Photo Hints
For the Basic User: There are some
basic editing tasks which many
amateur photo takers can do to
enhance their photos. In this article
I’ve used some photo editing
software called PhotoDirector from
Cyberlink for a couple of reasons; it
is available for PCs & Macs at a fairly
low price and also as a free Android
or Windows 8 mobile app and also
fairly easy to use.
PhotoDirector there are two options to
try:
a) Content Aware Removal where you
use a brush to outline the object you
want to remove, or your finger if
using the mobile app, and then apply
the effect.
b) Smart Patch where you use a pen
tool to outline the area that you want
to remove and then drag it to a
similar area that you want to use to
copy in place of the removed object.
There is certainly more
comprehensive photo editing for the
expert user like Photoshop and GIMP
but I wanted to use software that
anyone can use.
3. Remove or change the background
by using the selection tools to outline
the area you want to keep or remove.
Colour boards can be used to replace
the background or a transparent
background can be applied and if
saved as a png the photo can then be
used with another image for the
background.
The following video shows 3 basic
editing features:
1. Adjusting colours using HDR
presets. Presets can be used to
change the colours in the photo,
make them richer and add artistic
effects. PhotoDirector has a great
variety of presets already installed
and more that can be downloaded
from their website. All the user has
to do is apply the preset they like
and save.
For the more Advanced User: How
to make a 3D pop out photo.
The graphics editing software used
here is GIMP which is open source and
free. It is comparable to Photoshop.
If you want to try to put this image
together with your own picture visit
gimp.org to get your copy of the
software and install it on your
computer (not a tablet!)
2. Remove objects from a scene
such as a leash or brush, etc. by
selecting the object and using a
smart removal feature which
basically copies a clean area of the
image to hide the object. In
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