Lightroom Presets

Lightroom Presets – Calendar Print Templates

I gotta tell ya, today’s presets are an awesome way to kick off the first post of the new year. Honestly, I think they’re going to be hard ones to top. That’s probably because I didn’t create them 🙂

Blog reader and photographer, Ed Weaver, sent me a message on my Facebook account, (just click LIKE to follow me there) the other day with some presets he had developed. Once I saw his sample image I immediately said to myself, “I wish I had thought of that!”. I didn’t, but luckily Ed was kind enough to let me share the presets here on the blog.

Before we go any further, here’s an example (click to see it larger):

Installing the presets is a little bit different than normal. Here’s a link to a quick video I did this morning.
1) First, download the zip file here.
2) Unzip the file. You’ll see two folders, “Calendar Presets” and “Calendar PSDs”
3) Go to your Lightroom Preferences (Mac: Lightroom > Preferences | PC: Edit > Preferences) and go to the Presets tab.
4) Click on the button that reads “Show Lightroom Presets Folder”
5) Navigate folders to Lightroom > Print Templates and copy the “Calendar Presets” folder there.
6) Restart Lightroom. You won’t see the presets if you don’t.
7) Now drag the “Calendar PSDs” folder over your Lightroom icon to import, or simply import them through File > Import. These PSD files contain all of the calendars for the months of the year.
8. Once they’re there, go to your Presets panel in the Print module (NOT THE DEVELOP MODULE) and click on one of the calendar presets.
9) At this point, things work just like any other Custom Print Package in Lightroom 3. You drag your photo from the filmstrip into the placeholder. Then you drag all of the months of the year into their placeholders as well (you’ve got to do it 1 by 1). I find it helps to create a “Calendar” collection with all of the months in it and add the photo to the same collection as well. That way you’ll have them in the same place once you’re in the Print module”.

I realize this one is a bit tricky. Again, here’s a link to a quick video I did this morning.
And let’s give a big round of applause to Ed Weaver for sharing these. Thanks Ed, you ROCK! I appreciate it and I know everyone here does as well. Let us know what you think. Enjoy!

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74 comments

  1. Mick 13 October, 2011 at 16:55 Reply

    Hi Matt
    I know this is an old post but could you tell me how to change the calender psd files to update for 2012 ?

    Many thanks
    Mick

  2. Jim Felder 12 February, 2011 at 09:09 Reply

    I gave these a test and order a couple 8.5×11 prints. I didn’t like the way the text came out on the calendars. I also added a white border around them to increase spacing between them. I think that might have caused some of the text to be cut off on top and bottom. The text just looks too faint and isn’t legible until you get really close. Maybe a different font?

  3. monica 19 January, 2011 at 11:01 Reply

    is this only for lightroom 3? I’ve tried with my lightroom 2.7 and its not working (the presents are there but they do nothing but stand in the way of good time management) Any help its appreciated

  4. Vince 19 January, 2011 at 00:54 Reply

    I’ve installed the preset by following the instructions and they appear in the Print > Presets section… However, hovering over the presets, they appear blank and cannot be clicked. If anybody has a solution for this, please let me know.

    • Thomas Ljungberg 18 January, 2011 at 04:50 Reply

      @Victor: You can use any software you want that can output a jpg, psd or other file that Lightroom can handle and print. I’m no Illustrator expert but I guess you can create a template in Illustrator and save the output as a jpg that then can be imported into Lightroom and used in the calendar print preset.

  5. Sheila M 12 January, 2011 at 10:18 Reply

    Brilliant! Thanks to Ed for sharing and thanks to Matt for the video and instructions. I’m new to Lightroom and this site is really helping me get comfortable in ‘my new photo editing home’. Thanks again!

  6. Chuck Almarez 9 January, 2011 at 21:45 Reply

    Here’s a way to create a 12 month template just once and avoid the repeated drag and drop.
    1. Create a 12-month calendar using the presets Ed provided: drag and drop each month into place – but don’t place an image into the print cell.
    2. Print the calendar preset to a file (Print To: JPEG File).
    3. Import the calendar file into LR and place it in the calendar Collection you created when you set up Ed’s presets.
    4. Select the new calendar file and go to the Print module and select the Custom Print module. (Make sure the page size matches your template size.)
    5. Now your 12 month calendar should fit on the page with all the months in place.
    6. The last thing is to add a new print cell to the page and manually rag it to fit the remaining space.
    Now you can drag any image into the new cell without having to drag the monthly calendars in one by one.

