Google__ The Missing Manual - Kevin Purdy [51]
The Left and Right commands pitch your shot 90 degrees counterclockwise or clockwise, respectively. Auto-Fix is just what it sounds like: a tool tries to improve the contrast, lighting, color saturation, and other aspects of your photo. Most often, this tool makes a subtle shift in your photo, which can take a decent photo and make it just a bit better, crisper, or more natural looking. Sometimes, though, Google+ goes a bit overboard, especially with dark, indoor photos taken with a smaller point-and-shoot camera or smartphone. To give Auto-Fix a shot, simply choose it in this menu. If you don’t like what it does, simply choose it again to undo the changes.
Choose the Creative Kit menu item and you’ll see a new, white box appear—and you’ll likely wait a bit, while Google loads its photo-editing tools.
NOTE
If you don’t have Adobe Flash installed in your browser, or you’re using a browser that doesn’t support Flash (like on an iPad), the Creative Kit won’t load, and you’ll see a message directing you to download Flash to continue. Until you can get to a browser with Flash, you’ll have to rely on Auto-Fix to spiff up your photos.
The Creative Kit window is so chock-full of features and looks so much like a separate editing program that it can be kind of intimidating at first. But it only includes a few kinds of tools, with lots of variations on each one. Besides, anything you do to your photo you can easily undo by clicking the Undo button in the window’s upper right.
To see the different tools Creative Kit offers, click one of the categories in the window’s upper-left corner:
Basic Edits. Along with the Auto-Fix tool you just learned about, you’ll find tools here that let you crop, rotate, and resize your image, as well as sliders that adjust exposure, colors, and sharpness.
Effects. Google+ applies these effects to your whole image, giving it a sepia tone, the look of an old camera like the Orton or Holga, a Polaroid-like frame, and so on. Clicking an effect on the left automatically applies it to your photo; move the sliders around, see how it looks, then click either Apply or Cancel to add the effect or remove it.
Specialty/Seasonal category. The exact name of—and offerings in—this category depends on what major holiday is coming up or just passed. For example, as this book was being written, the Creative Kit window included a Halloween category that let you add vampire eyes, blood splatters, and spider webs, among other things.
Text. Select this category and then type some words you’d like to lay over the image in the “Type here…” box at the top left of the window. Next, choose a font from the (fairly substantial) list shown in the figure on Fixing Photos and Getting Creative, and then click the Add button to place the text on the photo. You then can move the text around and resize it by dragging the little circles on the frame around the word, or click the text itself on the image and drag to move the text. When you click your text, a box pops up with all kinds of settings that let you change the text’s color, transparency, size, and even blend mode. Play around and see what works best.
You can undo any effects you apply while messing about in Creative Kit. Even when you click Save in the upper-right corner of the Creative Kit window, you’ll get another chance to change your mind: You’ll see buttons that let you either replace your original version of the photo with your newly edited version, or save the new version as a copy—highly recommended because, after all, you have unlimited photo-storage space. Choose either Save option and, after seeing some spinning gears and a “Working…” message for a bit, you’ll arrive back at lightbox view with your creative new image displayed.
TIP
Want even more photo-fixing options? Happily, you don’t need to invest in expensive photo-editing software. Google offers two great free options. One is Picnik, which you learned about on Signing In and Joining Up; simply head to www.picnik.com and upload your photo. The other option