In a recent article about differentiating yourself as a photographer, I mentioned panorama prints, and how JD can print panoramas up to 30×72″ on regular or metallic paper.  What I didn’t mention was the process for creating panorama prints. Actually, the process is pretty easy, and you can create them for free.

So why should you create a panorama if you aren’t going to print it?

Although panorama-sized portraits can be an incredibly profitable sale, printing and framing a large studio sample is an investment. Instead of printing one to start, use the instructions below to create a panorama, then layer it on a wall image (like on the right) and feature it on your website and in your marketing materials. If you can show potential clients what you’re capable of producing, you’re more likely to make the sale.

How to Create a Panorama:

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The right mouse button is the most overlooked tool on your computer, but computer programmers know all about it. In every software program written for the PC, the right mouse button displays the most commonly used menu options for the object selected. It is much faster to right click than to select something on the screen, then click on the top menu.

Most folks don’t right-click because they aren’t sure what the difference between a left-click and a right-click is. Then mention “double-click” and their eyes gloss over. However, knowing the difference can save you lots of time on your computer.

Here are the rules:

• Left-click to highlight something
• Left-double-click to select something
• Right click to see more options

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If you aren’t using 2 monitors, you don’t know what you are missing. Ask anyone who has two monitors, and they will tell you that they didn’t know how they ever got along with one.

Virtually every program is easier to use with two monitors. Imagine working in ROES on one full screen and thumbnails of all the images in a job on the other screen. You’ll almost never have to maximize, minimize or move a window again. The second monitor acts as an extended desktop – you can drag a window from one monitor to the other with your mouse as if you just had one very long horizontal monitor.

No matter what kind of PC or laptop you use, as long as you have Windows XP or greater, you can hook up two monitors. Here are 3 examples of products, one of which should work for you.

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If you don’t take credit cards, or if you’d like to take credit cards at an event, you should check out a new service called Squareup.

Squareup is an application that runs on any iPhone, iPad, iPod Touch or Android phone that is connected to the internet. It lets you scan a credit card with the free Squareup credit card reader, then submit the payment online. You get a response if the credit card was accepted, the customer will get a receipt via email, and in a few days, the payment will be deposited into your bank account.

I can think of a dozen ways you could use Squareup. For example, you could take print orders from guests during a wedding reception, an event, or while shooting families in the church for portrait directories.

Here’s what you need to get started:

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If you have ever had to fight with a list of image file names in a folder that wouldn’t stay sorted, you have to blame Bill Gates.

When Bill was writing the DOS operating system for the first PC, to save time he used the old “8.3″ file naming specification: eight characters (no punctuation or spaces), a period, and three characters on the end to tell you what kind of file it was. So for years, files could only have names like Lotus.exe (an executable program) or data.dbf (a database file). If you tried to name a file Aunt Millie’s 80th Birthday Picture #2, the computer would refuse to open the file.

But the worst part of 8.3 file names was that PCs sorted files according to a strange rule where numbers came before letters, and “11″ came before “2″. For example, say you had four files on your computer in the order you want them printed in LabPrints:

1. Page 1.jpg
2. 2.jpg
3. 11.jpg
4. Back page.jpg

LabPrints will store them alpha-numerically, so what you will get is this:

1. 11.jpg
2. 2.jpg
3. Back page.jpg
4. Page 1.jpg

Notice on the screen on the right. I made this as an experiment. You can see four files alphabetically sorted in Windows on top, and the exact same four files sorted alphabetically in DOS on the bottom – both on my PC! Although Mac people have never had this limitation, us PC folks have been fighting with it for years.

If you are a Mac user, you have a different set of problems that you don’t even know about. Mac files are stored in 2 parts: the file itself, and a hidden file that has the real file name, the extension, what program opens it, etc. That’s why when you copy just the image file from a Mac to a PC, the PC can’t open it. Newer Macs have solved this problem by including a check box that you should use that makes sure the files can be read by both Windows and Mac.

So what’s the solution? My suggestion is, when naming lots of images, put a number in front, and pad it with zeros so they line up. Then the rest of the file name can describe the image. For example:

1. 001 Front cover.jpg
2. 002 First page.jpg
3. 003 Mother Father.jpg
4. 004 Bride.jpg

Obviously, you only need the extra zero if you have more than 99 pages. However, these images will always sort correctly, no matter which computer (or CD or DVD) you save them on.

