#5 Exploring Adobe Photoshop CS3: Droplets, Automating Your Tasks (Part 2)

In Part 1, we created a Watermark Action for one or two images. Now what if you have to watermark tons of images? It would still be hard to open your files one by one and hit the play button tons of times.

So, enter the Droplets.

Droplets allows an Action to be done on a set of images. It automatically performs the Action you selected on the images you wish to process. This could be done by either dragging your images to the Droplet icon (which we will get to later), or by selecting all open files in Photoshop.

First, we have to create a Droplet. File -> Automate -> Create Droplet.

A window will then appear containing the following sections.

Save Droplet In

Select where you would want to save your Droplet. The Droplet would appear as an executable file. It has an icon of its own outside of Photoshop, meaning your Droplet will remain in view whether Photoshop is running or not. For this demonstration, let's say we save the Droplet on your Desktop and name it as Watermark.

Play

Set: Select the folder of your Watermark Action, if you created one, otherwise it would appear in the Default Folder.

Action: Select the Watermark Action.

For now, we will only mark the "Include All Subfolders" and "Suppress Color Profile Warnings" options. You can then later experiment with the other Droplet preferences.

Destination

Select a destination where you would like to save your Action-Performed projects. For this sample, create a Watermarked Folder on your Desktop.

You may leave the Override Action "Save As" Commands unmarked since we have not done any Save As commands while recording the Watermark Action in Part 1. However, if you did save your file during recording, marking this checkbox would mean automatically saving your file in the Destination Folder (which is the Watermarked Folder you created on your Desktop) regardless of where you saved your file during recording. But if you do mark the checkbox, if your recording does not contain any Save As commands, your watermarked files will not be saved whether you have indicated the Destination Folder.

File Naming

This is where you specify the filename format you would like to use for watermarked images. To keep thngs simple and short, select Document Name for the first box and extension for the next box and leave the rest empty. Take note that you may save your filename will appear as the option you select - lowercase, uppercase, day before month and the like.

Starting serial#: We leave this as 0.

Compatibility: Select your operating system. Right now, I am using Windows.

Errors

Here you may either Stop for Errors or have it written in a file.

Click the OK button when you are done.

You would then notice a Watermark icon on your Desktop. To get things going, you may either double click on it to start the Watermark Action on all open files (these files must be saved first) or drag a folder of images to it (remember that we checked the Include All Subfolders option, so all contents of your folder will be watermarked). Either way, Photoshop would start to automatically watermark your images.

If the Save As command isn't included in your Watermark Action (which is not if you followed exactly the steps in Part 1), the Save As Window will continually appear after every watermarked image.

Since watermarking is usually a last step in creating images, it would better to add a Save / Save As command to the Action. However, if your Action is to be done at the middle of your work, a Save As command would not be really needed to be included in the Action and it would be better to mark the Override Action "Save As" Commands to prevent the Save As prompt each time.

Once done, check your Watermarked Folder on your Desktop and you will see your images all watermarked.

Aside from watermarking, you could use Actions and Droplets in cropping and resizing (which could really be handy when making thumbnails or a photo album), adding color, textures and more complex tasks. More time could be saved and getting the job done is a lot easier.

So there!