Recently, I had the pleasure of writing a guest blog post on Photography Talk titled 'Convenient and Powerful Photo Editing From Your Smartphone.'
Below is a brief outline of the content in the article:
I shared some basic tips to get the most out of the free, versatile, and powerful Snapseed app by Google.
Settings
The first step after installing any new camera photo editing app is to become familiar with the settings. The main default setting to change is the Format and Quality from JPEG 95% to either 100% or PNG file format.
Tools
The Tools option provides a large range of global (whole image) and local (specific area) adjustment options:
Perspective
Straighten, rotate and stretch areas of the photo. You can also use the scale option compress at the vertical or horizontal axis. Using the Freeform mode, simply drag a corner in different directions to correct or further warp the lens distortion typical of a wide-angle smartphone lens.
Tune Image
A number of familiar adjustments are available, including Brightness, Contrast, Saturation, and Shadows. There are also extra options including Highlights and Ambiance which acts like a vibrancy boost.
Curves
One of the more intimidating tools, this one is worth pursuing and understanding. You can adjust the contrast or use one of the available presets to assist you if you do not want/need to know how curves work.
See article: Snapseed Curves tool enhances colour and tones – makes your photos pop
Below is a brief outline of the content in the article:
I shared some basic tips to get the most out of the free, versatile, and powerful Snapseed app by Google.
Settings
The first step after installing any new camera photo editing app is to become familiar with the settings. The main default setting to change is the Format and Quality from JPEG 95% to either 100% or PNG file format.
Tools
The Tools option provides a large range of global (whole image) and local (specific area) adjustment options:
Perspective
Straighten, rotate and stretch areas of the photo. You can also use the scale option compress at the vertical or horizontal axis. Using the Freeform mode, simply drag a corner in different directions to correct or further warp the lens distortion typical of a wide-angle smartphone lens.
Tune Image
A number of familiar adjustments are available, including Brightness, Contrast, Saturation, and Shadows. There are also extra options including Highlights and Ambiance which acts like a vibrancy boost.
Curves
One of the more intimidating tools, this one is worth pursuing and understanding. You can adjust the contrast or use one of the available presets to assist you if you do not want/need to know how curves work.
See article: Snapseed Curves tool enhances colour and tones – makes your photos pop
Tonal Contrast
This is a quick feature that allows you to selectively apply the extra definition to highlights, mid-tones, and shadows within the image.
Details
There are two options to sharpen your image: Structure and Sharpening. Structure dramatically sharpens content in the image that has contrast, creating quite a grungy look. Sharpening will indiscriminately sharpen every pixel in the image.
Selective
In this area-specific tool, you simply tap the screen to drop a pin, then pinch and zoom to increase/decrease the range of nearby pixels of similar tone and colour. Next, swipe up and down to access the adjustment for Brightness, Contrast, Saturation or Structure. Lastly, swipe left and right to adjust the strength of the adjustment to the selected area.
This is a quick feature that allows you to selectively apply the extra definition to highlights, mid-tones, and shadows within the image.
Details
There are two options to sharpen your image: Structure and Sharpening. Structure dramatically sharpens content in the image that has contrast, creating quite a grungy look. Sharpening will indiscriminately sharpen every pixel in the image.
Selective
In this area-specific tool, you simply tap the screen to drop a pin, then pinch and zoom to increase/decrease the range of nearby pixels of similar tone and colour. Next, swipe up and down to access the adjustment for Brightness, Contrast, Saturation or Structure. Lastly, swipe left and right to adjust the strength of the adjustment to the selected area.
Healing
Remove a distracting object within your photo. Pinch and zoom in and swipe over an area of the image to replace it with the surrounding content.
Portrait
This feature has presets and adjustments available, including; Face Spotlight, Skin Smoothing, and Eye Clarity tools.
Lens Blur
Blurring the background makes the in-focus subject jump off the screen and remove the viewer's attention away from a busy distracting background.
Stacks
Similar to layers in desktop editing programs, this advanced feature provides the to go back and fine-tune or delete a previous edit in your editing history. Where this feature really excels is the masking function, specifically choosing where and how much of any edit to be applied to the image.
Remove a distracting object within your photo. Pinch and zoom in and swipe over an area of the image to replace it with the surrounding content.
Portrait
This feature has presets and adjustments available, including; Face Spotlight, Skin Smoothing, and Eye Clarity tools.
Lens Blur
Blurring the background makes the in-focus subject jump off the screen and remove the viewer's attention away from a busy distracting background.
Stacks
Similar to layers in desktop editing programs, this advanced feature provides the to go back and fine-tune or delete a previous edit in your editing history. Where this feature really excels is the masking function, specifically choosing where and how much of any edit to be applied to the image.
Summary
If you are new to photo editing, then the filters located in Looks (Android) and Styles (iOS devices) is a great place to start and apply a quick edit.
The next step is to have a quick general editing workflow to streamline and a quick six-step editing workflow with consistent use of Perspective, Crop, Tune Image, Details, and Healing, then Lens Blur to finish off the image.
To read more - go to the original Photography Talk article 'Convenient and Powerful Photo Editing From Your Smartphone' here.
The next step is to have a quick general editing workflow to streamline and a quick six-step editing workflow with consistent use of Perspective, Crop, Tune Image, Details, and Healing, then Lens Blur to finish off the image.
To read more - go to the original Photography Talk article 'Convenient and Powerful Photo Editing From Your Smartphone' here.
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Smartphone Photography Training acknowledges the traditional owners and custodians of country throughout Australia and their continuing connection to land, waters and community. We pay our respect to their Elders past and present, and extend that respect to all Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander peoples today.
Smartphone Photography Training acknowledges the traditional owners and custodians of country throughout Australia and their continuing connection to land, waters and community. We pay our respect to their Elders past and present, and extend that respect to all Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander peoples today.