Thanks to the versatility of digital photography, there is perhaps more to learn about after the photograph is taken than there is when taking the picture itself. How exactly do you touch up your raw digital images? How do you lighten a dark image, correct 'dirty spots', crop an excessive background and more? Since most digital photos call for some level of enhancements before final output, here is a list of the more basic modifications that night have to be made to your digital images.
Step 1: Start Up Your Image Editor To get started you must first open your chosen image editing program. For those just starting out, try a program such as Ulead Photo Impact. This particular program provides professional level results while still being simple and friendly to use.
Step 2: Remove Red-Eye Almost everyone has experienced the red-eye effect when taking pictures of people. This is an easy corrected problem with image editing software. A Red-Eye Removal tool can be found in the menu of Paint Shop Pro that does all of the work for you. Ulead Photo Impact offers the same feature with its Remove Red Eye option in the Tool Panel.
Step 3: Rotate and Crop If you want to change the angle of your photograph, you can do this with little loss in quality by using the rotate tool. You may also need to crop your photo to remove cluttered or unnecessary background area that might take focus away from the subject of the photo. Doing this will create a much more professional look.
Step 4: Play with Color Editing software opens a whole world of color options to you. Experiment with color variations for a new and unique look for your image. You can make clouds purple, change your photo to black and white, add a rose hueany effect you might want. A good photo editing program should have an automatic color balance option to adjust color imperfections in your photos.
Step 5: Blurring Effects Adding a blurring effect sometimes can make a photo stand out. To do this, select an area or areas of the photo which are unimportant and blur them out to bring more attention to the subject. For a close up of a butterfly on a flower, blur out the leaves or grass in the background to really make the subject stand out.
Step 6: Sharpen Up Sharpening the image is the next step in the photo touch up process. Contrary to popular belief, you can\'t actually sharpen an out of focus image. What I typically do when sharpening an image is to selectively sharpen. That is, I select a part of the image, maybe a person\'s eyes and sharpen only that area. Leave unimportant areas unsharpened.
Step 7: Resize You may need to resize your photo depending on your needs. Resize down to a smaller size to e-mail your pictures to family. Resize to a 4x6 print to turn your image into a greeting card.
Step 8: Save Your Work Ok, you\'re pretty much done. Remember to save your work in the appropriate image format. Use the large TIFF image format if you want to retain all details for subsequent image editing. On the other hand, you can use the JPEG image format if you want to just send the picture via email or upload them to your website.
Conclusion That's all there is to it! Now you have the basics for touching up and preparing your raw digital photos for output. While all of the above steps might not fit every photo situation, they are among the most common your might need. Experiment and practice with the different tools and options to make the most out of all of your digital images.