Proof Print Action-Script?

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Koyaanis
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Registriert: Mo 25 Sep 2006 20:23

Proof Print Action-Script?

Beitrag von Koyaanis »

I was recently playing with a plugin that unfortunately ONLY works with PS, but I like the idea and thought it would be possible to write an "action" script for PL32 that does the exact same thing.

With color-management always being a trouble spot, I often come up with printouts that are tinted too blue, so just before printing I have to adjust the color balance by trial & error. The plugin I was playing with does what we used to do in the color-darkroom. It would make a composite of the original image, and then divide it up the page into a 3x3 grid, (though a 4x4 or 5x5 grid would be nicer). Then it would apply a range of hue-shifts to each grid-image. Overlaying text information on each smaller image of the amount of color-shift that was applied on each one. You print up that proof page, select the image that looks best, then use those color settings to adjust your original image.

So ... how would one go about doing that with PL32's "action" feature? It would have to downsize the original to a page of 3x3, 4x4, or 5x5 grids, put the image in each grid position, then apply a selectable color shift amount to each one to cover all possibilities (lightness and darkness or contrast too?), as well as overlay text for the amount of changes needed.

Does anyone know how to go about this? Or has an action script like this already been created? Could it be a built-in tool in the print-options in a future version of PL32? (Now that would be sweet!)
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Hoogo
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Beitrag von Hoogo »

On first glance such a script does not look too difficult. I'd start with resizing the image to a fixed, not too small size. After that it should be possible to create a lasso with the "formlasso" (don't have PL32 at hand..) as it's always at a fixed position and play with the histogramm. As you can not show all R/G/B-changes in a simple 2D-Pattern, I would try Lab, but I can't tell without looking at it if it will give useful results.
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Koyaanis
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Beitrag von Koyaanis »

Well, I tried making such a script/action the other day, and I guess I'm just not well-versed enough in using the record-action features of PL32.

I started out by resizing a new layer of the original to the required thumb-size needed for a 3x5 grid, and then pasting it into a template I made using guide-lines so they would snap to position.

There I could adjust the +RGB and -RGB (+CMY) levels for each thumb in each position. Using the quick +/- RGB clicks on the contrast-brightness tool-bar. (Does anyone know how much each click changes the amount of RGB? I presume it's in steps of 10? Seems to be. I couldn't find this mentioned in Help or anything.)

Then it would have been a simple matter of adding text overlays properly positioned on each thumb's panel describing the +/- RGB (or -/+ CMY) changes that each one had done to it.

BUT ... the Action recording feature fails to record the guide-lines, it won't import the guide-lines from a predefined guide setting (that I made and saved). It won't auto-position the clipboard images to their needed positions, you have to run the action with dialogs and tell each and every one where you want it to be pasted. The action recording feature won't even create the new document needed to start this all. So, I gave up trying to use the crippled features of the Action tools.

The Action recording feature really needs some way where you can manually edit the actions needed, and have it support every conceivable command available in PL32. I could probably do all this in PSP with its more capable scripting features, but I'd rather not ever go back to using PSP. In lieu of all this, I did find an earlier version of the plugin that started me doing all this, which *does* work with PL32. But it's limited in just how many color variations can be done on a proof page. Just one (user definable) step for each color change, in a 3x3 grid (2 of the thumbs used for brightness variants). I wanted/needed far more than that.