Today in the lesson, I used the program ‘Adobe Photoshop’ to edit the image I took of my Grandpa with his tractors on one of my shoots for environmental portraiture.

Above is the original and below is the edited version. Firstly, I cropped the photograph to enable me to focus on the main aspects of the picture, this being, my Grandpa’s face, the steering wheel and the poster behind him, also about tractors. When cropping the picture, I had make sure I was obeying the rule of thirds by aligning key parts with the lines and intersections. In this photo, my model’s face is centered but I believe it has a positive effect on the viewer.

Next, I adjusted the saturation so there was none – it was black and white. By doing this, I was able to use the ‘levels’ tool on Photoshop to alter the intensity of the blacks, whites and mid-tones; essentially changing the contrast. I found a balance I was happy with, which I thought looked effective for the photo.

Finally, once I was happy with the outcome, I flattened this photograph by going to ‘layers’ then ‘flatten image’. This allowed me to put it on the blog to show you my thoughts.