How to automate Photoshop? - automation

Question

I am trying to automate the process of scanning/cropping photos in Photoshop. I need to scan 3 photos at a time, then use Photoshop's Crop and Straighten Photos command, which creates 3 separate images. After that I'd like to save each of the newly created images as a PNG.
I looked at the JSX scripts and they seem to a lot of promise. Is what I described possible to automate in Photoshop using JavaScript or VBScript or whatever?

Answer 1

I just found this script just did the work for me! It automatically crop & straighten the photo and save each result to directory you specified.
http://www.tranberry.com/photoshop/photoshop_scripting/PS4GeeksOrlando/IntroScripts/cropAndStraightenBatch.jsx
Save it to local then run it in the PS=>File=>Command=>Browse
P.S I found in the comment it said the script can be executed directly by double clicking from Mac Finder or Windows Explorer.
Backup gist for the script here

Answer 2

I actually got the answer on the Photoshop forums over at adobe. It turns out that Photoshop CS4 is totally scriptable via JavaScript, VBScript and comes with a really kick-ass Developer IDE, that has everything you'd expect (debugger, watch window, color coding and more). I was totally impressed.
Following is an extract for reference:
you can run the following script that will create a new folder off the existing one and batch split all the files naming them existingFileName#001.png and put them in the new folder (edited)
#target Photoshop
app.bringToFront;
var inFolder = Folder.selectDialog("Please select folder to process");
if(inFolder != null){
var fileList = inFolder.getFiles(/\.(jpg|tif|psd|)$/i);
var outfolder = new Folder(decodeURI(inFolder) + "/Edited");
if (outfolder.exists == false) outfolder.create();
for(var a = 0 ;a < fileList.length; a++){
if(fileList[a] instanceof File){
var doc= open(fileList[a]);
doc.flatten();
var docname = fileList[a].name.slice(0,-4);
CropStraighten();
doc.close(SaveOptions.DONOTSAVECHANGES);
var count = 1;
while(app.documents.length){
var saveFile = new File(decodeURI(outfolder) + "/" + docname +"#"+ zeroPad(count,3) + ".png");
SavePNG(saveFile);
activeDocument.close(SaveOptions.DONOTSAVECHANGES) ;
count++;
}
}
}
};
function CropStraighten() {
function cTID(s) { return app.charIDToTypeID(s); };
function sTID(s) { return app.stringIDToTypeID(s); };
executeAction( sTID('CropPhotosAuto0001'), undefined, DialogModes.NO );
};
function SavePNG(saveFile){
pngSaveOptions = new PNGSaveOptions();
pngSaveOptions.embedColorProfile = true;
pngSaveOptions.formatOptions = FormatOptions.STANDARDBASELINE;
pngSaveOptions.matte = MatteType.NONE;
pngSaveOptions.quality = 1;
pngSaveOptions.PNG8 = false; //24 bit PNG
pngSaveOptions.transparency = true;
activeDocument.saveAs(saveFile, pngSaveOptions, true, Extension.LOWERCASE);
}
function zeroPad(n, s) {
n = n.toString();
while (n.length < s) n = '0' + n;
return n;
};
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Answer 3

Have you tried using Photoshop Actions? I don't now about the scanning part, but the rest can all be done by actions quite easily.