  7. Thomas Ljungberg 9 January, 2011 at 10:11 Reply

    Great post and great presets. Big thanks to both Matt and Ed to share this.

    Since not everybody are English speaking and Sunday is not the first day of the week in the entire world, I’ve made a Swedish translation and rearrangement of the days in some new calendar templates. I’ve also made some additional Print presets for these calendars using A4 paper size (both updated Ed’s letter size presets and added a couple new ones).
    You can download these, as well as the full layered psd files if you want to make new calendar templates in another language here:

    http://aurora-foto.se/2011/01/lightroom-calendar-presets/

    Again, thanks Matt and Ed for sharing!

  8. Ken 6 January, 2011 at 11:39 Reply

    A long time ago in a galaxy far away, I decided to make photo calendars as gifts one year.

    I had to create a layout, send out to have the type set, (who else remembers commercial type setters?) paste it up, send that out to have film made, then contact print the calendar film while masking the area for the photo, swap the mask, print the photo, then finally develop the print. I only did this ONCE!

    Light Room makes this so easy! A great idea, now I can give gifts again!

  9. Marc Weisberg 5 January, 2011 at 10:26 Reply

    Matt, Happy New Year buddy! What can I say you totally rock dude! I always pick up little gems from you. This one’s a diamond. I see endless self promotional opportunities with these calendar templates.

    P.S. I have a request for a post on Stacks in LR 3. Don’t really understand them. I’d be super jazzed if you’d do an in depth post on them some day.

    P.P.S. LR has totally changed my post production life. I’m a professional photographer and shoot everything 100% RAW. It allows me to get my digital 95% there before hitting up CS3 for some quick retouching or befoer dropping my image folders on to some Droplets I’ve created to automate my retouching.

    Be well my friend and THANK YOU for sharing you knowledge!

  10. Gerry 4 January, 2011 at 23:03 Reply

    Do these presets work only with LR ver 3.0?
    I have ver 2.3 and the presets appear on the Presets panel but nothing happens when you click on them

    Gerry

  11. Michael 4 January, 2011 at 16:05 Reply

    Fantastic! I just printing out a 17 x 22 from my trip to Cinque Terre. It is gorgeous! Is there any way to permanently fix the months into the presets so that when I change my picture I don’t have to reload the months? I saw the suggestion above about making jpg of the calendar and using it as the identity plate. Is there a better way?

    Thanks for all you do for us Lightroom users.

  12. Cindy 4 January, 2011 at 12:20 Reply

    Yep, great preset, my partner has been asking me to make a custom family calender. I have everything all set and inside the collection, but is there a way to save these out for the future or just for layout purposes in case you want to edit your choice of photo selections or print multiples at a later time. Can you do this? I am just missing something. Great easy concept though. Thanks Ed.

  13. Gerry Slater 4 January, 2011 at 12:02 Reply

    A big thanks to Ed for a great preset. And the same props to Matt for the crystal-clear explanantion– I would never have gotten this into Lightroom without your tips.. Great start to the New Year!!

  14. John Swarce 4 January, 2011 at 11:18 Reply

    One thing I noticed is that March has only 30 days on the template! “Thirty days has September, April, June and November……”

    The April template is right, though! 😀

    –John

  15. Peter Marcaurelle 4 January, 2011 at 10:32 Reply

    Thanks Ed for sharing this technique. I have been creating calendars in Lr for several years now using the identity plate option. I like the flexiblity of your method alot.

    If Matt doesn’t mine I am following Ed’s offer of a free download at my site here is a link for anyone looking for a Monthly calendar that fits on a 8 1/2 x 11 format – http://camerasview.com/?p=546

    NOTE: Developed on PC so I am not sure if they will work on a Mac.

    After unzipping the templates and are added to Lr as described by Matt.

    Thanks again Ed and Matt.

