Digital Photographic Workflow Handbook

Chapter 10

Master Files and Derivative Files

© Patricia Russotti

“It is a bad plan that admits of no modification.”

—Publilius Syrus

The edit and proof steps funnel image selection down to a set of images to be taken to the next workflow step, optimization for final use. In many cases, there will be multiple final outputs like Web, print, and offset reproduction. Our primary goal at this step is to create master files to provide maximum flexibility when repurposing image files. A master file is defined as a large version of the image (at least as large as the camera’s native file size) in a wide gamut color space. Unlike batch-processed capture ...