THL Toolbox > Images & Immersive Technologies > Technically Processing Images > Processing Images for Essays and JIATS

Processing Images for Essays and JIATS

Note: These instructions for processing images for essays including JIATS articles are relevant only until the Media Management System is fully functional, at which point the ingestion of images into that system will follow that program's guidelines.

Images for essays should be sent by the author. If these are printed pictures that need to be scanned, follow the scanning instructions elsewhere in this section. Otherwise, it will be assumed that the image is a large JPG from a digital camera. You will need to create a large and small version of each image.

I. Convert to TIFF for Resizing

To resize the image into the two usable versions one must first convert the format to TIFF, which will allow resizing without loss.

1. Open the file in Photoshop
2. If Photoshop warns about a "Missing Profile", choose the "Leave as is (don't color manage)" option. (This is usually the default checked option.)
3. From the File menu, choose Save As
4. Under the Format option, choose TIFF (*.TIF, *.TIFF). Keep the file name the same except for the extension, and click the Save button.
5. Accept the default TIFF options on the next panel by clicking OK. On a PC this is Image Compression = None and Byte Order = IBM PC.
6. At this point, you can do some image manipulation to the TIFF if necessary. If the image is too dark, it can be brightened. Crop the image to center the subject, if this can be safely done without loss of content/meaning for the article. And so forth. Be sure to save the original JPG image sent by the author without any modifications for a backup.

Create a Photoshop Action to Batch-Process Images

Follow the individual instructions below, but you can use them to create a Photoshop Action to batch-process images and save time. Note: this worked once but the second time it didn't work, so you might have to ask the consultant in DML.

1. Open an image file.
2. In the Actions dialog box, click Create new action (at bottom right of the Actions dialog box). Give your action a name, and click “Record.”

Then do all the actions you want to run: Image > Size > set W=350px with constrain proportions and resample image=bicubic … . Click OK and the dialog box will close and add an Image Size subaction to your action in the Actions dialog box.

1. Then File > Save for Web and devices with preset=JPEG HIGH. Then click save; then select destination folder. Rename the file and when you have finished the process, click OK. This will add an Export subaction to your action in the Actions dialog box.
2. Then at the bottom left of the Actions dialog click Stop Playing/Recording. Close the image file and do not save it.

To run the action:

1. File > Automate > Batch > and in the Play section in the Action pulldown select the action you just created and named.
2. In the Source section click Choose button that is beneath the Folder pulldown and select the folder where the files you want to process are (make sure you have another copy of the files in a different folder in case something gets screwed up); in Destination click Choose and select the folder (make sure it is a different folder than the source folder; it is probably be to create a new folder at this point for some reason). In the File Naming section at the bottom, in the first field enter Document name; in the second field (to the right of the first field, on the top row) enter “-sm” (without the quotation marks); in the third field (row 2, beneath Document Name) pull down the menu and choose EXTENSION.
3. Click OK and it will batch process your files.

This is for making the 350 px wide jpgs. You can create another action to process the tiffs into 700-px wide jpg files.

II. Make Large Image

First make a large version of the image. This is the version used when a user wishes to see a larger version of an inline image. Its width is generally 700 pixels. General height for such images is around 525 pixels. However, for inverted upright images taken by turning the camera 90 degrees, set the height to 900 pixels maximum.

1. With the newly created TIFF file, choose the Image menu select Image Size
2. With "Constrain Proportions" and "Resample Image: Bicubic" checked, set the width to 700 pixels.
3. If it is an inverted, upright image, check the height. If it is larger than 900 pixels, set the height to 900 pixels.
4. Click OK.
5. From the File menu, choose "Save for Web".
6. Under the Settings menu in the resulting window, choose "JPEG High" this should set the quality of the JPEG image to 60%.
7. Click Save
8. Name the file "jiats{2-digit issue number}{author last name}-img{2-digit image number}.jpg. Thus, if it was the second image for Jones in issue 9, the name of the file name would be "jiats09jones-img02.jpg" For THL essays, not in JIATS, name the file with the authors first name followed by a dash, an abbreviation of the essay title, another dash, and then an image number, such as jones-nomads-img01.jpg.
9. Click Save
10. Close the original TIFF without saving (when you close the window, a dialog box will open; click the "Don't Save" button) so that it will remain at its large size for storage.

III. Make Small Image

The small image is the one actually used inline in an article. It is small enough to allow text to wrap around it (generally) and is clickable to display the larger image. No matter what the height, the width of the smaller images is always 350 pixels. Height would generally be around 250 for normal (horizontally-oriented) pictures to around 500 for vertical-oriented images.

1. Reopen the TIFF created in Step I.
2. Choose the Image menu select Image Size; with "Contrain Proportions" and "Resample Image: Bicubic" checked, set the width to 350 pixels.
3. Click OK.
4. From the File menu, choose "Save for Web".
5. Under the Settings menu in the resulting window, choose "JPEG High" this should set the quality of the JPEG image to 60%.
6. Click Save
7. Name the file the same as the large file with the added suffix of "-sm" before the image extension (.jpg). That is, "jiats{2-digit issue number}{author last name}-img{2-digit image number}-sm.jpg. Thus, if it was the second image for Jones in issue 9, the name of the file name would be "jiats09jones-img02-sm.jpg"
8. Click Save
9. Close the original TIFF without saving (when you close the window, a dialog box will open; click the "Don't Save" button) so that it will remain at its large size for storage.

IV. Post Images to Site and Backup

When the derivative images (the JPG files) have been completed, they should be posted to the appropriate directory.
JIATS

1. Post to either dev.thlib.org or one of the quandu servers in the directory for that issue of JIATS: /usr/local/projects/thdl.org{for dev.thlib.org, this directory is thlib.org}/static/reprints/jiats/{issue number}/images
2. Zip and post as a back-up in Collab.
3. Post the tiff files to the directory for that issue of JIATS in coldstorage: /net/hsm/dfg9w/jiats/images/{issue number}/{author's last name}

Essays

1. Put all the images in the appropriate image folder in Cocoon
   1. For a THL essay this would be in a folder by the authors name in the essay images folder. Should it be an essay by Jones that is not in JIATS, this would be at: /cocoon/texts/essays/images/j/
2. Post the folder and images to Subversion and deploy them with the deployer tool.
3. Zip all the images into an archive and post in the JIATS collab resources as a backup.