Turning Photographs Into Art Part 5: Printing from Lightroom A - Selecting, Editing and Creating a Layout

Turning Photographs Into Art Part 5: Printing from Lightroom A – Selecting, Editing and Creating a Layout

Techniques

September 28, 2018 ·

Alain Briot

The Lightroom Interface in the Print Module

1 – Introduction: why printing your work is important

An important aspect of turning your photographs into art is printing them. Printing is necessary because fine art photography is both a digital and a physical artistic medium. In the case of photography, the physical medium is a digital or a chemical print. In the case of other mediums, it can be a painting, a drawing, a sculpture or any other object or physical creation.

While today we can share digital photographs on the internet and view them on a computer monitor or on a variety of digital devices, art shows, galleries, museums and other locations where art is displayed or sold still require physical prints either matted, framed or mounted on a metal, wood or other support. You can print your work from Photoshop, Image Print and from just about any other software package. You can also print your work from Lightroom and doing so is the focus of this essay you are reading now. This essay features a detailed account of the Lightroom Printing Module. This account follows my workflow and it is organized in the order in which I use each dialog box when I print my photographs.

2 – About this essay
This essay will be published in three parts numbered A, B and C. Part A focuses on selecting, editing and creating a layout. Part B will focus on using Templates and Soft Proofing and part C will focus on color management and printing on the Epson SC-P600.

This series of three essays is part of my Artistic Lightroom Mastery Workshop on USB or DVD. This extensive mastery tutorial covers all aspects of Lightroom starting from image management and selection, continuing with image processing and optimizing and concluding with proofing and printing your photographs. You can view a detailed table of contents here together with a special offer for Luminous Landscape readers.

This photograph was processed entirely in Lightroom, from the raw file to the final print file.

3 – Image collections

Before you can print from Lightroom you need to select the images you want to print. You do this by choosing a Collection from the Collections palette. This means that before you can print you need to create a collection of images because the Image Folders menu is not accessible from the Print menu.

In Lightroom, an image collection is a folder in which you place a selection of images. You start by creating a Collection, naming it and adding images you want to have in this specific collection.

A – Print collections

To maximize workflow efficiency I recommend you create a collection that you name “Print Collection” plus the name of the location, subject or date to make it easy to find if you have several print collections.

B – Selecting photographs to print in a collection

Before you can drag images to the printing page you need to select which images will be accessible to you in the printing module. Lightroom gives you three options to filter which photographs are displayed in the printing module film strip:

– Selecting All Filmstrip Photos will show all the images in a filmstrip

– Selecting Selected Photos will show only the photos you selected

– Selecting Flagged Photos will show only the photos that you have flagged, meaning photos for which you set a Flag ranking in the Develop or Library module.

In the printing module you need to select one of these three options in your print collection to be able to add images to print:

The three selection options determine which photos are displayed in the filmstrip and which photographs will be printed. Here I selected the Flagged Photos option.

4 – How to select which photographs will print
Before choosing one of the three selection options you need to know exactly how each of them works because they each select images in different ways. Your choice needs to be made on the basis of which images you want to print. Here is how it works:

Use All Filmstrip Photos to print all the photographs in the filmstrip (the Filmstrip is the row of images at the bottom of the Lightroom interface). When you select this option all the photographs in your collection will print even if you select only some of the photographs. Pressing the command key while making a selection does not allow you to select only some of the images.

Use Selected Photos to select only some of the images. If you need to select photographs that are not next to each other you can do so by pressing the Command key (for Mac or the Alt key for Windows) while clicking on the photographs you want to select. If you do not press the command key while you are selecting images you will only be able to select photographs that are next to each other.

Use Flagged Photos to print all the photographs you flagged.

When you select this option all the photographs will print even if you select only some of the photographs because pressing the command key will not allow you to select only some images. I personally prefer the flag option because it allows me to make a selection of images specifically for printing. For that reason, I use mostly the Flag Photos option to filter the images I want to print.

5 – Editing images from the print module

You can continue editing the images in a collection after you started working in the print module. Placing your cursor on a print collection in the Library module will bring up a small arrow on the right of the collection name. Clicking on this arrow will take you directly to the Printing Module where you can make further image adjustments.

Placing your cursor on a print collection in the Library module will bring up a small arrow on the right of the collection name, next to the number of images in the collection. Clicking on that arrow will take you to the Develop Module.

6 – Lightroom Layout Styles

The Lightroom Layout Styles dialog boxes control how your photographs are placed on the printing page. Lightroom features three different Layout Style options. These layout style options are located on the right side of the printing module.

