Photos: Gondola Ride
The filters available to manipulate your images are simply fun to experiment with.
Truth is, I, like everyone first discovering photo filters, got carried away at one time. I scoured my beach images looking for those I thought would make good art and began the process of playing with the filters I had at my disposal.
Don't Go Crazy, But Do Have Fun
Some of the filters applied to photos can make an image look like a bad trip with people melting into the pavement -- or whatever. The secret to using filters on your photos is to make sure the result is fun and enjoyable or even evocative if you like. Just be sure to hold back on use of filters or simply undo a process which doesn't look and feel right. It's experimental and if all goes well, you end up with something you and others can enjoy. I used to take my beach images and filter them, then turn them into greeting card art that people purchased at galleries.
Advantages to Using Filters on Beach Photos
Probably the main advantage is the dreaded problem of photo releases. If you don't have permission to use a person's face in your pictures for commercial use, you are in big trouble. Avoid at all costs! However, if your work is such that your are making frameable art and gift cards like I mentioned, you may have solved the problem of seeing the likeness of individuals in the pictures your hope to sell. Other advantage include distracting objects in pictures ranging from trash on the beach to other people walking in the background. Filters subdue those annoyances and can actually make the beach photo better at a time you didn't make use of your lens and its ability to throw background objects out of focus. Of course, with extremely bright beach conditions it is a challenge to use that technique.