  16. Richard 4 January, 2011 at 06:04 Reply

    For anyone who has problems with the layout (screwed up pages) here’s a tip.
    Install a driver for a large-format printer like the Epson Stylus Pro 9900.
    Make sure that you don’t make it your default printer because you cannot really print to it.
    In the page setup of the Print module select this large-format printer and select a large paper-size. Now all (calendar) templates will fit correctly on the ‘paper’.
    When you’re ready with the design and adding the photo’s just print it to file. You then get a large jpeg file that you can print on A4/Letter or other formats.

  17. Linda Vich 3 January, 2011 at 23:52 Reply

    Thanks for the great preset! I was able to get the 8.5 x 11 presets to work a couple of times but then had trouble. The preview of the preset looks right but the page itself is set to the wrong orientation therefore the preset is screwed up on the page! I could not find anywhere to change the actual dimensions of the existing page. If you provide us with this info, then I can make the preset work for me!

  18. fritz meyer 3 January, 2011 at 18:05 Reply

    Great preset, and you can edit a copy of each month in photoshop, from the develope
    module for “special days” such as birthdays or an anniversary. I really love it. ffm

    • cheryl 5 January, 2011 at 10:07 Reply

      Fritz,
      Can you tell me how you edited the pages in ps? I would like to be able to put birthdays and special occasions on their respected days. I work on a mac and I have ps cs5.
      thanks,
      Cheryl

  19. Richard 3 January, 2011 at 16:19 Reply

    This is a great set of presets to start the year. I’d be really interested in a quick tutorial on how he laid out the calendar in Ps. I’m thinking there has to be an easier way than the one I’ve come up with to replicate the capability.

    I’d also love a tutorial (maybe you’ve done it and, as my teenager would say, I’m demonstrating epic failure at searching today, on how to create custom print packages in Lr.

    Thanks!

    • Ed Weaver 4 January, 2011 at 16:18 Reply

      Richard,
      I’d like to tell you I had some special trick for creating this in Photoshop but the truth is I didn’t use Photoshop at all. I started that way but it was just to cumbersome for me.
      I have Mac’s so here is what I did.
      I used Pages to make the templates. It’s very fast to create a table, with everything easily modifiable. The original template took less than ten minutes. The only trick is, after you have the table you like, goto Page Setup and create a custom paper size that’s the same size as your table. That way there will be no white borders around the calendar. I saved it as a Template so I can use it over and over. Then I just typed in the months and dates. You can change the fonts, colors, borders, sizes etc..

      Here is the fun part!

      The sequence that I used getting from Pages to a PSD is as follows:

      Export from Pages to a PDF file. Use “Best”

      Open PDF in Preview, “Save As” a PSD with the DPI set to 240.

      That’s it! You now have a file that Lightroom will accept. It takes longer to read this, than create the PSD!

      I hope that helps!

      Ed Weaver

      PS If you still have trouble, send me an email and I could send you a sample Pages document.

  20. Anki Sandinge 3 January, 2011 at 16:00 Reply

    Really a lovely preset BUT almost useless for me since I’m from Sweden and we’re starting our weeks on Mondays … and also we’re not having the same papersizes over here 😉 I sent Ed a note about it. I can do my own psd files using his as a guide though. Thank you for thinking it a good idea to share it with us 🙂

    Best
    Anki Sandinge

  21. Connie Cooper-Edwards 3 January, 2011 at 15:48 Reply

    Hey Matt & Ed, thanks for sharing this. I see great potential in this custom calendar. I was wondering who could print this or where I could get this printed? Don’t have a printer & would love to market these to clients.

  22. Per-Christian Nilssen 3 January, 2011 at 15:25 Reply

    Thanks, guys! Now I know what to give to family members this week! 🙂 🙂

    I have one suggestion for version 2,0 though – Maybe you could make a calendar set that starts the week on Mondays – as the Europeans are used to!

  23. Iggy 3 January, 2011 at 15:08 Reply

    Matt

    I imported all as you said,, I see the templates in the print module.. When you hover over it you see it correctly in the preview.. But when you click on the template it does not work as advertised.

    This is in the 13×19 and the 17×22 I am guessing I have to change the page setup for that to work correctly? is that correct?

    I was expecting if I was printing to a jpeg I would not have to change..

    Am I on the right track..

