mollydotw: Taking and Editing Autumnal Photos

Out of all social media sites, Instagram is a my favourite, and the one I always check first thing in the morning.

(I am one of those people that are too obsessed with making sure my theme all matches and goes with the current season..sad I know!)

After many many months of researching different cameras, going into camera shops and trying out different makes and saving up my money, I finally bought myself a Canon EOS 700D DSLR, and I love it!

At the moment I only have the standard lens that came with the camera, so I cant use it for its highest potential but it does the job and the quality of the photos are amazing!

Now that Autumn has arrived I have been taking my camera with me on days out and dog walks because everything just looks so pretty, colourful and warm and just perfect to photograph.

My Instagram at the moment is full of autumnal photos, and I am loving the way it looks, some of these have been taken on my camera but the majority are from my iPhone 5S, which to be far has a pretty good camera on it anyway, especially for close ups.

I'm going to show you how I take and edit my photos for Autumn, just as I love seeing how other people do theres and I thought it would be nice to share how I edit mine :)

Please bear in mind I am not in any way a professional, nor am I trying to be one I edit and take my photos entirely on my own, and just apply what I think looks nice. (And I'm 100% sure that many of your out there are much much better at this than me ;))

Firstly I chose a scene that looks light and colourful which compliments Autumn the most, so for example this could be leaves, trees, grass, the sunsetting etc etc.

Then if I have my camera on me I will set it to the right setting so Macro for close ups, auto flash on for dark scenes and auto no flash for general outside photos. For warm photos I generally don't use the flash mode as this adds more light which can make the photo look washed out and cold.

I edit my photos using VSCOcam and stay away from Instagram filters as much as possible, just as I feel they take the quality away from photos some times.

The edit I use the most for autumnal photos is 'M5' and 'M3' (If you download the VSCOcam app this will make perfect sense to you!).

These edit filters add a browny orangey warm feel to photos.

Normal photo without a filter (taken on iPhone 5S)

The same photo with M5 added and faded to +9.

This basically means you add the filter and then choose how strong you want the filter to be, +12 being the highest.

This filter has made the photo look much more autumnal, but I then change the brightness and, saturation, exposure and temperature to make the photo look a bit better...

This is the completed edited photo (I did this really fast just to give you an example) with the following added to the filter -

Exposure -2

Saturation +3

Temperature +2

Skin Tone -3

I just kind of add and take away these sections until I think the photo looks nice and fits the look I was going for, I don't think theres any right or wrong way of doing this to be honest!

The thing I love about VSCOcam the most is simply that it makes editing photos so easy and quick, and its an app for your phone so you can literally edit on the move. I normally take the photos (if on my phone) edit them if we stop at a cafe or something or in the car on the way home and then upload my favourite ones later.

Heres a few before and after editing...

You may realise on some photos that the before and after weren't that much different, but I don't see this as a bad thing, because if you have taken a photo in really good lighting and with strong colours, then theres not really much to change, and not every photo that gets uploaded to Instagram has to be necessarily edited anyway, it all depends on what you like and what look you are going for.

For example just by changing the edit on a photo, could make it look like it was taken in Autumn, when really it was taken in Summer...

Taken on holiday in the middle of Summer ^

The same photo but with an Autumn edit ^

So basically its very easy to cheat, if you don't have any photos taken in Autumn to upload ;)

Selfies, which we all know we take but hate to admit ;) I also try and edit using an Autumn edit just to carry on the theme, and it gives them a lovely warm look which compliments your skin and eyes.

Soooooo lets not tell anyone else, but I only ever take selfies stood in a particular area in my house (haaahaaahaaa.) which is in my parents room by their window as the natural light always shines in here and makes the photo have much better quality.