Edit Digital Photogrpahy: Digital Photos Touch Up Guide

One problem I faced when starting out with digital photography was how to touch up my raw digital images. Perhaps an image was slightly dark, perhaps it had to be rotated or cropped. Maybe some dirty spots had to be cleaned out and erased. Digital photos usually require some form of manipulation before final output. So here\'s a short guide which I\'ve compiled to help you touch up your photos.

Step 1: Start Up Your Image Editor The first step, of course, is to fire up your favorite image editing program. For beginners, it\'s best to get a program like Ulead PhotoImpact. It\'s a great tool that allows you to achieve professional photo effects using simple, easy-to-follow steps.

Step 2: Remove Red-Eye Should you be taking photos of people, odds are that some if not many will suffer from red-eyes issues. This is easily solved with image editing software. In Ulead Photo Impact you will find an option called Remove Red Eye in the Tool Panel that will correct the red-eye problems. Paint Shop Pro also has a Red-Eye Removal tool in the menu that when chosen will do all of the work for you.

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 Experiment with the different color tools for a different look. Through the versatility of digital editing programs you can make the sky green, the whole photo black and white, or give it an antiqued look with a sepia tone. A good photo editing program will have an automatic color balance option to adjust color flaws in your pictures.

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. You cannot sharpen an out of focus image into clarity contrary to popular belief. The best way to utilize the sharpen tool is to selectively sharpen just a portion of an image such as a person's eyes. Leave the unimportant areas unsharpened to give the focus to your selected area.

Step 7: Resize Depending on your needs, you may want to resize your photo. If you\'re emailing a picture to a friend, you\'ll want to resize the picture down to a much smaller size. If you\'re printing the photo on a greeting card, you can scale down the image to the size of a 4x6 print.

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.

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.

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