Fun with Photo Editing & Collages

My husband and I both LOVE to take photos.  

We also love to play with photos after we take them.

Recently we discovered this site Fotor.com .

So many photo editing sites have been changing their formats and I'll be honest, I don't like them as much as I used to like them.  So, I was really excited to find Fotor.  The Fotor site is super easy to use and you can do SO MANY THINGS--from simple editing to adding fun stickers/clipart to making photo collages to making cards.

When I saw the clean, fresh design of the site, I knew it was what I had been missing and looking for!  And--Fotor is available for iPhone as well as for computer!

When you first click on "Edit a Photo", you can select a photo from your computer.  Then you are brought to a screen that invites you to upload more photos.  I love this.  It keeps me focused to all the photos I want to edit and go through them one at a time.  Also, I like that if I add a certain effect or change the lighting, it can be consistent throughout a set of photos.

On this day, I decided to play around with photos of my adorable niece.  I got permission from her parents to post her photos on a public blog.  I just LOVE close-ups of babies!

I felt the photo was too bright, so I played around with lighting.

The Fotor.com site makes it super easy to edit Brightness, Contrast, Saturation and Sharpness and Tone, among many other things.  I also found this site to be more sensitive even than PhotoShop, so often I feel like I am moving the point on the spectrum and NOTHING is happening and then BAM!  it's like a GIGANTIC change---that was NOT the case with Fotor.com.

I noticed that my sweet little niece had a blemish on her cheek, I was very pleased with how Blemish Fix worked.  Some photo editing software make you match that spot with another spot on the photo or end up looking almost scarred.  Fotor.com just smoothed out the blemish and made her baby skin look FLAWLESS.  It could not have been easier or worked better!

Next, I took this photo of her.  It's too bright and I wanted to crop in close to her face.

After I cropped the photo and played around with the lighting, I felt she looked a little washed out.  Probably because the photo was so bright to begin with it didn't show her little apple cheeks.  So, I added a little blush.  Just a touch, she's a baby, after all!

Next, I decided to play around with this photo.  It also needed cropping--you don't need to see my hands, but I did want to show my niece unwrapping one of her first-ever Christmas gifts!  And, this photo was pretty dark, so I wanted to brighten it up!

Then I decided to play around with some of the special effects available on Fotor.com, I am normally not a huge fan of these special effects.  I like things simple and sometimes I think special effects can look cheesy, but the effects on Fotor.com, I found to be pretty tasteful. Plus, who can resist Holiday special effects when editing Holiday photos?

There are also all of these effects.  I think in the age of Instagram, these are just FUN!

Next, I decided to play around with the Photo Collage options on Fotor.com.  I loved the ease and simplicity of making the Photo Collage and I REALLY LOVED that you can EDIT the photo when it is in the collage!!

There are TONS of options for Photo Collages on Fotor.com.

Did I mention I LOVE that you can edit a photo while making the collage???

Then, you have all of these FABULOUS border options....

I kinda couldn't help myself.  I so often wish we had a DSLR camera and all of these photo editing sites when my girls were little!

You can even make the border patterned!  For reals!

You can add Clip Arts, too, there are dozens of fun options here as well!

Then you can write something on your collage...the options are really limitless!

Then, you can click on the Photo Card tab and even make photo cards.  Seriously, people, Fotor.com is one awesome site!  I highly recommend playing around on there!!

How to Make an American Girl Doll Pencil

This was Piper's video for Seven Cool Homeschoolers this week.

How to make an American Girl doll pencil :)

Create Photo Collages & Banners with Picasa

In the last week, I have gotten several emails asking how to make photo collages with photos from a camera now that Picnik is gone and Photobucket has changed their photo editing options.

One option to  easily make really cool collages is Picasa Photo Editing Software from Mac.

It's completely free.

Doesn't take up a ton of room.

Is easy to use.

cnet recommends it ;-)

It's very easy to install.

It will walk you through installation.

Then you want to click on the icon

It will open in this window

You will see your iphoto library in the lower left, click on the album from which you want to edit/make collages. 

 If you just want to make a hold down your Shift key and click on several photos that you want to include in your collage.

{Easy Breezy!}

Once you have selected your photos, click the second button from the left to Create Collage :)

You could still always click the Library tab at the top left and add more photos if you wanted :)

Picasa gives you more collage options than Photobucket did.

You can have pre-made Mosaic collages.

You can slide that grid spacing bar to make the grid marks between and around the photos larger or smaller.

To see all of the options, click the Settings tab, try the different options until you get the one you like.

Frame Mosaic option.

If you want to completely play around and create, choose the Picture Pile option :-)

From here you can make photos larger and smaller, drag them around and place them where you want them.  Angle them...have fun with it!

You can make the photos larger and smaller by clicking on them and manipulating the little gauge with your mouse.

The album you chose the photos from will be in your left hand side and you can select other photos you want to use.

You can select your background/grid colors.

You can also use an image for your background.

Some folks upload scrapbook paper for backgrounds.

{Get creative!}

when you are happy with your collage, click 

Create Collage

in the lower left (next to desktop background and above close)

Now you can edit your collage, make it lighter, edit for redeye, even add effects like Instagram by using those green and blue palettes tabs ;-)

you can make the photo lighter or brighter, reduce shadows, etc.

you can add text to your collage :-)

When you have edited your collage, click File > Save As and name your collage...

You could even use the Picture Pile feature to make little banners and signs for your blog.

Click on text and type in and play with fonts, styles and word placing.

Then crop that little area out of your collage ;-)

And save it on your computer!