Those who know me know that it’s no secret that I love taking food pics though I admit, not every dish looks presentable in photos. This is why photo editing apps are a must!
1. My favourite app for adding text and overlays would be Phonto. It’s super useful for adding watermarks and image overlays because you can adjust the transparency and quickly save your photo.
2. VSCO is a popular photo editing app, but the filter selection is limited (compared to Instagram) because there are certain ones you have to purchase. VSCO also offers basic adjustments such as brighten and contrast, which are great for food pics that weren’t taken in good lighting.
3. If you’re into putting all of your food photos onto one image, Layout (created by Instagram) (iOS • Android) allows you to create collages with ease. You can choose as many photos as you’d like, add borders, and flip or rotate individual photos within the collage. The one issue I have with this app is that you can’t adjust the border’s thickness or colour. (I made the side-by-side below using Layout.)
4. For iPhone users, the built-in Camera app has eight different filters (shown on the right above) you can choose from. The filters are accessible when you tap the “Venn diagram” icon on the bottom right corner (circled in red above) of the app. My go-to iOS filter is “Fade”. Unfortunately, the filter levels can’t be adjusted… which brings us to probably my favourite photo-editing app of all (so far)…
5. Instagram! I use Instagram’s editing functions for almost all of my photos, so I’ve learned quite a few tricks along the way.
Instagram filter and editing tricks/hacks (refer to screenshot above):
- If you scroll all the way to the end of the Instagram filters, there’s a “Manage” button (circled in red) where you can move the filters around and/or even hide some (circled in orange). We can FINALLY hide that awful Kelvin filter! Just kidding… My favourite filters are Clarendon, Lark, and Reyes.
- Tap on any filter twice and you can adjust the strength of that filter. Adjusted to 15, maybe Kelvin isn’t so bad after all?
- You don’t have to just add a filter to your photo. You can also edit the basics (circled in yellow) like brightness, contrast, and even its angle (only works for square images right now).
- Too lazy to fiddle around with the adjustments? Tap the Lux icon (circled in pink) for a quick auto-adjustment.
- If you’ve made a million edits already and want to compare it to the original, just tap the pic for a quick peek.
- Now here’s my favourite trick/hack:
First, go to your Instagram settings and turn on “Save Original Photos”. Next, turn off your WiFi/data, edit your pic, and hit “Share”. Your edited photo will automatically save to your camera roll.
If you have a favourite photo editing app that I haven’t mentioned, please share them with me in the comments or on my Instagram page! I love trying new apps. ?
Written by guest blogger, jessyywongg.
