Adding photos to your blogs posts can make a world of difference. Not only can they help you to show your readers what you’re writing about, but they can help to break up the text and make it look much more palatable.
If you want the photos that you publish in your blog content to really have a big impact however they need to look good. That is where a few simple tips to edit and improve your photos can really help:
- Crop the photos using the rule of thirds
By cropping your photo you can remove any parts that may be unwanted or that could distract viewers. Instead, you can make sure the focus is squarely on the subject and the other important elements that are in it.
One of the most useful techniques to use when cropping your photos is the rule of thirds. It requires you position the subject and other elements by aligning them along the gridlines and at the intersection points of a 3×3 grid. In doing the composition of your photo will be more balanced.
Keep in mind the dimensions that you want to display the photo in when you crop it as well – and make sure you don’t crop too much that it affects its quality.
- Straighten photos that are tilted
Unless for a specific reason, you should always straighten photos that are tilted. It will make them look more balanced and stable, whereas tilted photos will look a bit off.
The easiest way to straighten photos is to use the horizon or some other strong horizontal line as a visual guide – and rotate it accordingly. It is best to straighten the photo before you crop it, as you’ll need to crop it later to even out the edges anyway.
- Make the colors pop and look more vivid
People tend to be drawn to vivid colors that seem to pop in photos. To make the colors in your photos more vivid you need only increase the saturation.
To be honest it is best to first fix any issues with the exposure, white balance, and color balance before adjusting the saturation. On top of that you should take care not to increase it too much, as that will not look appealing either.
It can take a bit of trial and error to get the colors just right, and you should periodically compare your edited photo against the original to see the changes more clearly.
Learning how to edit pictures can be tricky, but the methods listed above are easy enough. If you use them as a starting point, you should be able to improve the photos that you publish on your blog significantly.
After that you can look into other ways to edit and improve them further if you want to. Make no mistake there are lots of options that are open to you – if you’re willing to invest the time to try them out.