Once upon a time, using pictures in newspapers and magazines was a very straightforward business. Photographs were taken manually, developed in a hurry, and positioned on the page ready for printing - none of this editing, manipulating, airbrushing and tweaking of images to provide just the right look to support the story. Before modern photo-editing tools, publishing images was much more honest. Wasn't it?

Well, no. Photographs have been manipulated for more than a century, through manual techniques either during the developing process or physically altering a developed image. This shouldn't necessarily be seen as trickery or a con; certainly, manipulating images can be used to hide the truth, such as the notorious removal of out-of-favour revolutionaries from photographs taken in the early days of the Soviet revolution. But it's wrong to see editing essentially as one with lying.

Altering certain elements of a picture for use in the media can draw attention to the critical aspect of a story, it can protect the innocent, and it can be used simply to make a publication or article more visually engaging.

Traditional techniques for adjusting images weren't always easy or rapid; making changes to a physical, tangible photograph requires a great deal of expertise. If you're involved with any kind of publication, from a major newspaper to a local club magazine, whether online or in print, Adobe Photoshop brings a clear benefit in improving appearance.

More attractive

Pictures can be used to tell a story, but often the intent is to boost the story, to make it more appealing and engaging. Indeed, in many publications - such as those which deal with fashion, or art, or gardening - the picture can itself be the story, showing off a new creation.

In such cases, Photoshop makes it easy to adjust the contrast or colouring of an image, and to crop and straighten, so that the subject looks its best. It's also a very straightforward process to polish up a picture and remove any unsightly imperfections; indeed, the software even provides tools that are pre-programmed to identify and fix common failings, such as red-eye or small marking on the skin. Teeth can even be convincingly cleaned, should the subject have been a little to busy to attend to that themselves!

Whenever it's important that the subject of a picture is as visually appealing as can be, Photoshop provides a solution that's quick and simple to get to grips with.

Highlighting detail

But perhaps the whole of the picture isn't the story, perhaps there is one detail that's more important. In a studio environment, the photographer will have time to set the shot perfectly, but the photojournalist rarely has this option. Of course, unwanted parts of the picture can easily be cropped out, but Photoshop also provides the option to adjust the colour or contrast of that part of the image separately, by dividing the picture into layers.

The important element can be isolated as a different layer to the background of the picture, and the contrast and colour can easily be enhanced in the foreground layer (or diminished in the background) to give that detail more impact. And this isn't just useful for highlighting a key detail - often it can be handy just for making an image more aesthetically arresting.

Protecting and prioritising

Perhaps the key element in the image is a small but significant detail, such as an individual in a crowd. In this case, it's very easy within Photoshop to pick out that part of the picture, to magnify and enhance it so that it illustrates the story most effectively. Alternatively, perhaps someone or something in the picture needs not to be seen - there might be a vulnerable person whose safety could be compromised by publishing their likeness. Again, Photoshop makes it simple to deal with this, providing a range of tools to blur or distort the sensitive details.

Making life simpler

None of these techniques are new to publishing or photography. However, Photoshop still makes a huge difference in the ease of such editing, and the time needed to carry it out. A complicated and painstaking job can now be done by anyone with just a few clicks. What's more, if you use Adobe InDesign to create and manage your publications, Photoshop images can be opened directly within that program, and dropped straight onto the page.

There are real advantages to be found in using Photoshop within publishing, and it might well be worth considering a short training course for you or your staff to make the most of the opportunities it provides. You could be saving time and money, and benefiting too from a much more engaging and effective end result.