27.05.2015

Photo editing with just one click

27.05.2015

Photo editing with just one click

VSCOcam is one of my favourite photo editing applications. It was the first tool I started using as an alternative to Instagram filters.

Why do I like it? Most of all, because it provides for free a series of filters that can add that something extra to your photos, without making them seem over-edited. VSCOcam is ideal for anyone who doesn’t want to spend too much time retouching photos manually. Once you’ve selected your filter, when you click on it a second time, this app also allows you to adjust the intensity of the chosen filter (something I haven’t often found in the other editing apps I know), so that you can quickly choose to give your image a more or less pronounced look.

1 - Me, Lusty and the mountains

When you download this application, you automatically get a standard package of filters; I recommend that you go to the ‘Shop’ section and download at least all the other free packages (there are two or three more). Of course, there are also filters you have to pay for in this section. I downloaded all the free versions and, so far, I haven’t bought any additional packages, partly because I very often find myself using one single filter for my rapid retouching: the F2. I retouch a lot of the photos I take with one click using just this filter, at the very most just increasing the intensity a bit.

2 - Galleria Vittorio Emanuele

There are filters that don’t involve many steps that I often use for rapid editing, especially B1 and B5 for those (rare) moments in which I choose to publish a photo in black and white and A5, which I use on images in which I wish to enhance the blues, such as in this photo I took recently in Otranto, Puglia.

3 - Punta Palascia Lighthouse

It is true that VSCOcam is particularly suited to rapid photo editing; however, the app can also provide good results for those who like having a go at manual editing. Indeed, as well as the sets of filters, within the tools section, you can find several retouching options. As well as the basic light, contrast, proportion and shape adjustment, you have, for example, the option of increasing or decreasing the image grain, which is useful if you want to give your photos a more or less vintage feel.

When I publish images featuring people, I always retouch them using the skin tone adjustment option. This function is really useful because skin often takes on a reddish or unbalanced shade in photographs. The skin tone adjustment allows you to create a very natural result. I recommend using this function not just for actual portraits, but also when there are just certain details in the photo, such as the hands.

4 - Relax

One of the VSCOcam functions I have the most fun with is playing around with shadows tint and highlights tint, adding shades that go from warm to cold. You can choose the same colour tones for highlights and shadows, selecting tint on tint if you want to highlight one colour in particular, or using them in contrast with one another, selecting a warm colour for the highlights and a cold one for shadows or vice versa, as I did with this photo, for example, starting with an image edited using filter B5.

5 - Batman was in town

With these functions too, as with the filters, you can adjust the intensity of the selected colours of the highlights and shadows, by clicking for a second time on the chosen shade.

Giulia Dini

I was born in Turin but I consider Milan my home. I love nature, good food, sunny days spent outdoors and in good company.

instagram.com/giuliadini

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