Basic Photo Editing with PicMonkey
Hi everyone! I’m Jann Newton from Newton Custom Interiors where I blog about home decor, sewing and DIY projects. I’m excited to be back to do another guest post for Deby. Today we’re going to talk about basic photo editing with PicMonkey.
A few months ago, I guest posted here at Mom’s Make Money about taking better pictures for your blog. In that post, I talked a little bit about how I love to use PicMonkey to edit my pictures after they’re taken. In the next few weeks, I’ll be doing a three part series here on Moms Make Money about how to use PicMonkey.
PicMonkey Part One – Basic Editing
PicMonkey Part Two – Applying Text and Overlays
PicMonkey Part Three – Collages
Making your pictures look the best that they can is so important in blogging, especially with everyone pinning blog images to Pinterest. PicMonkey is a very easy to use picture editing program.
PicMonkey is free, or you can upgrade to the Royale edition. Even the upgrade is not very expensive – $4.99/month or $33.00/year. I did upgrade to Royale, and I love the larger selection of fonts and overlays that you get with the upgraded version.
Important tip – Before you start editing your photos in PicMonkey, make a copy or copies of the photos you’re going to edit. Once you have saved an edited photo in PicMonkey, you can’t go back and undo the edits you’ve made.
PicMonkey Basic Editing
I’m a visual learner. I learn so much better when I can see a video of something rather than trying to learn it by reading instructions. So, I’ve done a short video of my computer screen while I edit a photo. There are written instructions for each step too.
1. Go to PicMonkey.com
2. Click edit a photo, and upload the photo you would like to edit.
3. You’ll be in the basic edits part after you upload your photo. I like to straighten my photos before I crop them, so click on Rotate to do this.
4. Click on Crop to crop the photo.
5. Click on Re-size to make the photo the size you would like. Make sure the Keep proportions box is checked if you want to keep the photo the same shape.
6. Click on Exposure. There are 4 different ways you can change the photo in Exposure. Brightness, highlights, shadows and contrast. Brightness and contrast are the two I use most often. You can also choose auto adjust if you would like PicMonkey to make the changes.
7. Click on Colors. There are two parts to the colors section – Saturation and Temperature. There’s also an option to use auto adjust here too.
8. Click on Sharpen. Again, this section has two parts – sharpness and clarity.
9. A new feature that PicMonkey has just come out with is Canvas Color. Now when you open up PicMonkey, you can click on Canvas at the top of the home page to choose a shape. Once you’ve picked out your shape, then you can use the Canvas Color, in the basic edits, to make it whatever color you would like.
10. You can play around with the other two editing options – Effects and Touch-ups. I don’t use these very often for the kind of pictures that I edit for my blog. In fact, I forgot to mention them in the video. They’re good edits to use for red-eye, wrinkles and even weight loss!
Here’s a before and after of the photo I was working on in the video.
So, what do you think? Stay tuned for PicMonkey Part Two – Applying Text and Overlays coming next week.
Jann Newton shares home decor, DIY and sewing tips on her blog, Newton Custom Interiors. You can find her at Google+, Pinterest, Facebook and Twitter.
December 9, 2013 @ 7:01 am
Oh thank you so so much for sharing this!!! I am lost whenever I get on this site.
December 9, 2013 @ 9:35 am
Dee, I’m so glad it was helpful!
January 17, 2014 @ 11:46 pm
I feel like a whiz on the site now. But I’m back to look at this post for more help. 🙂
December 9, 2013 @ 10:02 am
Great information – I keep hearing about Pic Monkey (I have been using something different) but I am going to give this a try because I keep seeing that a lot of bloggers use Pic Monkey. It’s nice to know the information without learning trial by error. stopping by from the Pin It Monday Hop.
December 9, 2013 @ 10:09 am
I know Jann has lots more tips to share in her future posts – we’ll all be experts by the time she has finished with us!
December 9, 2013 @ 10:15 am
PicMonkey is great! I love sites that are so user friendly.
December 10, 2013 @ 1:46 pm
thanks for this tip jan, i use picmonkey a lot but i don’t use exposure, sharpen & color manually..
stopping by through creative party!huggies♥
rea
December 10, 2013 @ 7:25 pm
Rea, I think doing the edits manually works better. You can control the settings to get the results you want for the picture.
December 10, 2013 @ 10:23 pm
I love Pic Monkey and I use it for all my blog photos. I have previously used Corel for photo editing but found that Pic Monkey is so much more user friendly. Thanks for sharing and I know this will help others. Hugs, Beverly
December 11, 2013 @ 8:31 am
Thanks Beverly!
December 11, 2013 @ 12:04 pm
I totally agree that I need to do this!! Most of the time I take pics at night and that means lots of shadows and bad lighting!! Thanks for the tips!
December 11, 2013 @ 2:15 pm
Check out PicMonkey, JoAnn. I think you’ll really like it!
December 12, 2013 @ 9:56 am
Found you through Sparkles and a Stove. I love PicMonkey and use it all the time!
December 12, 2013 @ 10:34 am
Thanks Sharon, it really is a great program!
December 12, 2013 @ 9:56 am
Good tutorial. I’ve started using PicMonkey to update old posts on my blog and I am loving it. Always love learning new ways to use it – I haven’t tried to do any actual photo editing but you’ve inspired me!
Popping over from The Weekly Creative.
December 12, 2013 @ 10:35 am
Thanks Tonia! Great idea to update old posts with PicMonkey. I think you’ll like the photo editing options.
December 12, 2013 @ 5:10 pm
Thanks so much for sharing!!! These are great tips that make it seem so much easier to use 🙂
December 12, 2013 @ 10:52 pm
Thanks Katie!
December 12, 2013 @ 5:38 pm
I just started using picmonkey and have fallen in love with it.
December 13, 2013 @ 8:40 am
Yes, PicMonkey is great! It has so many features that I didn’t even cover in this video.
December 17, 2013 @ 5:13 pm
I love PicMonkey. They a great way to edit photos. Thank you so much for sharing
December 17, 2013 @ 7:27 pm
I love that you’re a fellow PicMonkey fan!
December 18, 2013 @ 9:30 am
i love picmonkey, my photoshop crashed and i actually think i like picmonkey better. i too have the royal version and its worth it. thanks for linkning up to the all thigns pretty party
December 18, 2013 @ 11:22 am
Chrissy, I have never used Photoshop, but I’ve heard that it has a steep learning curve. I’m so thankful that I found PicMonkey!
December 18, 2013 @ 9:50 am
I love picmonkey and this was very much needed. Thanks for sharing it. I will share with my social network. Merry Christmas.
December 18, 2013 @ 10:56 am
Thank you for the sharing – Jann has done an excellent job with these tutorials and Pic Monkey is so useful for bloggers, both for improving photos and creating graphics and banners. And Merry Christmas to you too!
December 18, 2013 @ 3:24 pm
Thanks Michal! I’m glad it was helpful.