Stop Taking Pictures. Start Taking Photos.

Facts

3. Make editing your photos fun enough that you’ll actually do it.

It’s no secret that editing photos can make a huge difference in the end result. Still, my disdain for Photoshop brought me to the point where I’d started to skip editing all together. Lightroom for desktop offers a more manageable alternative, but still requires a good bit of time dedicated to sitting down and working through photos (and plus it’s expensive!).

Luckily for me and the other Photoshop-haters, photo editing has become just about as powerful on mobile. I now do 95% of my photo editing on my phone — and I love it. If you’re on iOS, check out Mextures. If you have an Android, try Snapseed. You’ll be amazed what you can do within 5 minutes of opening the app.

Edit aggressively. Personally, I had to get over some feeling of guilt from editing photos. There was some sense that I was taking artistic liberties and artificially inflating some pretty average photography to make it look like I can take a decent photo. Sometimes I still have to remind myself that I’m editing photos for enjoyment — not doctoring security footage. Cameras simply cannot capture the dynamic range that the human eye can see. This results in dull looking and underwhelming photos compared to what we’re seeing with our eyes. Touch up edits are usually necessary to create a more realistic image. Taking it a step further, though, allows us to add our artistic touch and turn pictures into photos.

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