Creating Templates

[monkeyfotos]

We are new to PS Remote and need any help we can get on creating templates. Are there instructions available as to how to use photoshop to create and how to use in PS Remote? We've downloaded the manual, but still not sure how the two come together. Thanks!

[Chris Breeze]

There is a series of articles on photobooth shooting on our website which might help:
http://www.breezesys.com/articles/photobooth.htm

[monkeyfotos]

So am I understanding this correctly - from a graphic design standpoint....basically i would design my borders/templates, whatever i want to use (ie if I want wedding bells on the corner for wedding, or add christmas holly or whatever to be used for different events) I simply put together my design set to 4x6 ration and then set my printer settings to place and size images around the design jpg? or does the system read a png file and automatically size and place photos where masks were created in photoshop?

[Chris Breeze]

Yes, you can use any graphic design you like. Use the background.jpg image for anything that goes behind the photos and the overlay.png image for anything that overlays the photos. The alpha channel in the overlay image controls the transparency and so you could have wedding bells or holly overlaying the photos and have them casting a semi-transparent shadow.

The print formatting doesn't resize the background and overlay images and so the best thing to do is to make them exactly the same size as the printed output in pixels. The easiest way to do this is to set the output option to JPEG only, take a test shot and then use the saved JPEG layout as the starting point for the background and overlay images. The custom layout option gives you precise control over the positioning of each photo.

[obtphoto]

I do not quite understand the way the calculation is done in the custom layout screen. I tried putting a spreadsheet together that will do my calculation for me once I plug in the height and width and the any of the other variables necessary for calculating the required information. I have a feeling I am over-thinking it and I need some help. Can it be explained in another way?

Thanks

[Chris Breeze]

Are you referring to the way the width is calculated when only the height is specified (or vice versa)? The aspect ratio of Canon PowerShot images is 4:3. Canon and Nikon DSLR images have an aspect ration of 3:2.
So if the width is specified as 120 pixels and the height is set to 0 this would give an image height of:
PowerShot cameras: 3 x 120 / 4 = 90 pixels
Nikon and Canon DSLRs: 2 * 120 / 3 = 80 pixels