Photo Tutorial: Improving Your Pet Photos In 4 Steps!

I originally posted this tutorial for our members on the Rat Chatter Forums, where I am a moderator. I also wanted to share it on my blog.

Everyone can learn to improve their photos with these simple steps. All you need is a photo program like: Paint Shop Pro, Adobe Fireworks, Photoshop, etc. There are also free programs out there on the web that will allow you to edit your photos to show their best. Picasa 3 is a free photo editing program. PhotoBucket even has a buit in program for editing photos as well.

I wanted to give a short tutorial on how you can edit your pet photos in just 4 steps to make them look their best. I'll be using Photoshop 11, but you can also do these steps with other photo editing programs.

Note: To view the pictures full size in this tutorial please click on them.

Here is our straight out of camera original photo:

This photo is good, but it has a gray overcast to it and needs to be sharpened & brightened up!

Step 1: Sharpening Your Photo.

Sharpening your photo will make it clearer & crisper. (It helps to pick a photo where the subject is in focus.)

Let's sharpen our photo & compare it with the original. You can see the sharpened photo is clearer.


Step 2: Brighten & Contrast.


We need to brighten up our photo a bit & increase the contrast.

I increased the brightness to 10 & the contrast to 5 for this photo. (You can increase or decrease to your liking.)

Let's Compare:


Step 3: Color Balance


I'm going to increase the color balance towards warmer because this photo has a gray overcast look to it.

I slide the bar towards warmer to warm up the photo and get rid of the gray look. (You can increase or decrease to your liking.)

Let's Compare Again:


Step 4: Increase Saturation


The last step is increasing the saturation to give the photo more color. This tool is usually called: Hue & Saturation.

All I'm going to do is slide the saturation bar up to 8, this makes the color stronger. (You can increase or decrease to your liking.)

Let's Compare:


Now that's we've finished let's compare the original photo to the finished version:

Original:
Finished:
You can see our finished photo is clearer, crisper & brighter than the original. Just 4 easy steps is all it takes to make your photos look their best!

1 more tip for getting clear photos. If your camera has a MACRO setting, it will help for taking close up clear pictures without being blurry.

I use a Sony Cyber Shot DSC-W55 for all my pictures.

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  1. Thanks for the detailed tutorial! I found it helpful...now to just talk J in to a new camera, lol!

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  2. I want a new camera myself, but a NICE Professional one, a Sony SLR... sigh... maybe next year, haha!

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  3. Wow-- too much for me to take in. Can I just hire you as my personal photographer? :)

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  4. Haha! Thanks Christine, I'm flattered. I need a more professional camera first! :-p

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  5. Great topic! I do this with ALL photos I put in the web. I'm obsessed with picture quality :)

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  6. I would be thrilled if I could just get my rats to sit long enough for a picture!! Also, I'm in the market for a new camera and there are too many options for an inexperience person like me. Nevertheless, thank you for the advice!

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