Sunday Stills – Photoshop | Tails From Provence

Sunday Stills – Photoshop

I don’t have Photoshop. The LSH uses Lightroom and I’ve used it a bit when processing photos after an equestrian event, but I find that iPhoto is sufficient for my needs.

One thing I’ve never figured out, though, was how to add Text to a photo in iPhoto. I’ve kludged it a few times using Powerpoint : insert photo into slide, add text and overlay it on photo, save as JPEG and reload into iPhoto if necessary. Much more complicated than it should be, so I decided that I would use this week’s Sunday Stills to force me to learn an easier/better way.

I googled “add text in iPhoto” and found this :

nheacock

Feb 4, 2011 3:45 AM

So I was helping someone add text to their picture and was SHOCKED to see that iPhoto still won’t let you do it (what an oversight for a program that’s on version 9 for crying out loud).

Anyway, without having to download or install anything, I set up Preview as an external editor for them. With preview you can do “text annotations” and because it’s linked as the external editor when you edit a photo it instantly and seamlessly loads Preview and when you save the file it’s instantly saved in iPhoto.

Granted there are much better editors out there the Preview, but this was quick and easy and the person was pleased as punch. This little tip may help you if you’re looking for an easy way to add text with the tools already available on your Mac.

(The full thread can be found here but I got all the information I needed in the second paragraph. Thanks, nheacock!)

I’ve had an image in mind to use for a sort of inspirational poster, so I snapped this photo this morning and added my text in about two minutes flat. Not only that, but I added a © line as well!

I call it “Stand Out.”Feel free to share, but I’d appreciate being credited with it.

And here’s one I prepared earlier (just because I like it).

Here’s the Before :

It’s a bleh photo of a pretty horse; nothing special and the rider’s head is chopped off – unforgivable!

Here’s the After :

When I cropped it to concentrate on the horse’s head, it was just a little too soft. I emphasised the softness using iPhoto’s effects : antique, fade colour and edge blur and I was very pleased with the result. This prints off nicely as a soft, romantic shot and makes a lovely postcard!