    As always thanks for the work.

  24. Yolanda 3 January, 2011 at 14:16 Reply

    Wow. This is allowing me to truly see the power of the LR3 Print Module for the first time. I don’t think I’m the one to make it happen, but I predict we’ll be seeing full blown album design templates (or press cards, etc.) coming very soon.

  25. Matt Kloskowski 3 January, 2011 at 14:09 Reply

    Hey folks. If any of you have problems where the sizes or templates don’t look right, it may be because your printer doesn’t support those sizes. You can still use this though, but you’ll have to create your own size print and just drag-n-drop the calendar files on to the page itself. It’s a little more work, but when you’ve done it once, save it as a preset and then you won’t have to do it anymore.

    Thanks 🙂
    – Matt K

  26. S. Copes 3 January, 2011 at 13:48 Reply

    Thank you so much!!! I have been asked to be involved with a fundraiser for a young mother of two pre-schoolers who has stage 4 cancer. She doesn’t have long,… so I will use this for taking family photos for calenders with the proceeds donated to her family. THANK YOU!

  27. C.E. Jones 3 January, 2011 at 13:36 Reply

    Matt,

    I love your presets. I do a lot of work in lightroom. Also, I teach computer classes and do some computer consulting. I know you probably use a MAC. But, since I teach computer courses to businesses, I have to stay in the PC World. I’m looking at applications to use to create video tutorials on Windows 7. Do you have any suggestions? I’m thinking about Adobe’s Captivate.

    Thanks

    C.E. Jones

  28. Jonas Berggren 3 January, 2011 at 13:21 Reply

    Hi Matt

    I am not a friend of the print module… I really don’t get the hang of it 🙁
    How the hell do I make 12 pages with the presets in every page?

    The big glitch in my well used brain is how to “save” my prints? Some times the printing I have recently done appears when I a go from library to print but seldom when I want it to… *sigh* And yes, I have Scotts book of LR and am a proud owner of a brand new book called “layers”, written by a fantastic author.

  29. John Swarce 3 January, 2011 at 12:24 Reply

    Matt:

    I lost you at the .PSD files. I’m on a Win 7 machine, not a Mac, so I can’t drag onto my icon for LR3.

    Chose File, then Import (Photos? From Catalog?). That opens the import dialogue, but am I creating a new folder? Your video looks like I am creating a new collection. Maybe if there was sound to the video, it would help. Really would like to use this template…it looks great!!

    –John

  30. april 3 January, 2011 at 11:46 Reply

    Ok I’m having trouble. I’ve got it all into LR but it’s not properly laid out. The boxes are overlapping each other and nothing is centered. Am I supposed to change the page layout? I tried setting it to 8.5 x 11 but it did not make it look any better.
    What am I doing wrong?
    Thanks

  31. Craig Stocks 3 January, 2011 at 11:34 Reply

    I love the idea, and I took it one step further. I found it cumbersome to get the photo and the calendar months all together, so I created an identity plate using a jpeg of all of the calendar months together. (I printed to jpeg using the 8-1/2 X 11 12-month calendar, then cropped to get a jpeg of just the 12 months). Next I set up a new custom package with one photo at the top, and selected the calendar jpeg as an identy plate, which I could then position and size as desired. With this setup, I always have access to the 12-month calendar.

    By the way, I had the same problem with the comment function, it defaulted to a previous commenter and showed me his information.

  32. Not Tom Mullen 3 January, 2011 at 10:38 Reply

    sorry–this is kinda funny though…the comment box problem. But as i posted earlier, i’ve installed the calendar presets…reopened lightroom and see them in the template browser…but as i curser over them or try to select one…the preview window shows a blank white page that changes it’s orientation only and the working main window doesn’t do anything. any help?

  33. Not Tom Mullen 3 January, 2011 at 10:08 Reply

    Something’s odd about your comment box – I’m not Tom and shouldn’t be seeing his information or commenting as him.

    But I do like the calendar idea and will have to try it out later.

  34. Sarah 3 January, 2011 at 09:59 Reply

    Love this..thanks for the link. I installed as you explained. in Print module..i see the calendar presets in the template browser…but when i select any of them they don’t populate in the window at all. Any idea what might be happening?

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