This tutorial will show you how to use batch processing with Photoshop actions and more specifically how to create an action to crop and resize images using batch processing in Photoshop.
Batch processing allows you to apply an action to a large group of images all at once so there is no need to open each image by hand and apply the action Photoshop can do it all for you.
Before you do this tutorial you may want to look at my actions tutorial
Video Tutorial
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Text Tutorial
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Step 1 – The Action
Go to Window > Actions or use keyboard shortcut ( Alt + F9 )
Make your action that you want to batch process I made a video tutorial about creating actions you can watch that to refresh your memory, and I briefly show you in the current video how to create an action.
Step 2 – Batch Processing
Once you have your action go to File > Automate > Batch this will take you to a screen where you can change certain options as in the next step.
Step 3 – Batch Processing Screen
Play: Set – Select the folder from the dropdown list where you created your action
Play: Action – Select action from the dropdown you want to perform.
Source: Folder > Choose the folder where all you images are. i would highly recommend you make a copy of this folder as a backup just in case you make a mistake and you cant get your images back.
Destination: Folder > Choose the folder where you want to save all your images once the action has been performed.
File Naming: [document name] will keep the current file name in lower case and + [extension] will add the file extension such as jpg, gif, bmp
Click Ok when you have the correct settings and this will start the processing.
Step 4 – The Output
When the processing is finished you can check your files by going to your destination folder this should have your processed files in. Your source folder should have you original files, they should be exactly the same and should not have had the action applied to them.
Conclusion
You can probably see how batch processing can save you a lot more time using actions that you have created, if you are applying an action to a whole group of images you may want to test it on a few of the images to make sure that you get the desired results for each of the images.
Batch processing can be used for a whole host of different things maybe you need to re-colour a group of images or add a certain border to them, the possibilities are endless.
Comments
Do you use batch processing? What do you use batch processing for? Let me know in the comments below.