EmulLab
Manual · 11

Export photos
and contact sheets.

Make finished files from one frame, a selection or the whole roll, and lay a roll out on a contact sheet.

Export frames

  1. Choose File › Export (⇧⌘E), or click Export in the toolbar.
  2. Pick a Preset: Full Size (JPEG), High Resolution (Print), Archive (ProPhoto TIFF), Web (JPEG 2048 px) or Social (JPEG 1350 px).
  3. Under Frames, choose this frame, the selected frames, the ones the Library filter shows, or the whole roll.
  4. Check File Naming and Destination: to start, an Exports folder inside the roll’s folder.
  5. Click Export n Frames. Progress shows above the filmstrip in Edit; you can keep working.

Make a contact sheet

  1. Choose File › Export Contact Sheet (⇧⌘P). With several frames selected, the sheet shows those; otherwise the whole roll.
  2. Choose the Paper, Orientation, Columns and Background, and what the captions show.
  3. Choose PDF or JPEG. The preview shows each page.
  4. Click Save.
Format, color space, size and names
  • File Format: TIFF (16-bit), JPEG or PNG (16-bit).
  • Color Space: sRGB, Display P3, Adobe RGB (1998) or ProPhoto RGB, embedded in each file. The default is set in Settings › Export (sRGB to start); Full Size (JPEG) and Custom start with it, and picking a preset never changes it.
  • Size: the original, or a long edge of 4000, 2048 or 1350 px.
  • File Naming: the original name with “-positive”, the original name, or the roll name and frame number.
  • Changing the format, color space or size switches the preset to Custom.
What goes into the files

The capture date, camera, rating, label and keywords are written into each file, with the color profile. Existing files are never replaced: a new file gets a number instead. Exports saved in the roll’s own folder would show up as extra frames next time; the Exports folder inside it avoids that.

If an export doesn’t finish

EmulLab says which frames weren’t exported and why. If the disk is full, free some space or choose a folder on another disk. If EmulLab isn’t allowed to write there, choose another folder, or choose the same one again to allow it. Choose Another Folder exports the missing frames there. If a scan itself can’t be read, the folder is fine: Show Scan in Finder shows which file, and a frame can’t be opened says what to do. One export runs at a time.

Contact sheet options

Paper is US Letter, A4, Tabloid or A3, with 2 to 8 columns on white or black. Captions can show stars and labels and file names, and a header the film stock and roll name. The sheet is rendered at 300 dpi. A JPEG sheet of several pages is saved as one file per page, in a folder you choose. There’s no print module yet: print the PDF from Preview or another app.

Applies to EmulLab 0.9.1 (Public Beta). Updated October 9, 2026.