ASSIGNMENT

Your assignment is to capture a photo and transform it into 3 different photos using mobile editing apps. Use
the apps Dan walks through to explore and alter your image in 3 ways, each photo creating a different
feeling.

DELIVERABLE

Three different, edited photos of the same image.

MATERIALS

● Mobile device with a camera

● Instagram
● Optional editing apps: Cortex Camera / Average Camera Pro / Snapseed / SKRWT / TouchRetouch
/ VSCO Cam

PROJECT STEPS

Capturing

1. Snap photos of anything that excites you throughout the day

The iOS camera app and most mobile native camera apps have a lot of useful tools for snapping good
photos, comparable to the features in a point­and­shoot camera. Try out Average Camera or Cortex
Camera.

What should you shoot? Dan's favorite subjects include:

● Architecture in your city
● Plants or landscapes in your neighborhood
● Friend or a subject in a place you find beautiful (Tell their story.)

Helpful tips for capturing photos with the iOS camera app:
● Tap to focus and set exposure
● Tap and hold to lock and control exposure to a specific place
● The setting will save on the area of your photo as you move the camera

Use the following pre­capture apps to capture movement:

● Average Camera Pro: This app captures multiple exposures and averages them together to make
one image. This is great for smoothing out moving water or cloud movement. Ideal with a mobile
tripod.
● Cortex Camera: This is a handheld version of Average Camera Pro. Great if you don’t have access
to a tripod, or want a more organic image.

Editing

2. Review your images and select your best to save for editing
Create a separate album on your device with photos you want to edit. This will organize your best so you
don’t have to keep going through your photo feed, and it will also save the raw images for you. The best
photos to work with are the ones that struck you upon capturing them. See how you can push them!

3. Make small, specific edits to your photos

Apps that are really good at just one or two types of edits are a good place to start.
Dan’s favorite one­stop­shop editing apps:

● TouchRetouch: Removes blemishes from your photo. Use your finger to paint over the blemish, and
the app will act as a clone stamp similar to Photoshop. Use the eraser to tighten up your mask.
● SKRWT: Fixes lens and parallax distortion. This is good for correcting architecture and structural
images.
● Snapseed: Selective adjust gives photos the extra attention they need through contrast, brightness,
or saturation on specific parts of the image. When you don’t want to change the feel of the entire
image, but just a small part, this app is great.

4. Make broader, more general edits to your photos in VSCO Cam

VSCO could easily be the only editing app you use for the variety of functions it performs.
Dan’s tips for using VSCO Cam:

● It covers everything from white balance to exposure, shadows to highlights.

● Conducive to a fast and consistent workflow.
● Use the VSCO library to house the raw photos and all editing information so that you have the
option of revisiting or tweaking an edit in the future.
● Use a preset that comes close to how you felt as you captured the image. Let your intuition guide
you and make the photo your own.
● Fix the exposure on every image. Never trust a default exposure!
● Contrast tweaks the saturation of your image.
● Most raw photos have too much density. Lift some shadows just slightly, the fade will help.
● Use tones that represent your composition.
● Crop your image here instead of in Instagram. That way, if you choose to change the cropping you
can go back into the VSCO library.