How to add effects and adjustments to a photo

Discover the endless possibilities by adding photo effects and adjustments. 

Effects and adjustments are the secret sauce that achieves the look you want with your photos. Here’s how to get started adding and managing them. 

Start by adding a photo to your canvas. Select the photo to see its properties appear on the left side of your screen. This is where all your photo effects live, starting with Opacity and Blend. 

Clicking Effects brings up your basic color options, like Grayscale and Darken, and more advanced choices, such as Duotone.  

Click an individual effect in Basic to apply it to your photo. Then click that effect again to bring up an icon that lets you adjust that effect the way you want it. 

In the Duotone options, each effect is preset, but you can change them through access from the Custom icon. Click a duotone. Then click the Custom icon to bring up a modification menu, and edit the effect from there. 

Adjustments is home to your classic filter options — contrast, highlights, color saturation, and so on. Use this menu to make all the custom color adjustments you can imagine to get your photo exactly right. 

Types of image properties you can add  

To recap, here are the effects and adjustments you can make to photos: 

• Modify opacity to show more or less of a background. 
• Change blend modes so you can merge colors and patterns. 
• Use grayscale.  
• Darken a photo.  
• Use duotones to bring out middle tones and highlights.  
• Create adjustments to make custom colors.