Cropping several photos a the same time in Photoshop

[Overread]

Ok so I've a selection of photos in Photoshop and what I want to do is to crop them to the same crop. However I also want to have them overlaid so I can review the crop on each one before committing to a crop of all three.

Now I know I can copy and paste them and do that with layers in a single photo; but I feel it must be possible to do it to multiple separate files without having to fiddle with moving photos into a composite file and then out again to get what I want.

In addition I googled; but could only find replies for using actions to automate the process, not allow for review and comparison .

 

[JacaRanda]

Sounds like a job maybe for LR.

I have only repeated a crop to one photo from a previous, but never tried multiple.

Will give it a shot tonight (if I remember).

 

[Forkie]

You could create an action to do the cropping, but I haven't heard of batch cropping.

Cropping automatically is a difficult thing to do. It's not like a filter or colour cast where you might want to apply the same colour to every image. Resizing is also easy, because it simply resizes the image to set proportions. Because cropping is compositional, unless your subject is framed exactly the same way in every shot, the software won't know how you want to crop it.

 

[Dave442]

I guess when you say the same crop is that you are changing the aspect ratio and you want to find a crop/aspect ratio that works for all three images. I would do that in LR. Look at the three in Grid layout and then with an idea for the crop go and do a crop on one in Develop and make the special aspect ratio if required. Then try on the other two and adjust, if it does not work on one photo then make change and then apply change to the other two photos and recheck. Not very automated.

Then of course you could go into PS and do some content aware fill if there was an image that needed that to work with the aspect ratio desired.

Usually I just run into this when making a slideshow for a TV with the 16:9 aspect ratio.

 

[407370]

Ok so I've a selection of photos in Photoshop and what I want to do is to crop them to the same crop. However I also want to have them overlaid so I can review the crop on each one before committing to a crop of all three.

Now I know I can copy and paste them and do that with layers in a single photo; but I feel it must be possible to do it to multiple separate files without having to fiddle with moving photos into a composite file and then out again to get what I want.

In addition I googled; but could only find replies for using actions to automate the process, not allow for review and comparison .

I am not sure what you want to achieve but...

Irfanview gives several options to batch process including crop:

 

[dennybeall]

If you bring up the set of photos you want in Adobe Bridge you can load them into PS as layers of a single file with one command. Then make the changes you need.

 

[Forkie]

If you bring up the set of photos you want in Adobe Bridge you can load them into PS as layers of a single file with one command. Then make the changes you need.

This is actually the best idea I've seen so far.

Do this and then just switch each layer on and off as you save them.

 

[Raj_55555]

Agree with Jaca, this can be done pretty easily in LR if you have it! Just crop one of the photographs, copy the settings and paste it on all the others selected together.

 

[Buckster]

If you bring up the set of photos you want in Adobe Bridge you can load them into PS as layers of a single file with one command. Then make the changes you need.

Doesn't even require Bridge. In Photoshop itself, it's File>Scripts>Load Files into Stack.

But I doubt that matters, considering the OP said:

I feel it must be possible to do it to multiple separate files without having to fiddle with moving photos into a composite file and then out again to get what I want.

The LR solution seems like a good one. After Sync'ing the crop to multiple photos from the first, each can still be finessed to move it's crop around or even re-crop entirely if needed, but it gives a common starting point for all.