I’ll start a section today: “Original vs. Edited”. By “edited” I mean that I myself have modified tones, highlight, contrast and have cropped the original picture. It is my own work rather than letting an app like Instagram do all the editing (or most of it). I like Instagram photos; they’re fun! But sometimes I prefer the old-fashioned “DIY” since you can begin discovering your own preferences and perhaps even shape your own style.
The original picture was taken in the Outer Banks (NC) in August 2011:
And this is the edited version:
As you can see, the light blue of the sky and the pond is more intense in the second photograph due to modifications in contrast. By modifying the contrast and a bit of the tone and highlights, I was able to highlight the reflection of the ducks on the pond, which gets a bit lost in the original.
In this case, I didn’t crop the image because the group of ducks is already in the center of the image, which divides the frame in two parts: sky and ground/water. But as we will see in future post, cropping is a great tool remarking some details of an original photo.
Don’t be afraid and edit your own pictures! It can take a bit of time, yes (and if you tend to perfectionism, even more) but I promise it’s lots of fun and it’ll give your pics a personal magical touch!…
