Beta Yourself Image Editing

It turns out photos shot at skew-whiff angles with random blotches in-frame are not necessarily ‘arty'. Stuff team outlines how to spruce up snaps with a minimum of effort...

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THE BASICS

Play the numbers

When editing, be mindful of pixels. The more you have, the better: blow up a small crop and the results will be bad. Also consider resolution and formats. Screens can be forgiving – you can get away with lower quality and rougher edits for social media than for a photographic print.

Don’t destroy

Understand how the editors you use affect your files. Ideally, go for non-destructive tools that afford space for experimentation and don’t overwrite your original photos. If unsure, duplicate a photo and work on the copy. When trying out complex edits, save ‘breakpoints’ so you can always revert to an earlier version.

Learn to focus

Photos that stick in the mind tend to be those that draw the attention to a subject or focal point. So decide what you want to emphasise – even when you’re just posting a snap to Facebook. Crop out distractions. Consider a vignette to make a central subject more prominent. Adjust colours to strengthen what you’d like to highlight.

Beware the bots