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I own Lightroom 5 and I've been running a quite stable workflow for several years, including calibration of the monitor and the printer. In the past I printed my photos on my own and I was pleased with the results. I used to print by exporting photos to Photoshop one by one. Having calibrated both the monitor and the printer, I just needed to change the whitepoint before printing to match my specific lighting conditions for looking at the prints.

The problem is that the process was taking too long, and in the end I can't do it any longer. I've accumulated hundreds of photos to print in recent years.

That's why I'm now looking at a printing lab capable to process my photos. I've tried a couple ones and I think I've found a possibly good one. In fact, it allows me to pre-elaborate the JPEGs, including the colour profile to use in printing, and they guarantee a "raw" printing without any further elaboration. They of course provide the profiles for their printers. Now the residual problem is still whitepoint adjustment. I can't afford to export photos to Photoshop one by one, so I need something that works in batch mode, possibly in the Lightroom workflow.

To prepare JPEGs for printing, I use the "Print" panel that allows me also to specify the layout, the paper background colour, etc. It allows me to specify the target ICC profile, also to apply a quick brightness and contrast adjustment... but I don't see any other adjustment.

To be clear: the whitepoint adjustment to be made is the same for each photo, but relative. I mean: I don't have to apply "5696 K" to all the photos (I could do that with batch editing), since each photo has its own whitepoint; I need to increment the temperature of each photo of say 1500K to have cooler colours in the prints.

I appreciate any suggestion. The use of a third party Lightroom plugin would be ok, as well as even an external tool that could work with the JPEGs exported from the Print pane, assuming it won't change anything else and won't damage their quality.

Thanks.

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    \$\begingroup\$ So the question isn't how to batch adjust. The question is how to batch adjust the same amount relative to the original white balance. Correct? I don't believe LR has any built in function to achieve this, but a quick Google search revealed a plug-in that is specifically for Lightroom relative adjustments - photographers-toolbox.com/products/lightroomstatistics/… \$\endgroup\$
    – dpollitt
    Commented Dec 16, 2014 at 13:48
  • \$\begingroup\$ Correct, the question is also about batch adjust (I say "also" because I'd like to have a plugin that does this directly in the "Print" panel, but I'm probably asking too much). Going to try the plugin you suggested, thanks. I'll be back with a feedback after trying it. \$\endgroup\$
    – Fabrizio Giudici
    Commented Dec 16, 2014 at 15:52
  • \$\begingroup\$ Well, it looks good. Actually, in order to have cooler colours, Lightroom requires to decrease the colour temperature setting. The plugin applies the settings in a preset: while some settings, such as Tint, have negative settings, colour temperature doesn't. But since presents are stored in the disk as plain text files, it's easy to modify them after they have been created. So, I got it working. I have prepared a small bunch of prints to set to my printing service and we'll see if this resolve my primary problem. But for sure my question about relative batch adjust has been answered. Thanks. \$\endgroup\$
    – Fabrizio Giudici
    Commented Dec 16, 2014 at 16:34
  • \$\begingroup\$ Shouldn't the correction be part of the printer profile you use? When you (batch) export to JPEG it would target the specifed profile, right? \$\endgroup\$
    – JDługosz
    Commented Dec 24, 2014 at 5:11
  • \$\begingroup\$ @jdlugosz The profile is fundamental, but in the case of printing can't deal with everything because a reflective medium such as paper depends on the context. I mean: with a monitor, you can calibrate it so you have e.g. D65 and 140cdm^2, which are a standard. But the look of a printed photo depends on the light source you use to watch it: is it a natural daylight source? A bulb lamp? A calibrated light source (unlikely, unless you're at an exhibit). The printer lab assumes a reference value, then I have to adapt to my specific viewing context. \$\endgroup\$
    – Fabrizio Giudici
    Commented Dec 25, 2014 at 13:20

1 Answer 1

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  1. Open one picture in Develop mode
  2. Set the (relative) adjustment you want to one picture.
  3. Ctrl-Shift-C (Copy Settings) and check at least White Balance.
  4. Return to Grid view and select multiple pictures to which you want to apply the same relative adjustment.
  5. Press Ctrl-Shift-V (Paste Settings).

Now all select images will have the relative White Balance adjustment applied (along with any other adjustments you want to include in the batch process).

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    \$\begingroup\$ I just tested in LR-5.7 and it made relative adjustments, at least if the adjustment to the original image was relative. I.e., I didn't set the original to a specific WB K value, I added +10 to its value (though not sure what those relative units mean in kelvin terms). \$\endgroup\$
    – feetwet
    Commented Dec 24, 2014 at 14:59
  • \$\begingroup\$ Ah, very nice. Good find! \$\endgroup\$
    – dpollitt
    Commented Dec 24, 2014 at 15:00
  • \$\begingroup\$ That's sounds as the normal copy/paste settings workflow, and it applies absolute changes in my case... Perhaps I'm not understanding something. What do you mean by "added +10", I mean, which is the user gesture for that? Thanks. PS I have LR 5.6, not upgraded yet. \$\endgroup\$
    – Fabrizio Giudici
    Commented Dec 25, 2014 at 13:28
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    \$\begingroup\$ OK, this is a little trickier than originally noted: WB values are absolute for RAW formats, and relative for others. So to take advantage of this solution you would have to first export your RAW files as TIFF, JPG, PSD, and then you can apply the relative adjustment to those. \$\endgroup\$
    – feetwet
    Commented Dec 25, 2014 at 15:17

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