Behind the Brand P6: Learning PSD

Editing the first photos was and is the bane of my existence. Take it from me: INVEST IN A GOOD GRAPHIC DESIGNER FOR RETOUCHING. It took days…for four photos! Luckily, another friend from business school – Sunny – helped in a HUGE way (thanks again!) to show me the ropes to Lightroom and Photoshop. The two biggest lessons I learned from Sunny were the following.

First, there is no substitute for capturing the right angle of the object you want, and you should do everything possible to get the initial photo perfect in terms of positioning. For the front on shots I simply combined into a collage of LIC landmarks. 

Second, while camera quality used in the initial photo is important, the right software can make an enormous potential difference in the end product of the picture. I think people casually throw around the word “Photoshop it” without truly understanding how incredible it (and its counterpart Lightroom) is. Quite simply, you can make mediocre photos look great if you know a few tricks. After watching some how-to videos on YouTube, I was ready to make some shirt designs and I retouched the Silvercup pic to the final image.