When it comes to editing images, it’s not as difficult as it sounds. Most digital cameras now come with some sort of basic software which can easily help you to make corrections and minor edits. Even the most basic digital camera software will guide you in a step-by-step fashion. The editing process usually consists of cropping, color adjustments, and corrections such as red-eye removal.
A good rule of thumb is to make a backup copy of your pictures before you start making changes. This provides you with another option, just in case you decide you aren’t happy with the changes you’ve made. When at all possible, these copies are best kept on a secondary hard drive, preferably on an external backup disk. Once you have completed all of your editing, be sure to backup all your images again in case something happens to your main hard drive.
You might want to consider having a Universal Card Reader to transfer your images over to your computer, making the process faster, and easier. This prevents you from having to install additional software and drivers for your camera. If you do choose to plug the camera in your computer, it’s important to transfer all images beforehand, never working on or editing the images directly from the camera.
Cropping consists of cutting the edges that you don’t want to keep as part of the image for printing. Always leave space around your main subject, since the shape of your image may not match a standard printing shape (as in a 4×6 sized printed picture), depending on your printing. When cropping your image it can take on a whole different perspective, depending on the area that you select.
To adjust your colors, you should always aim for a natural look. Adding too much brightness, contrast, or color saturation can make your image look strange. This is especially true when printing. What you see on your screen might not look the same when printed. The great thing about digital photography is that with proper software, you can learn how to adjust the image in many ways, sometimes finding details that you wouldn’t have seen otherwise.
Certain available software programs, like Adobe Photoshop Elements allow you play with your image, adding effects to give your image different looks. Think about how your image would look in the style of old newspaper or old photographs. It’s even possible to create your own postcards, birthday cards, calendars, etc.
Most graphic/photo editing software now come with a red-eye correction feature which can be fully automated, or at the very least, requires you to pinpoint the eyes and let you fine tune the correction.
You do have to consider however that some common mistakes can’t be remedied with software. These would be lack of proper lighting, which results in artifacts (grainy texture in the dark areas), the focus being off or the subject being photographed moving quickly and causing blurriness.
As you become more familiar with both your camera and the software that you use for editing, you can find a whole different approach to your image taking. You may find yourself wanting to experiment more with what you can do with many types of images.
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