Photography is one of the most popular hobbies today, and it’s easy to understand why. Now that we’re all walking around with pretty impressive cameras in our pockets, photography is more accessible than ever before.
Image by SplitShire
Chances are, you’ve devoted your photography experience to what happens behind the camera. Now, it’s time to take it a step further by working on what happens after the photoshoot.
We’ve got great photo editing tips that will immediately boost your photographer skills. When you know how to edit photos, you know how to turn great images into astounding works of art.
Read on for our top tips that will help you to improve your editing skills in no time.
Start With Your Best Work
When you head out to take pictures, you probably take a few of the same shot to improve the odds that you capture something great. This is an important instinct to have as a photographer because it means that you can discard anything that isn’t stellar. When you start dabbling with photo editing basics, it’s important to continue focusing on only your best work–you can’t edit a mediocre photo into something great.
Narrow In on Your Subject
What are the first things that you want to do when you start editing your photos? You want to make sure that your subject is getting the attention that it should. That means straightening your image, cropping it, and removing any unwanted features from the photo.
Cropping gives you the opportunity to make sure that your photo follows the rule of thirds even if the initial image didn’t. Straightening and cropping can be done on just about any photo editing software, but you’ll have to look elsewhere for something like a photo background remover.
Understand What Editing Features Do
In order to effectively use basic editing features on your phone or computer, you need to understand what those different features do. The most important features include:
- brightness: increase or decrease the vibrancy and light
- contrast: increase or decrease the contrast between light and dark colors
- shadows: increase or decrease the darkness of shadows
- highlights: increase or decrease the darkness of highlights
- saturation: increase or decrease the intensity of color
The best way to understand what these features do to your photos is to start playing with them. Remember, good edits are subtle and enhance what is already there. If your edits are more noticeable than the photo, itself, you’ve gone too far.
Improve Your Photographer Skills With Photo Editing Basics
Photography is one of the most popular hobbies because it’s fun, creative, and there are endless opportunities to improve. If you’ve honed your behind-the-camera photographer skills, it’s time to start working on photo editing basics.
Improving a creative skill doesn’t have to cost a fortune. The tips we’ve provided here won’t cost more than what you’ve already paid for your phone, tablet, or computer. If you’re looking for more frugal creative tips, take a look around.
