Archiving and Backing Up Your Digital Photo Collection

You can archive digital images that you don't need to access quickly or frequently. If a photo is valuable to you on some level in the long run but you don't imagine wanting to look at or print it in the foreseeable future, just save it to disc - a CD or DVD is the best choice because Zip disks and floppy disks have a considerably shorter storage life. You have several archiving options, many of which may be on your computer right now. If they're not, you can easily acquire them.

Backing up your best shots

Once you've organized your photos, you should already have the photos categorized and know which ones are important to you. You need to back up these cherished shots and store them in some way to protect them from anything that can happen to your computer or your photo albums (printed or electronic).

Your backup options are simple:

• Store the photos on disk. You may want to avoid floppy disks because they offer very little storage space and are notoriously unreliable. Zip disks have a higher capacity and are more reliable, but they're more expensive than CD or DVD media.

• Write them to a disc by using a CD or DVD burner. This method enables you to store up to 700MB on a single CD or several gigabytes on a DVD. If your computer already has a burner in it or attached to it, all you need is a package of writable CDs, which you can use with your burner.

• Store them online. Web sharing sites also can provide you with a sort of backup for your images. It's best to use these sites as a secondary backup (sort of as a backup to your backup) because you have no way to guarantee how long these services will be around!

Using CD-R and CD-RW discs

Most new computers come with a CD burner as standard equipment. If your computer has only CD-ROM capability, you can easily add an inexpensive CD burner.

With the ability to write to a CD, you now can save up to 700MB of data on a very reliable medium. Unlike floppy and Zip disks that can be ruined by exposure to magnets, heat, cold, sunlight, water, and rough handling, CDs are quite stable if handled correctly.

Now, before you run out and buy a CD burner and CDs to burn, consider these writable-CD facts:

• Writable CDs come in two types: CD-R and CD-RW. CD-Rs can be written to (the R stands for Recordable), but only once. CD-RWs can be written to and erased, and written to again.

• You can use a CD-R or a CD-RW like a floppy or Zip disk by using a mode called Packet Writing (also called UDF). In that mode, you can copy files or groups thereof to the CD.

• CDs are virtually indestructible (unless you crack, break, or severely scratch them). Even so, you shouldn't expose CD-Rs and CD-RWs to direct sunlight or extreme heat.

Using DVDs

DVD players are a reasonable tool for saving data because DVD recorders have dropped significantly in price, and blank DVD discs are inexpensive. DVDs hold more data than a CD-R or CD-RW can - almost 5 gigabytes or more.

Like CD burners, DVD burners also come in more than one type:

• DVD-Video discs (the prerecorded kind) come with stuff prewritten to them. You can view what's on them, but you can't erase and then rewrite to them.

• DVD+R and DVD-R discs can be written to only once.

• DVD+RW and DVD-RW discs can be written to, erased, and written to again.

If your computer already has a DVD-ROM (read-only) drive in it, that doesn't mean you can write to DVD discs. It simply means you can play them. To write to a DVD disc, you need:

• A DVD+RW or DVD-RW drive that both plays and records DVDs

• DVD-R, DVD+R, DVD-RW or DVD+RW discs

Off-site storage for maximum safety

If your photos are so precious that you'd just die if anything happened to them, or if they're important for legal, financial, or other compelling reasons, don't risk losing them to a fire or burglary. You can store your archives off-site in one of three ways:

• Use a bank safe deposit box.

• Use a safe located in a secure storage facility.

• Arrange to keep one of two archive copies with a friend or family member.

If you save your images to CD or DVD, you can make two sets and store one set off-site.

http://tech.yahoo.com/gd/archiving-and-backing-up-your-digital-photo-collection/153010;_ylt=AiunZmxyMSygwviQkxAIynwvLZA5

Adding Text to Your Digital Photos

You can add text to any image you edit with Photoshop Elements. You can add text to an image that will become a greeting card, poster, or framed artwork. You can create vertical or horizontal text using any font currently installed on your system.

Create Text

1. Open the image to which you want to add text.

2. Select the Text tool.

   

3. In the Options bar, click the Vertical or Horizontal Text icon, as shown next.

   

4. Click the down arrow to the right of the currently selected font and select the desired font family from the drop-down list.
5. Click the down arrow to the right of the currently selected font size and choose an option from the drop-down list. Alternatively, you can enter the desired value in the text field.
6. Click the desired alignment icon to left align, center, or right align the text.

7. Click the text color swatch to open the Color Picker, shown next.

   

8. Drag the arrows to the right of the Color slider to choose the hue and drag inside the Color field to set the saturation.

   

   To match a color in the image, move your cursor outside of the Color Picker. Your cursor becomes an eyedropper, signifying you can sample a color from within the image. Click the desired color to select it.

9. Click OK to exit the Color Picker.
10. Click inside the document and type the desired text. Photoshop Elements creates a layer for the text.

11. Select the Move tool.

    

12. Click and drag the text to the desired location.

    

    Photoshop Elements installs several Adobe Pro fonts with the application. Fonts such as Adobe Caslon Pro are particularly well suited for text on posters or cards.

Add a Drop Shadow to Text

1. Open the Layers palette.
2. Select the text layer to which you want to apply the drop shadow.
3. Choose Window | Layer Styles to open the Layer Styles palette.

