Hello there! I had an email from a lovely reader, asking me a question I get asked quite a lot, which was...
How do you edit your photos? What version of Photoshop do you use? Where can I buy it?
I use the wonderful Photoshop to edit my photos. I highly recommend it, because it may seem confusing, but it is very easy when you know what to do - there are SO many different options avaiable to edit your photos and it all looks very proffessional. I use Photoshop CS4, but they have made newer versions which have more features. My tutorials work on all versions because they all are simillar and set out the same. If you want to buy photoshop or have a free trial, check out the Adobe Website!
I have posted a Basics of Photoshop tutorial HERE, but today I thought I'd show you again, because since then I have learned some new things! Lets begin...
The first thing I do when editing my photos is curves. Curves brightens your image, and helps balance out the lights, darks and the contrast in the photo. To get to the curves, you go to Image > Adjustments > Curves in Photoshop and there will be a box like this...
The long diagonal line is all we need to worry about. In the top half of the line, you can drag this upwards until you have the lightness you want. Then drag the bottom half of the line downwards, until you have made the contrast how you like. This is what mine looks like, but it always varys depending on the photo...
When you're done, just press OK and you've finished curves!
Once I have done the curves, sometimes I like to add an action to my photo. There are so many different actions out there, some free and some cost money, and there are all different sorts. To get to the actions pallette in photoshop, go to Window > Actions and it will appear. There will be no actions until you install them. You can find actions online, I got all mine from Google Searches. Once you get the zip file, double click on the action and it will load into photoshop! As easy as that! You don't always have to put actions into your photos, just when you feel it needs it! I also like to play around with the opacity of my actions, so that they aren't so harsh etc.
It is a great idea to add words to your photos sometimes too! You can do this using the test box, located in the left pallette here...
I have a tutorial all about adding words to your images HERE where you can learn all about it!
When editing photos, it is a good idea to crop them. This is so that they don't appear massive in your blog/emails, they don't take forever to load and they don't take much space on your computer. When I crop my photos, I go to Image > Image Size and I change the width to 800px, like this...
Then I just press OK and have finished cropping!
When you go to save your image, don't press SAVE! You need to SAVE AS, so that you still have the original copy of your image, incase you want to re edit it one day! To do this, do to File > Save As and chose a name, where you want it to be saved to and make sure it is a .jpg, not a .psd or it won't be able to be put in a blog post or email etc.
Have lot's of fun photoshopping! I would love to know how you go and see your photos, if you have done some, and would like to show me, please leave a link and I will check it out! Thank-you my lovelies! xoxo, Emily
