setting valve clearance

I just got my head back from the machine shop had valve job, head surface shaved to clean it up. my question is do I just put the cams in on the old shims and go from there or is there a easy way to get the right shims the first time. this is my first shim type engine and im lost

You're in for a little trial and error. Generally on a valve job, you'll need to drop 3 or 4 sizes or so on what shim was in previously, so for example if you had a 260 shim in a particular spot, you would put a 240 or 245 in there then check clearance. It's not cut and dry, so it's going to take considerable trial and error and swapping shims around. Hope for a good valve job, where minimal was cut, sometimes botched jobs can take valves down below adjustable figures meaning a 200 shim is still to large.

well ive used this shop for a lot of engines and there really good. had them check valve height and set to the book so hoping its a quick setup

What kind of bike is it?

A good shop would have a valve height gauge to put you in the middle racetoolz.com/

1980 kz 1000 ltd is where the motor come from had to switch to another frame because the old one was twisted so its a 1977 now

Well at least they should be shimmed on top of buckets,unless somebody changed them.
Its not a big deal to check/change those once the head is installed,you should recheck them once the head is torqued down on the motor anyways.