 72ppi. Setting a value around 72ppi results in a smaller file, resulting in emails and images that download faster.

What do RGB, CMYK and Grayscale refer to?
These refer to different colourspaces. Colourspaces refers to the different methods colour is displayed. RGB stands for red, green, and blue, CMYK refers to cyan, magenta, yellow and key, while grayspace represents the different shades of gray between white and black (inclusive). RGB is a additive colourspace, meaning that full values of each component creates white, whereas CMYK is an subtractive colourspace, meaning that full values of each component creates black. Because paper isn't black, printers usually print in CMYK.

How can you dodge and burn in photoshop?
Dodge and burn refers to the process of lightening and darking areas of an image. There are two main ways of achieving this in photoshop. The first method is to use the dodge and burn tools in Photoshop. The dodge tool lightens painted areas and is useful for increasing the brightness of midtones and blacks, while the burn tool is used to darken highlights and midtones. An alternative non-destructive method is to create an fill layer of 50% gray with a blending mode of overlay. Then using the brush tools, dodge and burn processes can be achieved by painting in grayscale.

Name the ways you can make selections in Photoshop.
There are a variety of tools in Photoshop which can be used to make selections on an image. the most basic of these are the marquee tools that allow you to select an area of a specified shape. Additionally, the wand, quick select and magnetic lasso tools allow you to quickly select an area that stands out from the image around it. Lastly, the lasso, polygon lasso and pen tools can be used to make more freeform selections.

How can you crop images in Photoshop? Write the procedure.
Using the crop tool in the main toolbar, click and drag around the area of the image you wish to keep. Then hit enter, and the area around the selected rectangle becomes removed.

Hoe can you make perspective changes in Photoshop? Write the procedure.
Perspective changes can be made using the transform function located in the edit drop down menu. Simply select and image then transform the selection with the perspective option. Moving the handles of the image changes the perspective.

How should you sharpen you images in Photoshop?
One method of sharpening images is to use the high pass technique. Using a duplicate background layer, set the blending mode to overlay and apply a high pass filter until the desired amount of sharpening is achieved. Then using a neutral gray, you can paint on the layer to create areas where sharpening will not be applied.

What are some of the ways you can make tone colour and contrast adjustments?
Two methods are using the image adjustments and using adjustment layers. Adjustment layers are usually the way to go because they are non-destructive and easily editable.

What does RAW, JPEG and TIFF stand for in file management?
Raw is not an acronym; it is simply the raw or verbatim data that is recorded by the camera sensor. This is often the highest quality file you can obtain from a digital camera. JPEG is an acronym for the Joint Photographic Experts Group, which created the standard. JPEG is one of the most common lossy compression format for digital images. TIFF or Tagged Image File Format is commonly used on Macintosh systems and is currently being maintained by Adobe. TIFF is a lossless format, which makes it popular for professional imaging applications as it allows for the editing and re-saving of an image without loss in quality.