Editing Photos

After finishing the photos, I went to edit them and decided to use Paint.NET to do this, rather than Photoshop. I have been using paint.net for a while to edit photos and use for drawings so I was quite confident with the functions whereas I was less confident with photoshop and the tools there, even though I had use it quite a bit.

I wanted the images to be impressive and artistic looking as this was going to be a very artistic magazine and good pictures always support the good artists.

Mojo's photo style is slightly cooler looking, not highly saturated and contrasts, but a there is usually a subtle look to them. Q, however, uses high contrast images that are sharp and have a bigger impact and Uncut uses classic images with black and white features.

I liked the subtle style, so on the front cover I decreased the saturation. This gave it a softer look and made the red and yellow in the hoodie stand out even more. By increasing the contrast, the greys looked less the same and more variety was brought out. Before doing this however, I used the lasso tool to draw around the figure and pasted this into a new layer. I then blurred the background to make the figure stand out and emphasise the imposing angle of the shot.

For the image on the contents page, I increased the contrast and tweeked the levels to make the background darker and mke the figure stand out against the black. I decreased the saturation again so give the subtle effect and made the guitar less imposing on the page.To make the image stand out, I used the lasso tool again to draw around the figure and paste onto a new layer, then blurring the background so it wasn't so clear.

The double page spread photo was edited in a similar way to the other images. I decreased the stauration and increased he contrast. I wanted the blues to stand out against the grey wall so edited the levels to create this look. I liked the grey wal as a background for the entire double page, but it was too textured so I cut around the figure and pasted it onto a new layer, then blurred the background to give it a softer edge that would make the text readable if placed on top of it.

These images were evetually used on the DPS, however, I experimented a lot with them before editing to see where they would fit best; on the contents, front or double page. I increased the contrast but didn't decrease the saturation of these as I really like the brightness of the colours and their summery contrast against the darker images. Positioned together, these image work really well together. The same costume compliments and the close-ups feel quite intimate whilst the soft colours and tones make them quite innoccent.