My Favorite Photo Editing Tools

For some bloggers, their photo editing technique is a closely guarded secret, but I am more than happy to share. I would consider myself to be fairly low-tech when it comes to my content creation and editing process. For example, unlike most bloggers, I do not have a DSLR camera. Instead, I use my handy-dandy camera phone, and despite the lower quality, I think they come out looking great.

After I take the photos, I upload the choice shots into the Adobe Lightroom app. This is a free app with some in-app upgrades, but I don’t find any of those necessary. I select the photo that I would like to edit and immediately scroll over to the preset folder and select my custom preset.

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For those who do not know, a preset is a filter that adjusts. many levels on a picture, such as exposure, highlights, temperature, saturation, grain, etc. Up until January 2019, I had never used a preset before. Sure, I played around with Instagram’s filters and settings, but the thing that so many people, including myself, like about presets is that it gives your Instagram grid a cohesive look to it. My preset lightens the overall picture, makes the white look whiter, while adding warmth. Presets, in recent years, have become so popular that creators at all levels are now marketing theirs to their followers for purchase.

After the preset is applied, I take in how the picture looks. Is it too warm? I bring down the temperature. Are there still too many shadows? Let’s see if I can get rid of that with increasing the highlight. Just tiny adjustments because I still want the picture to fit into the color scheme and overall aesthetic of my grid. Once I like the picture I export it.

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From here, I do one of two things. 1. Deem the picture satisfactory and place it in my grid planning app to develop a caption and set a post time, or 2. Open the picture in Facetune for a few more adjustments.

Now, over the years Facetune has gotten a bad reputation for offering features, such as a reshape button that you can use to make your waist look small and butt round. However, there are also a few great tools that I go to over and over again in the app. My favorites are the Smooth, Whiten, Details, and Tones buttons.

• I use the Smooth tool to ease wrinkles out of my clothing.
• I use the Whiten tool to make white walls or details pop.
• I use the Details tool to make texture stand out.
• I use the Tones tool to enhance individual colors.
• I DO NOT use Facetune to edit my body or skin!

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Once I feel like the colors are popping or the small details are highlighted. I add the photo to the grid planner app that I use and schedule it out.

There you have it! Lightroom and Facetune are the only two apps that I use to edit it my photos before the are published on Instagram or here. It took me some time to get familiar with both of these apps, but once I knew how to manipulate the levels for each tool it became easy to make quick edits and develop a cohesive color story for my Instagram.

If you have any specific photo editing questions, or an interest in grid scheduling apps, or hashtags, let me know in the comments below and I will get to writing a blog about it.