Photo collages

[black]

I've admired Arp's photo collages of woodlice and ladybirds on this site. I'm wanting to have four 6x4 images, two up two down so to speak, on a 12x8 print with no space between the images or background. Each individual image is in the 3:2 ratio with the same size Megapixel dimensions eg 3072x2048.

I use Photoshop Elements an early freebie edition I recieved with a scanner. Is there an easy way of doing this?
I had a look at the Picture package option but this didn't seem to have the 'number of prints' and 'size of prints' combination I wanted.

[Pudding4brains]

Hi Black,

Thanks for your kind words ... most of the time I create my collages because the individual images are too small to be uploaded here by themselves - but I guess sometimes it's also useful to see a "storyline" in one image rather than 4 or so

From your remarks I'm gathering you're looking for a solution along the lines of a printer driver throwing together several images in one printjob or so. That might work, but it's not how I go about it. I just very simply cut & paste the component images into a new "canvas" for the collage. Any-ol' image proggie should be able to that, you may even do it with "Paint" or the equivalent "no-frills" drawing application that came with your operating system (whatever it is you're using).

I'm sure your freebie Photoshop Elements can do that too. Just for the heck of it try something simple such as:

- to avoid errors resulting in loss of originals make backup copies of all images you intend to use - or rather create extra copies in a "working folder".

- open one image, create the crop you want, maybe resize and "copy" to the clipboard (usually Ctrl+C)

- open a second image, maybe if needed select the "select/area/box/whatever" tool, point, click & drag to select an area to paste the first image into and "paste" it from the clipboard (usually Ctrl+V).

Anyway ... something like that.

On Windows I'm quite pleased doing all that sort of thing with my standard viewing tool on that OS: The freeware program "IrfanView" - just can't be bothered to open a second application for it and it does all the basic things one can think of (crop, resize, rotate, play with colours, sharpen, red eye red., save as numerous different file formats ... whatever).

Hope it helps
Cheers, Arp

[black]

Thanks Arp,
I've managed to sort it out, I just opened one image re-sized the canvas, opened the other three then there was a "move" icon which allowed me to reposition them on the canvas as different layers.
I saw a number of slugs at the weekend and I thought they'd look quite neat four on a print. It is an ideal medium for the storyline effect.
I'm paranoid about losing photos, I lost some prints a few years ago that were of sentimental value with no negatives. Now its digital I have four external hard drives kept in various places!

[Pudding4brains]

Originally Posted by black

I've managed to sort it out

Good for you!

I'm paranoid about losing photos, ... Now its digital I have four external hard drives kept in various places!

Sounds a tad paranoid allright But better safe than sorry

I'm supposed to be IT-savvy, but my backup solutions (and discipline!) for my personal stuff is ... well, the worst ... Oh well, at least I can do my own data recovery

As long as you have 4 external drives anyway, I suppose you keep at least one "away from home"? A-bomb proof shelter at your parents place? You wouldn't be the first one to keep double copies, all in the same house ... that burned down.

Cheers, Arp