The layout style you select will change the options in the printing palettes. The list below shows which options are present under each of the three printing modules:

Layout Style: Single image/contact sheet

– Image settings
– Layout (replaces cells)
– Guides (Ruler units and grid are in Layout)
– Page
– Print job

Layout Style: Picture package

– Image settings
– Rulers, Grid & Guides
– Cells (replaces layout)
– Page
– Print job

Layout style: Custom package

– Image settings
– Rulers, Grid & Guides
– Cells (replaces layout)
– Page
– Print job

The three Layout Style options in the Layout Style dialog box.

7 – Creating the Print layout

The print layout is the process through which you prepare your images for printing in regards to how they will look on the page. This includes the print size, the page size, the page direction and more.

A – Paper size

There are two ways to set the paper size. You can set the paper size in Lightroom by selecting a Lightroom template that features the page size you want to use. Or you can set the paper size in the printer dialog box by clicking on the Page Setup button at the bottom left of the Lightroom interface. This button opens the printer dialog box in which you can either select the paper size or enter a custom paper size.

In practice, I often end up using both. I start by using a template with the paper size I want to lay the print onto and I continue by setting the same paper size in the printer dialog box.

The Page Setup and Print Settings buttons are located under the Collections palette.

The paper size options in the Print Setup dialog box.

B – Page orientation

The page orientation can be set to either horizontal or vertical to accommodate images that are vertical or horizontal. This is set by clicking on the Page Setup button at the bottom left of the Print module. This button opens the printer dialog box in which you can select a vertical or horizontal page orientation.

The page orientation –either vertical or horizontal– is set in the printer Page Setup dialog box by clicking on the Page Setup Button in Lightroom at the bottom left of the Print module

Horizontal page orientation selected in the Printer Page Setup dialog box.

Vertical page orientation selected in the printer Page Setup dialog box.

C – Cells

A cell is the frame in which you place your photograph. Lightroom gives you the option of having a single cell on your page, the size of your print, or to can have two or more cells on your page, to either print the same photo in different sizes on a single page or to print different photographs on the same page. When creating a Custom Package you can add cells from the Cells palette. You can also control the size, rotation and aspect ratio of these cells in the same palette.

D – Moving cells

When you add multiple cells they may overlap each other. To organize them the way you want you can move them forward or backward by right-clicking on the cell and selecting the option you want from the drop-down menu that comes up. You can also rearrange the cells by dragging them to the location of your choice on the page.

The Move Cell options. You access this menu by right-clicking on a cell in the layout window.

F – Photo Info

You can have Lightroom include information under each photograph according to the choices you make in the Photo Info drop-down menu (you need to right-click on Photo Info to access this menu).

8 – Skill enhancement exercise

Here is the skill enhancement exercise for this essay:

Open Lightroom, load some of your photographs and practice the tips outlined in this essay. Because this essay is presented as a set of instructions, it will be much easier to follow if you are working in Lightroom while you reading it.

This photograph was processed entirely in Lightroom, from the raw file to the final print file.

9 – What’s next?

This series is a suivre and you do not want to miss the next episode. Part B will continue this series on printing from Lightroom with a tutorial on how to use Lightroom Templates and Soft Proofing functions.

10 – About Alain and Natalie Briot

I create artistic photographs and I teach students how to create artistic photographs. To this end, I teach field workshops and classroom seminars with Natalie and I offer Mastery Tutorials on composition, image conversion, optimization, personal style, printing, business and marketing.

You can find more information about our workshops, photographs, writings and tutorials as well as subscribe to our Free Monthly Newsletter on our website here. You will receive 40 free eBooks when you subscribe to my newsletter.

I am also the author of Mastering Landscape Photography, Mastering Photographic Composition, Creativity and Personal Style, Marketing Fine Art Photography andHow Photographs are Sold. All 4 books are available in eBook format on our website here. Free samplers are available so you can see the quality of these books for yourself.

If you enjoyed this essay you will enjoy attending a workshop with us. I lead workshops with my wife Natalie to the most photogenic locations in the US Southwest. Our workshops focus on the artistic aspects of photography. While we do teach technique, we do so for the purpose of creating artistic photographs. Our goal is to help you create photographs that you will be proud of and that will be unique to you. The locations we photograph include Navajoland, Antelope Canyon, Monument Valley, Zion, the Grand Canyon and many others. Our workshops listing is available here.

Alain Briot
September 2018

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Alain Briot

See all articles by Alain Briot

Alain Briot creates fine art photographs, teaches workshops and offers DVD tutorials on composition, raw conversion, optimization, printing and marketing. Alain is the author of Mastering Landscape Photography, Mastering Photographic Composition and Marketing Fine Art Photography. All 3 books are available from Alain’s website as well as from most bookstores. You can find more information about Alain's work, writings and tutorials as well as subscribe to Alain’s Free Monthly Newsletter on his website. You will receive over 40 essays in PDF format, including chapters from Alain’s books, when you subscribe.