by Susan Latreille

Creative Fun With Photo Editing (Part 3)

For the third part of having fun editing photos, I have chosen another photo from the same August day as those used in parts 1 & 2. These echinacea were also headed to the recycle bin. I have to admit I don’t like all of the final results of the editing processes that I’ve used in my three-part series, but my aim has been to show some of the possibilities available if one wants to play around with their photos.

Since the program (Picasa) I use has been discontinued to new users, I looked for other choices of free editing programs. You might be interested in checking out this site for recommendations:  https://www.techradar.com/best/free-photo-editor

I have downloaded GIMP (recommended to me by CAGAC’s own Francois Desjardins) – it will take a few (maybe many!) tutorials just to learn the basics. I have also used Canva and Paint, though I must admit that, old fogey that I am, my tried & true Picasa is where I feel most comfortable.

I hope you enjoyed a bit of my creative process. I had fun doing it.

This is the original, ‘out-of-camera’ shot.

This is a simple crop keeping the original ratio.

This version is full Saturation making these simple flowers look very dramatic. I added a Museum Matte Border which has various colours and thicknesses available for the inside and outside borders.

Focal B&W can be quite effective if one wishes to highlight a particular aspect of a photo. Here I wanted the focus on the flowerhead that has a bee sitting on it. Focal B&W is available in a sliding scale for size and sharpness so you can choose to focus and highlight an exact area of a photo.  I also included a Drop Shadow Border.

Feeling ‘blue’ today – change the entire photo from a choice of a kaleidoscope of colours. This feature is called Tint, plus I added a pale blue Vignette Border to complete the ‘blue mood’.

I chose white as my Neon colour (a rainbow of colours is available) and I added a B&W border to enhance the total effect.

I mentioned in Part 2 that crops can be made to fit specific purposes. I re-cropped the original echinacea photo to CD case (a choice available in the Crop menu), added some text (title and artist, as if this was being made for a real CD), and a Drop Shadow Border to make the picture pop.

Collectif members, send an image (or a few) of very recent work to cagac.ca@gmail.com with up to 100 words describing what you did, materials used, inspiration, etc. Maybe share how you’re feeling & how creativity helps. We’d like an informative, inspiring show & tell. Writers, send us poetry, lyrics, a short piece or excerpt.