4. Click the down arrow to the right of the currently selected Style Library and choose Drop Shadows from the drop-down list. This displays the Drop Shadows Style Library shown here.

   

5. Click the desired style to apply it to the text. The following image shows text to which a drop shadow has been applied.

   

   http://tech.yahoo.com/gd/adding-text-to-your-digital-photos/191758;_ylt=AgzozbqGuMdODSWaHyFhdOEvLZA5
   

Adding Painterly Effects to Your Digital Photos

Photoshop Elements has several filters you can use to add a painterly touch to your images. If you're a frustrated watercolor artist, or you like to dabble with colored pencils but just can't seem to make it work, you'll love the artistic and sketch filters. The following steps will give you an idea of what you can do with them. In this tutorial, you'll take it one step further by applying the filter on its own layer and using the Opacity control to let some of the original image shine through.

1. Open the photo you want to transform into a painterly image.
2. Open the Layers palette.
3. Drag the background layer to the Create New Layer icon and name the layer Chalk & Charcoal.
4. Select the second layer.

5. Choose Filter | Sketch | Chalk & Charcoal to open the dialog box shown next.

   

6. Drag the sliders to achieve to desired look.
7. Click OK to apply the filter to the layer.

8. In the Layers palette, set the opacity for the layer to 80 percent, as shown here.

   

9. Click the More button in the Layers palette and choose Flatten Image from the Layers menu. The following image shows a portrait that was modified using this technique.

   

   http://tech.yahoo.com/gd/adding-painterly-effects-to-your-digital-photos/191759;_ylt=AqByXZ_zkhQEPvSfTWtn5PMvLZA5
   

Adding a Fish-Eye Lens Effect to Your Digital Photos

1. Open an image that you want to appear as though it was photographed with a fish-eye lens.
2. Select the Crop tool.
3. Click at the top of the image and, while holding down the SHIFT key, drag the tool to the bottom of the image. When you hold down the SHIFT key, you constrain the cropping box to a square, which is perfect for a fish-eye look.
4. Click the Commit button on the options bar (it looks like a check box). Alternatively, you can press ENTER or RETURN.

5. Select the Elliptical Marquee tool and create a circular section that stretches from top to bottom and side to side, as shown next. Remember, to create a perfect circle, hold down the SHIFT key while dragging. Press the SPACEBAR momentarily to move the selection while creating it.

   

6. Choose Filter | Distort | Spherize.

7. Drag the Amount slider to 100, as shown here.

   

8. Click OK to apply the filter.
9. Choose Select | Inverse.
10. Choose Edit | Fill to open the Fill dialog box.

11. Click the down arrow to the right of the Use field and choose Black from the drop-down menu, as shown below.

    

12. Click OK to fill the selection.

13. Choose Select | Deselect. The following image shows an image with this effect applied.

    

    http://tech.yahoo.com/gd/adding-a-fish-eye-lens-effect-to-your-digital-photos/191761;_ylt=Ao5etUPvZkywftQ8T.o2sCsvLZA5
    

Accounting for Aspect Ratio in Digital Photography

You may notice that your digital pictures have a different width-to-height ratio - or aspect ratio, in photography lingo - than pictures taken with a 35mm film camera. Digital cameras produce images that have an aspect ratio of 4:3, and 35mm film negative produces pictures that have an aspect ratio of 3:2.

Why the difference? Well, digital cameras were first envisioned as devices to produce images for display on computer monitors, which have a 4:3 aspect ratio (as do many television screens). So matching the monitor aspect ratio made sense.

Today, however, digital cameras offer resolutions high enough to produce excellent prints. But there's a hitch: When you print a digital photo at traditional print sizes - 4 x 6, 5 x 7, 8 x 10, and so on - you lose some of the original image area because of the aspect ratio difference. (If you've ever had your digital files output at a retail lab, you've probably already noticed this change.)

Figures 1 and 2 show the percentage of image area you can expect to lose when you print your picture at 4 x 6, 5 x 7, or 8 x 10 inches. The left image in Figure 1 shows you the digital original; the darkened areas in the three remaining examples represent the lost portion of each picture.

Figure 1: A digital image (left) loses a portion of its original self when printed as a 4-x-6-inch photo (right).

Figure 2: You also lose some picture area when the photo is printed at 5 x 7 inches (left) or 8 x 10 inches (right).

This issue isn't a digital-only phenomenon, by the way. Your print lab must similarly crop away part of your 35mm film photo when making a 5 x 7 or 8 x 10 print, too. The only print size where you don't lose part of your 35mm original is 4 x 6, which has the same aspect ratio as the film negative (3:2).

Whether you're shooting digital or film, the problem has an easy solution. Just remember to include a small margin of background when you compose your pictures, as in Figure 1. That way, you won't lose any vital picture elements if you decide to print your photos at the traditional sizes.

If you're printing your own pictures, you can alternatively choose to reduce the size of your images so that they fit entirely within the 4-x-6-inch, 5-x-7-inch, or 8-x-10-inch boundary. You'll have a blank border along two sides of the photo. For this image, the patterned areas along the left and right sides of the picture represent the percentage of border needed to fill out an 8-x-10-inch print.

http://tech.yahoo.com/gd/accounting-for-aspect-ratio-in-digital-photography/2526;_ylt=AohhlVu162wHZHDQQRgROpovLZA5