A couple of other “rules” for file naming that will make your life simpler:

• Keep file names short. “Katrina and Jeremy Dompulskis Wedding on December 12 2009-001.jpg” is so long it will always be abbreviated when it  is viewed.
• Don’t use punctuation. “Bill and Martha’s Wedding @ 1:00p.m.” will work on a Mac, but not a PC.

So what’s an easy way to rename files? Both ROES and LabPrints have automatic file renaming built into them. If you’re looking for something that can batch process images, try Bulk-rename. I was able to rename this sample group of four DSC files automatically less than 10 minutes after I installed the utility. Best of all, the basic version is free.

If you’ve ever designed a photo book with a dust cover you can appreciate how small changes to fonts, rules, overlays, and drop shadows can have a huge impact on the finished design. What looked good on the screen may not look quite right after printing.

This is because, unlike photographs, photo books (and post cards, business cards or any other press-printed products) must be cut and trimmed after printing. This results in pages and prints that are close – but never exactly – the same size. Combine this with double-sided printing, folding, stapling, binding and die-cutting, and even more layout problems can arise.

Below are three design mistakes we’ve all made when laying out photo books and other press-printed products. Avoid them, and every design you create will look better for it.

1. Backgrounds that don’t go up to the edge of the print. “Back in the day” we all sold bordered prints. In modern design, background colors and images are always printed to the edges (called full-bleed printing). For press-printed products like photo books, the paper edge is trimmed to create the same full-bleed effect you get with a photographic print. However, if the image doesn’t go all the way to the edge, a thin line of non-printed white paper is left. The only way to fix this is to trim the entire photo book shorter than the shortest page.

• Solution – Unless you’re printing an image in the center of a white page, cover the entire background.

2. Elements that are too close to the edge of a print. Text, logos, graphics, borders, and drop shadows that are too close to the edge of a print “look funny” and in some cases can be cut off.

• Solution – Graphic elements should always be at least 5% of the image size away from any edge. For example, on an 8×10 layout, 5% of 10 inches is 1/2 inch. This means nothing except the background should be closer than 1/2 inch from the edge. On small items like wallets or business cards, never put an element closer than 1/4 of an inch from the edge.

3. Elements on or near a fold. In ROES we sometimes assume that the blue “safe lines” on a product are exactly where the fold or edge will be, and push elements up to them. Actually, they are only an approximation to remind you that any parts of the photo like heads or feet outside the “safe lines” may be cut off or wrapped around the edge in the finished book.

• Solution – Don’t put text, borders, pinstripes, key lines, heads or feet up against safe lines.

Avoid these three design mistakes and your designs will look better to you – and your customers.

Need to share a great full-res digital photo, a PDF proof book or Adobe PSD layout? Attaching files larger than 1Mb to an email has a 50-50 chance of getting through. Either the receiving mail server mysteriously deletes the email, or it locks up the other person’s computer while they wait for the file attachment to download. Even if it finally gets through, it isn’t polite to lock up someone else’s computer.

Here are three FREE solutions:

Dropbox. Up to 2GB of file space for free, but you need to register and install the application. Works on Mac or PC. Betsy Flinn has started using this service, and she really likes it. Read her review.

Sendspace. Free version allows files up to 300Mb. You upload a file, copy and paste the link in an e-mail, and send. File stays up for 30 days, no registration required, no software to install. Here’s a test image I uploaded in less than 10 seconds for you to try. Note the ugly ads you have to look at, which is how they offer the service for free.

Drop.io is very popular with the online community. The free version only allows files up to 100Mb, but you don’t need to register or install any software. Click this link to see what your customer would see – again same image, much cleaner look.

After trying all three,

• I recommend the free version of Drop.io for sharing an image or two with customers.
• I recommend Dropbox for collaborating on images or sharing with family and friends.
• If you just need to send a large file to a non-client quickly, Sendspace is worth remembering.

Of course, when sending images to JD, always use ROES, LabPrints or our FTP service.