Picasa Tutorials

Picasa Tip: Cut thru the Haze

Our motorhome is currently parked in Salem, Massachusetts. A little city park called Winter Island. We’re using this home base to sightsee in the area, including Boston. For our day in Boston, we decided to take the ferry. Nothing better than a boat ride to start the day, and what a great way to see Boston for the first time! See our blog post on this wonderful day.

The weather was setting record highs … 95 degrees, and there was a lot of haze or smog in the air. You couldn’t even see the skyline of Boston until we were almost right on it! Not a good day for taking pictures.  I was glad I had my SLR camera with a Polarizing filter, that helps cut thru the haze a bit.  Jim has a little Nikon point and shoot (no filters) - I figured my pictures would be much better than his! 

But with just a few clicks in Picasa – here’s Jim’s picture:

Here’s what he did:

1. Basic Fixes: Straighten
2. Effects: Sharpen
3. Tuning: Increase Shadows*
4. Tuning: Increase Highlights*
5. Basic Fixes: Add Text

*I’m Feeling Lucky does almost as good, with one click, as increasing shadows and highlights.

The ‘before’ picture I wouldn’t want to show anyone.  The ‘after’ picture proudly went on our blog!

Here’s more videos that show you how:

Individual Photo View (Free)
Adding Text to Photos (membership required)
Basic Edits (membership required)
Tuning (membership required)
Intro to the 12 Effects (membership required)

If you’re not a member, join today for only $39 for a whole year.

Related posts:

1. Picasa Tip: 4 Clicks to Dramatically Improve your Photos
2. Better Pictures
3. Picasa Tip: I'm Feeling Lucky
4. Picasa Tip: Using the text tool
5. Making a Banner Picture