How to Use Snapseed – a Basic Photo Editing Process

So now you have an overview of the tools and filters of Snapseed, let’s start using a few, putting them together and begin editing a photograph.

Step 1: Select and Open a Photo

The first step is to select and open a photo to start working with. To do this from the initial splash screen tap ‘Open’, then select to open a photo from your device, from your camera or from the last image used.

For this I select a photo from my Camera Roll

Step 2: How to Straighten a Photo in Snapseed

With the image open which we’re going to work with, the first thing to do is open the tools menu. Generally, I prefer to open the photo in the ‘Rotate’ tool first to check and adjust any inconsistencies in the horizontal or vertical alignments.

To do this I tap the ‘Rotate’ tool. By default, Snapseed will often automatically adjust the rotation if it detects and strong horizontal or vertical lines and will straighten the photo to these. In some cases such as with photos will skewed vertical lines, this adjustment can be wrong. In which case simply slide your finger left and right to slightly straighten the horizon against the grid overlay. Once happy that the horizon is straight, I tap the confirm tick icon to apply the change.

Step 3: How to Crop a Photo in Snapseed

Next, I’m going to crop the image so that the composition of the photo is as I want it. To do this I again, tap the Tools tab, then select the Crop tool.

At the bottom of the screen you will see several options. The first stage on the cropping process is to select a ratio format by tapping the icon second from the right. This opens a pop up window with various ratios. Swipe from left to right until you see your preferred format. I generally go for a square 1:1 ratio format but it depends on the composition of the photo I am working with.

With the format selected I then move the crop area around using my finger until I have my desired composition framed. For this image I position the horizon on the lower rule of thirds grid line and position the tree on the lower right intersecting line.

You can drag the corners in or out, or change the orientation of the crop frame by 90 degrees by tapping the rotate icon (the icon to the left of the centre). Be aware though, that reducing the size of the crop will reduce the size of the final image.

To confirm the crop tap the tick icon and your crop is saved.

Step 4: How to Enhance Color and Exposure in Snapseed

The next step in my basic editing process is to fine tune the brightness, contrast, saturation levels of the image. The image we are working with at the moment is nicely exposed so there isn’t much to do here but sometimes you might want to make more drastic adjustments depending on how over/under exposed your image is or the effect you are aiming for.

Firstly, open the photo in the Tune Image tool, then tap the auto correct option (the icon to the right of the centre at the bottom of the screen) to see how the image looks. This tends to even out the Histogram levels (the graph image in the lower left). I find the auto correct feature offers a good starting point from which to work from.

If I decide to make any further edits I’ll make more manual adjustments. By swiping my finger up and down, Snapseed displays a selection of options which include; Brightness, Contrast, Ambiance, Saturation, Shadows, Highlights and Warmth settings. Swiping the screen left to right will adjust the level of a chosen setting.

For this image I don’t need to make any further adjustments so I save this edit.

Step 5: How to Selectively Enhance Color and Exposure Using Selective Adjustments

Next, I want to add a bit more contrast to the sky area in order to get a bit more texture into it, but not in the foreground area of the photo. To do this without affecting the whole image I use the ‘Selective’ tool.

With the Selective tool open, tap the screen where you want to place a marker, then using two fingers pinch in or out to increase or decrease the area to be affected. This will be shown in red.

With your adjustment area set swipe up and down to select from the Brightness, Contrast or Saturation options, then swipe left or right to increase or decrease the level of that option.

For my image I tap on the sky, then select the work area to include the whole of the sky and increase the contrast level to +50.

Happy with the edit I tap the tick to confirm my edit.

Step 6: How to Add Clarity to Photos in Snapseed

Next I’d like to add a bit more detail and clarity to the photo. There are a couple of ways to do this. The first is by using the Details tool. The second is by using the Tonal Contrast tool. Let’s take a look at both options.

Using the Details Tool

The Details tool allows you to give more definition and clarity to an image by adjusting the Structure and Sharpening of the image.

