Looking for easy way to make school contact sheets

[David H]

Hi all,

I have been asked to do a school photo shoots which is not a problem.

I am looking to see if there is a program that I can put in automatically the images onto a template with positions for the images as well as contact details price list etc.?

I can make up a template but the thought of having to resize over 2000 shots and manually put them in the template spaces is going to take forever.

Does any member know of an easy way or programme that will do this ?

Ideally I wanted to keep the price list and the images etc all on the one sheet without having to have the sheets printed first then the photos added as this would greatly increase the costs & time etc.

Thanks in advance for any help you may be able to give me is most appreciated.

regards,

David

[Chain]

Re: Looking for easy way to make school contact sh

From Bridge you can select as many images as you want and generate a Contact Sheet in InDesign.

Contact details and price lists complicates things, but with the InDesign contact sheet at least it's editable (compared to Photoshop or PDF). My Bridge is not communicating with InDesign at the moment due to some weird bug so I cannot test it.

[David H]

Re: Looking for easy way to make school contact sh

Thanks for the reply,

Never used InDesign but it may be worth looking into if it will save all the hassle, I have set up an action to resize them all but if I could speed up the contact sheet part then that would be great.

The other way was just to get Photoshop to generate a contact sheet then have a seperate price list etc but as there is only going to be 5 photos per person 3 portrait and 2 class photos but I would prefer to have it all on one sheet with my headers etc and keep the printing costs down.

regards,

David

[Chain]

Re: Looking for easy way to make school contact sh

If you generate a contact sheet with Bridge -> InDesign (or Bridge>Output>PDF, or Bridge>Photoshop) then you don't need to do anything about your images first. They will be resized automatically as needed for the sizes/resolutions you choose.

[David H]

Re: Looking for easy way to make school contact sh

Never thought of making a custom size contact sheet that I can then insert into the template I've made as a PDF with all the prices contact details etc etc Duh !!

That way I do not have to resize all the images first

[Chain]

Re: Looking for easy way to make school contact sh

You made a template as PDF? PDF is some exported print-ready copy of your template...

If we're still talking InDesign (probably, as that software is intended for such things) then you put your template-elements on the Master page of the generated contact sheet and it will show up on all pages.

When you export the finished document to PDF from InDesign all linked images are resampled to the chosen ppi (and converted).

[David H]

Re: Looking for easy way to make school contact sh

I can see that I will have to get a copy of InDesign, as if I am reading this right then when I generate a conact sheet in bridge and export it to InDesign then it places them right where I want with all the data price list etc. already there?

I just made the template up in Excel and then saved as a PDF

[Chain]

Re: Looking for easy way to make school contact sh

The contact sheet is actually generated in InDesign. You just start the process from Bridge (like with Photoshop Contact Sheets). It will distribute the images on the page (you choose how).

Static elements that will be identical on all pages can be added to the master page afterwards ("template").

Damn that my Bridge isn't detecting the rest of my Creative Suite or I could test it and give more detailed advice.

[David H]

Re: Looking for easy way to make school contact sh

had a look at InDesign,

That gridify is rather smart once you get you head around using the mouse and drag as well as arrow keys. never used Indesign but I'm getting there hehehe