I’m using Adobe Lightroom to edit and manage my photos, and previously the workflow was something like this:

• Export images to exports directory
• Open exported images in Photoshop to create custom framing
• Use scp to copy temp directory to web server
• Run script to create gallery XML description for AutoViewer

Note that I usually don’t clean up the exported directory to keep track of what I’ve exported, and how.

Surely all of that could be streamlined a bit. I had already create a small AppleScript app that would perform the last two steps automatically for a dropped directory, but how about the framing? I wanted a consistent style, with a text mark on the lower right corner. The frame itself would be easy with a PS action, but placing the text correctly independent of image size, not so. However, Photoshop provides an interface to AppleScript, so why not extend my existing script to take care of everything, and convert that to a Lightroom export action while I’m at it?

I’ve also included a hacked version of Rob Lewis’ AppleScript interface to Phil Harvey’s excellent exiftool to extract some metadata to be displayed with the photos. I couldn’t get the LNS List & Record Tools prerequisite to work, so I changed the result data to a simpler format. Not as clean, but works for what I’m trying to do.

Now, my new workflow for exporting stuff to my homepage is:

• Export images to exports directory

Nice, eh?

You can download the script here.

It requires exiftool for metadata extraction, Photoshop to draw the decoration and a passwordless rsync setup for the current user. You’ll have to fill in a few blanks, and probably also want to change the decoration (or at least the copyright notice) to suit your style.

If you find the script useful, have trouble getting it to run or have ideas for enhancement, feel free to drop me a note.