Adding Text onto Photos
For our winter issue, I created a layout called “Winter Wardrobe”. I took photos of some of my favourite baby clothes-- cords and sweaters, pink boots, etc, and cropped them into squares so that I could punch them out with a square punch once printed. Rather than add titles to these photos with letter stickers or rub-ons, I added text directly to the photos in Picasa.
Picasa is an amazing photo-editing program that is free to download. I have been using it for years, and I probably use it more than Photoshop Elements because of how quick and easy it is. The newest version allows you to add text directly to your photo, and it couldn’t be easier.
To begin: Choose your photo and crop to a square (choose “cd cover” under the crop options)
Next: Set the size of the font to around 24 and type anywhere on the photo. The beauty of this program is that you can then run your cursor over the different fonts in the dropdown menu to preview what your words will look like on that photo. Same with font size.
Once you are happy with the font and size, you can change the colour of your text. Click on the little circle next to the T, underneath the font selector. From there you can either choose a colour from the palette, or take the little eye dropper that appears as your cursor and click on a colour in the photograph. This will give you a custom colour that is perfectly matched to your photo.
Finally, to place the text vertically on the photo, first click on the text. A little wheel will appear with an arrow and red dot. Click on the red dot and move your mouse to rotate the text to 90 degrees. Click on the bounding box to move the text to where you would like it on the photo. Click Apply, and you’re done!
Although this may seem like a lot of steps, it is actually very quick. Once you get the hang of it, you will be adding text to your photos in no time!
Article by: Lisa Kisch
