I had a quick impromptu little photo session with a friend's kids yesterday.
They were wearing purple and laying on a pink blanket next to a purple curtain. So this picture came out so pink! What can I do in Picnik Premium to edit it?
Also, as you can see, I am having trouble focusing on more than one person. I've tried adjusting the F number but still can't seem to do it.
Thanks so much for any advice or critique anyone could offer with this or any of my other pictures! I'm just starting to learn and I really appreciate it!
Bonnie in the edit program I played with the brightness and contrast ... then the hues., until it got to this point.. . its not the best but from there you can play some more...
1. Auto Fix (I do this frequently while I'm making adjustments)
2. Exposure; auto fix (I will try this one first before making any more adjustments.)
3. Colors; neutral picker (click this then click on a nuetral color, white works the best. In this case I tried several different sections of the picture and found the whitest color in the upper left looked the best.)
4. Auto fix
5. Create; focal soften (you can adjust how large of an area needs faded out. My settings were: blur 50%, focal size 100% centered on both faces, fade 64%).
6. Auto fix
7. Crop (cropped out the left and lower section).
8. Create; Touch up; airbrush (on the baby's forehead because the detail was too distracting.) full size, fade 45%.
After uploading here, I tweeked the exposure 6 to the right. This lightened it up.
I hope this gives you an idea of what you can do in picnik. I use it primarly and am still learning it's features too.
Keep in mind, you may quite a few options so without knowing how you want the final to image to look there are unlimited ways to handle this.
I went back in and tweeked the skin tone.
Touch up; blush ( click on the lightest color, brush size 250, click on both faces where it needs lightened, fade 81%, click on the next lightest color and again click on both faces just once, fade 81%.)
Note: This picture is much darker than my posted picture. So, take a look at that one.
It's the light. Florescent? You need to adjust the color balance either in the camera on in editing. The nuetral picker will help. Play around with clicking on different colors on the picture (reset) until you find the right balance.
The best way to ensure that more subjects are in focus is by decreasing the aperture. That means you must increase the "F-stop". The higher the f-stop, the smaller the aperture and the less light being let in. Put simply, the lower the number, the less that will be in focus and the higher the number the more in focus. The other big thing for me is contrasting colors. Almost all of the colors in the picture are the same. It makes the entire picture bland and flat. I played around with the picture in photoshop a little bit, but there's only so much you can correct after the picture is taken.
Everything I did to this picture was done on Gimp - a free alternative to photoshop. There are so many people out there that use it so it is very easy to find tutorials on how to do anything you want on youtube. I highly recommend it.
One method you may be interested in is selective coloring... Everything is black and white except for what you want in color. You could make the pillow and wall black and white but their faces and shirts color.
@zswickliffe Thanks Zachary. I knew when I was taking it that they weren't coming out great, but the kids were being so cooperative I didn't want to mess with it. This was def a learning experience- I need to set up the scene better before we get started next time!
I've tried the F-stop adjustment without much luck so far. I will keep practicing. Thank you so much for your advice.
@dmortega I usually keep the white balance on cloudy, it seems to create a warmer effect that I like. They were inside next to a window that had a light purple curtain that I tried to move aside. I knew the light wasn't quite right, but I was just trying to get the shot before the baby started screaming, lol.
@mjmama. lovely. and like Zach says much more natural indeed... glad I could help a little , Im not very good at explaining the tech side of programs. I just play with them till it looks okay.. :)
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All done in picnik.com
1. Auto Fix (I do this frequently while I'm making adjustments)
2. Exposure; auto fix (I will try this one first before making any more adjustments.)
3. Colors; neutral picker (click this then click on a nuetral color, white works the best. In this case I tried several different sections of the picture and found the whitest color in the upper left looked the best.)
4. Auto fix
5. Create; focal soften (you can adjust how large of an area needs faded out. My settings were: blur 50%, focal size 100% centered on both faces, fade 64%).
6. Auto fix
7. Crop (cropped out the left and lower section).
8. Create; Touch up; airbrush (on the baby's forehead because the detail was too distracting.) full size, fade 45%.
After uploading here, I tweeked the exposure 6 to the right. This lightened it up.
I hope this gives you an idea of what you can do in picnik. I use it primarly and am still learning it's features too.
Keep in mind, you may quite a few options so without knowing how you want the final to image to look there are unlimited ways to handle this.
I went back in and tweeked the skin tone.
Touch up; blush ( click on the lightest color, brush size 250, click on both faces where it needs lightened, fade 81%, click on the next lightest color and again click on both faces just once, fade 81%.)
Note: This picture is much darker than my posted picture. So, take a look at that one.
Everything I did to this picture was done on Gimp - a free alternative to photoshop. There are so many people out there that use it so it is very easy to find tutorials on how to do anything you want on youtube. I highly recommend it.
I've tried the F-stop adjustment without much luck so far. I will keep practicing. Thank you so much for your advice.
@brunt thanks Steven I will check that out!
@dmortega I usually keep the white balance on cloudy, it seems to create a warmer effect that I like. They were inside next to a window that had a light purple curtain that I tried to move aside. I knew the light wasn't quite right, but I was just trying to get the shot before the baby started screaming, lol.