Images can serve many purposes, from sharing emotions, to beautifying our surroundings, and even delivering critical information. Sometimes a single picture can be asked to serve several purposes. Preparing images to meet all of our communications needs while maintaining the same appearance calls for some serious repurposing. That's what teach you in this chapter.

Digital images are captured with a variety of devices: point-and-shoot cameras, digital video cameras, dead-serious DSLR (digital single lens reflex) cameras, and even flatbed scanning devices. Each device captures images in a unique way and therefore should be dealt with individually.

By the time you get to this chapter, your images will have been corrected for content, color, and tonality, and ready to send it to your printer. Before you send your picture to a printer, you must have that printer's driver (software) installed on your computer. This software will list specific papers that should be used with the printer. Remember, your camera, your monitor, and your printer all speak the language of color, but speak it using different dialects. Moving an image from one device to another sometimes requires translational assistance.

Just as words spoken in different languages sound different, different devices speaking individual versions of the RGB color language can produce different results. If you've ever contacted the technical support department for help with your computer or software, you know it can be challenging to understand your language spoken by a person in another country. It is just as challenging to maintain accurate color between all these different devices.

This chapter will show you how to prepare your image for various different output purposes.

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