Make a Snapshot a Better Photo

This is our neighbour’s cat, Wyatt. He enjoys access to our garden, and our cats to his. I was lucky to have my camera with me when he came by and I grabbed some quick captures.

I wanted to use this cat photo as an encouragement for you to edit your own cat photos, especially if you think they are ‘not quite’ good enough, but you think maybe they can be improved a little.

Here’s my not quite good enough…

My lens was the 55-250mm on my Canon DSLR. With this I was able to zoom in but, as you can see, there is a lot of nothing much around the busy boy cat. Not great eh?

Let’s move in for a couple of light edits.

1. I cropped in closer. You will find, with your photos, that this can be a big help, especially if you have a busy or cluttered background. It focuses your viewer’s eye on your cat, or other subject.
2. I used a light touch of a pale vignette. It works as a matching frame for the tree on the other side of the frame. Not an essential edit but I think it works for Wyatt’s portrait.

The Edited Portrait

Marjorie Dawson

Cat Photographer, Instructor and Writer

Marjorie is an award-winning cat photographer, tutor, and published writer based in New Zealand. A Professional Member of the Cat Writers’ Association, she helps cat lovers strengthen the bond with their pets by improving their photography and editing skills through short how-to videos and encouraging, human written and well-researched posts. Marjorie believes anyone can take amazing photos and show off their cats to purrfection!

Professional Member of the Cat Writers Association,
Winner of the Kuykendall Image Award
Published at the Guardian newspaper