Learning the Basics of Digital Photo Editing

Photo editing has changed a lot since the days of printing photos in the darkroom. Actions that used to take hours of painstaking work can now be done or, more importantly, undone at the click of a mouse. So where do you get started in learning how to navigate the world of digital photo editing? Here is a quick guide on photo editors to help get you started.

Photo Editing Software

There is a long list of software on the market that is made exclusively for editing photos. They have an incredible range in terms of both price and quality. Ultimately, you have to decide how much editing you want to do with your pictures and how much you want to spend. In this article, we won't focus on the specific differences between editing software but instead will focus on the basics of what editing involves. If you're looking for free editors, you should look at The Giimp or Paint.net or if you want to buy a professional program definitely check out Adobe Photoshop.

Functions of Photo Editing Software

Although photo editing software can be very complex and allow for endless creativity, here are a few basic things that you'll want to know right away.

Crop: Cropping involves creating a new picture by removing the parts of the image that you don't want or need. So, anything inside the frame will become your new cropped image while anything outside the frame will be deleted. Just remember that when you crop an image, it ultimately changes the final dimensions of your picture so make sure to crop with the same aspect ratio (or width to height) otherwise your printed picture won't come out.

Contrast: Contrast impacts how much the colors or tones stand out from one another. By adding contrast you'll see your lights getting lighter and your darks getting darker, while if you remove the contrast eventually everything turns to gray. Higher contrasts can make for interesting imagery, but will also make the grain of your photos stand out more.

Level of Brightness: Brightness refers to the level of lighting of the entire picture. If you've taken a picture that turned out too dark, turning up the brightness may help some of the details stand out. With a little practice, sometimes you can save an otherwise un-usable picture by slowly increasing the contrast and brightness together.

Photo Saturation: Saturation refers to the deepness of the colors. In a color image, if you completely remove the saturation the image will turn to black and white. If you amp it up, your colors will quickly begin to look unnatural and super-bright.

The Hue: The hue changes the tone of your picture. By changing the hue, your picture can change from a green or blue tint to a red, purple or any other color. Although changing the hue can be difficult, it can make a big difference when taking pictures under fluorescent light.

Transforming Your Photo: Although each piece of software does it slightly different, they all basically let you flip, rotate, or re-size your picture. Hopefully you won't have to make too many adjustments of this nature, but should an image turn out slightly crooked it's good to know you have alternatives.

No matter what type of photo editing software you use, you need to be able to adjust all of the elements in order to get the photos just as you want them. One way you can bring out the photo's color and add depth is to increase the contrast while decreasing the saturation. If you can, try to do most of your composition work while taking the picture so you can avoid being overly dependent on photo editing software. If you're going to take the time to edit your pictures, make sure you start off with a picture that looks good from the get go.


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Autumn Lockwood is a writer for Your Picture Frames. Shop online and see our selection of triple picture frames in a variety of colors and sizes. Visit our web site to see our wood and
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