Printing an Image with a Black Border in Lightroom

I thought I'd pass on some things I learned today ... two ways to print a image with a black border using the Lightroom Print Module:

Method 1:

Really easy, but the result isn't that good.

In the Develop Module "Effects" panel, Post Crop Vignetting, set:
- Amount = -100
- Midpoint = 0
- Roundness = -100
- Feather = 0
- Highlights = 0

Disadvantages = Crops (masks) part of the image and the corners are round instead of square.


Method 2:

Takes a bit of effort to set up but once you save everything to a template it's easy peasy after that. The following example is for a 4 x 6 image with 1/8" black border.

1. In Photoshop create a low res 4 x 6 black jpeg (portrait orientation) ... something like 6" x 72 PPI for the long side. You can use a much higher res if you want, but since it's just a black box it doesn't matter and a lower res will prevent the Identity Plate tool in the Print Module from giving you a warning that the image is too large.

2. In the Print Module create a template. Mine is called: "4 x 6 - Epson Glossy, 1/8" Black Border"

3. Click the "Page Setup" button at the lower left to set your printer driver up.

For my Epson R3000 I had to select the following under "Print Setup":
- Paper size = 4 x 6
- Source = Sheet (Borderless)

and then under Properties I clicked the "Expansion" button which lets you select how the image expands to fill the paper and I changed the setting from "Auto-Expand" to "Retain Size". This bit is really important!.

4. Under the "Image Settings" panel at the top right I've checked "Zoomed to Fill" and "Rotate to Fit"

5. Under Layout:
- All margins should be set to zero
- Paper Grid is 1, 1
- Cell Size Height = 5.75"
- Cell Size Width = 3.75"

6. Under Page:
- I checked "Background" and made it black. However with Zoomed to Fill it's probably not required (I'll test that another time). Doesn't hurt anything though.
- Check Identity Plate and click the tiny drop down arrow (upside down triangle) in the bottom right of the identity plate image box
- Pick "Edit" and select "Use a graphical identity plate"
- Select the black jpeg image you made for the identity plate
- Depending on the resolution you used to make the image you'll need to scale the image to fill the image area
- Check "Render Behind Image". Now you should see your image with a nice 1/8" black border

7. To save your setup, right click over the title of the template you created (DON'T LEFT CLICK OR YOU'LL BE BACK TO STEP 3) and click "Update with current setting"

.... and you're done! Now just print the image with your normal "Print Job" settings. For every other 4 x 6 image you ever need to add a black border to it's now a quick 1 click process


I hope this helps some of you

Years ago somebody posted a set of borders for using in LR Print module like that. Should still work, that module hasn't changed since then.

Found it! Says five borders, but I see 9 downloads: http://www.tipsquirrel​.com …ve-borders-for-lightroom/

Not used it but seen several people recommending the Lightroom Mogrify2 plugin for doing this.

The easiest way to print with a border of any colour, as long as you don't want any fancy pattern is to turn on Stroke Border under Image Settings in the print module. The only thing you really have to remember in type setting 1 Point is 1/72", as it is set in points and is not changeable for units. I use it for putting white borders on monochrome prints, and black ones for colour images to simulate using Ciba-Chrome in my home darkroom. The stroke is then put around the inside of the cell, then you get your image. I usually allow for any stroke border when cropping for aspect ratio. It does make a noticeable difference, so is something that I usually try to control rather than letting it take care of itself.

Alan

Boarder directly on image, is a double edge sword with the shaper end toward the users bulk...
I don't use it unless there is a really good reason.

Dan Marchant wrote in post #17378715
Not used it but seen several people recommending the Lightroom Mogrify2 plugin for doing this.

...I use it: its brilliant. A bit tricky to install because you need to make sure ImageMagick is correctly installed, but once you do then adding borders of any colour or size becomes a matter of just changing the parameters on export. For example: the white border is my default upload framing. The second image with the black border took me 30 seconds to create by clicking a few buttons. Its very customizable.