The Structure setting will increase the amount of detail in the image. Structure will bring out the texture of objects throughout the photo, without affecting the edges of the objects. Sharpening on the other hand increases the amount of sharpness in the details of the image. Increasing the settings will give more definition to the image, while decreasing the settings will soften the look of the image.

For my photo I would increase the structure by +25 to introduce a little clarity in the grass and clouds but not too much.

Using the Tonal Contrast Tool

The next way to add clarity to a photo and the method I prefer is to use the Tonal Contrast tool.

The Tonal Contrast tool allows you to select the Low, Mid and High Tones and increase the level of definition in these areas in order to sharpen the detail contained within them. The tool also allows you to protect shadow and highlight areas which will gives you a further degree of control when adding definition to select areas of an image.

Very often you can just leave the Tonal Contrast settings at their defaults but for this photo I decide to increase the Low Tones to +100 and Mid Tones by +50. Tapping the icon in the top right corner allows you to compare the before and after states.

If you need to zoom in then pick out to zoom in and navigate your way around the image using the blur box that appears.

Once I’m happy with the results I tap save.

Step 7: How to Add Mood to a Photo in Snapseed

There are several tools in Snapseed that will allow you to add mood to a photo by applying a colour filter to it. Let’s look at a couple of the most popular tools.

Using the Grainy Film Tool

Grainy Film is a popular tool in Snapseed. It offers 18 different filters that gives a photo a more analogue film type look. The results are subtle and similar to the filters you get in the VSCO app.

After selecting a filter preset, you can adjust the amount of grain that is applied to the image as well as the strength of the filter. As with the other filters you are able to pinch to zoom in closer to the photograph for more detail.

Using the Vintage Tool

Another way to add mood to a photograph, and one of my personal favourites, is the vintage filter. I especially love it for landscape photography, its one of my go to filters in the majority of editing that I do.

Once you have opened the ‘Vintage’ filter select one of 12 filter presets from the pop up options that appear after tapping the small swatch icon (to the right of the centre at the bottom). In this instance I go with option 10.

To the left of the centre at the bottom is an option to add some vignette blur to the image. I opt to leave this switched off.

Next I swipe up and down to select the Brightness option and increase this setting to about +20. You can also adjust the colour saturation, the style strength or the vignette strength. I opt to leave these at their defaults except for the vignette strength which I reduce to +15. I prefer to add some extra vignette in the next step.

Step 8: How to Add Mood Using the Vignette Tool

I am a big fan of vignettes and nearly always add the effect to my photos. I love the way this effect directs the viewers attention to the subject in the centre of the photograph.

The reason I reduced the vignette effect in the ‘Vintage’ filter is because I prefer the increased level of control that you have using the ‘Vingette’ tool. Let me show you what I mean.

After opening the Vignette tool there are basically two settings, the inner and outer brightness. For this image I feel that the foreground is probably dark enough but the sky would benefit from a little darkening to the edges.

Using my finger, I move the centre point of the vignette so that it is located at the bottom of the image. I then spread the diameter of the vignette area to cover the top edge of the photo.

Next, I darken the outer brightness by -85 and leave the inner brightness at 0 and reposition to the centre point of the vignette area so that the main part of the vignette is applied to the sky area. Again, tapping the tick saves the edit.

Step 9: Save the Image

At this point I’m pretty happy with the end result so I save the image. To do this, tap the ‘Export’ tab at the bottom right of the screen, then ‘Save’ from the popup menu. This will save your edits to the original image in a none destructive way. You can also save a copy which will save a new version of the photo with affecting the original photo.

At this point it is worth pointing out that although Snapseed is the same on iPhone and Android devices, the android version has one minor difference when it comes to saving options. On android your save options are; Save (which creates a copy of the photo), Export (which creates a copy of your photo where the sizing, file format – JPG or PNG and image quality compression are changed to those which you set in the Snapseed settings). The third and final save option is Export as which creates a copy to be added into a selected folder of your choice.