Stroke border works for creating a black border when printing to a jpeg but not for printing to a printer ... which is why I went the Identity Plate route ... unless I screwed up somewhere ...

Dan Marchant wrote in post #17378715
Not used it but seen several people recommending the Lightroom Mogrify2 plugin for doing this.

Thanks Dan, I'll look into it.

Works for me. (Windows 7, Epson R1900)

I use mogrify as well works great and does have several other features besides Borders.

My only issues with it have been :
If try to publish/export more than once collection simultaneously it sometimes fails so one of the collections being exported doesn't get completed. I think this could be a case LR/Windows trying to access the executable part of Mogrify during the export when it is already in use by the first export operation.

The other issue is if using it to publish to Flickr using different collections and you want different settings colours on you latest collection to be published changing the Mogrify settings will assume that all your previous collections will need to be re-published unless you tell LR that they are up to date - I expect this can be avoided by having different instants of the Publish To Flickr set up to suit different border styles/colours....but then need to remember which is which

The borders are not added until the image is exported/published so you have no real idea what they are like until you completed the export/publish/print operation. Would be nice to have a preview.

tzalman wrote in post #17380058
Works for me. (Windows 7, Epson R1900)

A stroke border where there is no white on the outside ... in other words, just a black border? I couldn't get that to work. When I printed to file that's what I'd get, but to the printer it had a white border around the stroke. I'll give it another shot though since if I figure out what I'm doing wrong this would be a pretty simple way to get an all black border.

Sorry, I thought you meant black stroke and white margins. How about changing the background color? Set driver to borderless, crop for paper size minus frame, no stroke. (Below: paper 297x420 mm., crop 277:400.)

Yes you have to set the printer driver to borderless printing for a black stroke border with no white around it. If you don't the printers hard margins prevent you from printing to the edge of the paper. What is really annoying with my fairly basic Pixma MG5150 is that for borderless printing you are very limited in the paper sizes you can use. Other than 6×4 or 7×5 about the only useful paper size for me is A4. If I accept borderless printing I can choose lots of sizes, including for some reason A3 and 19×13, even though the printer will only take maximum 8.5" wide paper. It does though also allow custom size, which means that I can print on 12×8.5 paper, although it forces a 2.8/4.9 minimum top bottom margin and 8.5/3.2mm left/right margins. Because of this with the 12×8.5 prints I have been doing them with 5.0mm/8.5mm borders to equalise the positioning. When it comes to the printable areas of various sized papers this seems to vary not just by manufacturer, but also by model type too.

Alan

BigAl007 wrote in post #17381673
Yes you have to set the printer driver to borderless printing for a black stroke border with no white around it. If you don't the printers hard margins prevent you from printing to the edge of the paper. What is really annoying with my fairly basic Pixma MG5150 is that for borderless printing you are very limited in the paper sizes you can use. Other than 6×4 or 7×5 about the only useful paper size for me is A4. If I accept borderless printing I can choose lots of sizes, including for some reason A3 and 19×13, even though the printer will only take maximum 8.5" wide paper. It does though also allow custom size, which means that I can print on 12×8.5 paper, although it forces a 2.8/4.9 minimum top bottom margin and 8.5/3.2mm left/right margins. Because of this with the 12×8.5 prints I have been doing them with 5.0mm/8.5mm borders to equalise the positioning. When it comes to the printable areas of various sized papers this seems to vary not just by manufacturer, but also by model type too.

Alan

I tried the printer driver with borderless and simply "sheet". Neither worked. I also tried combinations of those with "zoom to fill checked or unchecked, changing background color, etc. and couldn't fine the magic formula to get it to output correctly. It was weird to see a wide stroke on the preview and on a resulting print to file, but just a simple borderless print outputted from the printer. I didn't try turning auto-expansion on and off in the print driver which will be the next experiment.

It sounds like you guys can get it to work though, so there has to be a setting ....

After searching the internet, the method I posted seemed to be the only way to get it to work.