Fotor Photo Editor: How to Quickly Make Your Images Shine in 2022 [UPDATE]

Are you familiar with the Fotor photo editor?

If you need a free photo editor, you are in the right place. 

This post is both a review and a tutorial of the Fotor Photo Editor.

By the time you are done reading this guide, you will know how to use the Fotor Photo Editor and why you should.

Let’s dive in and learn about the Fotor Photo Editor.

A famous saying goes, “You can have too much of a good thing.”

Not in the case of Fotor.

Their website transforms your photos into gorgeous graphics.

The company has updated their graphic designer leaving you with even more perks of their tool to love.

This post explains all the new bells and whistles they’ve added to their original platform and will review the premium features as well as the free features of the amazing Fotor Photo Editor and graphic-design tool.

[Read: How to Quickly Make Your Images Shine with Fotor].

The Fotor Photo Editor is quick to use and user-friendly.

By the end of this tutorial, you’ll be able to make eye-catching images that boost your traffic, engage your readers, and will have people wondering what magical effects you used.

You know why you need a mesmerizing graphic:

• Graphics pull the reader in enticing them to click your link.
• Most people are visual learners. Readers will understand your information better by looking at your pictures.
• If readers understand your article, they will keep reading resulting in an improved bounce rate and better SEO.
• Google likes to give visibility to posts with media. Therefore, using Fotor to add photos, graphics, and collages gives your content the potential to be found more often in search engines.
• Blog posts with spellbinding graphics are more likely to get social shares resulting in more traffic for you.
• If readers remember your graphic, they’ll remember your blog which increases the likelihood that they will be return visitors.

With the Fotor Photo Editor you have the power to do all of this: engage your readers, entice visitors to return and boost your traffic.

Fotor’s Features

• When you first enter Fotor, a tutorial offering step-by-step guidance is presented.
• Don’t have time to design your graphic? No problem! Just click “templates” and choose one of Fotor’s designs. Templates with diamonds are only available with the premium account. Fotor has thousands of templates to choose from.
• Want to try out a few graphic ideas? You can add pages to your work area. Experiment by making a few graphics and choose the most eye-catching.
• Feeling creative? Want to design your own graphic? Text, stickers, and background are available to customize your design.
• Change your mind about your last action? Just click “undo” or click the trash can icon in the upper right of the screen.
• If you find you liked your original idea, click “redo.”
• Should you decide you want to scrap your design and start over, just click “Original” at the top of the screen.
• You have options when it comes to saving your graphic. You can sync to the Cloud or save to a local disk.
• Already designing your holiday posts? Fotor has holiday templates.
• While you are working, you will see an inset of your graphic.
• Not confident with tech? Tutorials come on the screen to guide you each step of the way. These are optional. No coding or prior knowledge is required to use this tool.
• Zoom in or out as needed. The zoom function appears at the bottom of the screen.
• Hundreds of font styles are available.
• Your color palette has an endless combination of colors.
• Click “Preview” to see how your graphic will look to others.
• In a rush? The Fotor Photo Editor is quick to use. Photos import quickly and your completed design downloads fast as well.
• Too busy to finish your design and want to return to editing later? Click “snapshot” and your design will be placed in a photo “basket.”
• Feel free to modify Fotor’s predesigned templates by moving boxes around with ease.
• Lines appear on the screen to assist you in aligning your elements.
• Like a blurred effect? Drop the “sharpness” in the Edit mode.
• The graphic’s pixels appear on the bottom of the screen to ensure you have the right sizes for your various social media. I prefer to choose “Pinterest post,” and the size is already optimized for Pinterest.
• If you’ve made an account, when you log back in, you’ll see your saved templates. There is no need to go hunting for your favorites again!

Tutorial: How to Use the Fotor Photo Editor

Note: Fotor Free will also help you edit your photos.

Go to https://www.fotor.com/.

Example 1: Modifying a pre-designed template without a photo:

Modifying Fotor’s original template took seconds. I modified the message and typed my blog name.

Example 2: Modifying a pre-designed template with a photo:

Step 1: Choose the type of graphic you want to design.

I chose “Pinterest post” since I want the dimensions of my graphic optimized for Pinterest.

Step 2: If using you are using a predesigned template, choose your template.

Step 3: Click “Open” and download a photo from your computer, Dropbox, or Facebook.

Step 4: Drag and drop your photo into the template.

Step 5: Edit your graphic. You can move the location of the boxes, and play with the sizes and colors.

Step 6: When you are finished with your new masterpiece, click “Save.” You’ll be given the opportunity to name your graphic. Choose jpg, png, or pdf. Choose quality. I chose the default which was “normal.”

Example 3: Editing your photo and making your own design:

When you get to Fotor, click “Edit.” Keep in mind you’ll want an accurate monitor for photos for the best results, or the work you do might end up not being as good.

This is what you’ll see when you enter “Edit” mode.

Steps 1 – 10 are Basic Edits:

1. Since my photo came in horizontally, I clicked “rotate.”
2. I clicked “Tap 1 Enhance.” When I did, my photo became brighter. Otherwise, you can lighten the photo by amplifying “brightness.”
3. The photo appeared more interesting when I boosted “Contrast.”
4. I increased “Saturation” since the colors became richer.
5. I fine-tuned the photo and turned up “Exposure.”
6. Concerned the photo was becoming too bright, I turned down “Highlights.”
7. I turned up Temperature and Tint.
8. I increased “Intensity.” Can you tell there’s a black shadow around the image? Since the content of the post contains disadvantages of sharing that you blog, I thought the shadow around the image added to the mood of this part of the post.
9. RGB let me click “blue” since I felt that color needed more emphasis. (R and G stand for red and green.)
10. I resized my photo concerned it was too large for my social media sites.
11. Effect: Choose a filter. I chose “Artistic: Crisp.”
12. You have many choices of frames. I added an “Old School” frame. I liked the tattered look it resulted in at the top. Again, since I will be giving negatives about sharing that you are a blogger, I felt the tattered look added to the mood of the post’s content.
13. I was ready to add text. I needed a background for my text so the words would appear over the picture. Click “Sticker: Basic Shapes.”
14. Click “T” for text to add text. Although there are many font choices available, you should decide if you want your words to be the heading, the subhead, or body-size text.

Compare my finished product with the photo that I originally uploaded to the work area seen in the screenshot:

Example 4: Tilt-Shift

Tilt-Shift is one of the Fotor Photo Editor’s most popular features.

The company uses State of the Art technology to create an amazing finish to all photos. The feature allows you to focus on a specific place within the image to highlight and sharpen.

Go to http://www.fotor.com/features/tilt-shift.html.

Step 1: Click Effect: Tilt-Shift 

Step 2: Import your photo.

Step 3: Tilt-Shift brings in a blur. Decide which part of the photo you want to be blurred. You can choose to have a linear or even circular blur. Since the photo will be used for a post about video production, I wanted the tripod to be sharp and the rest of the photo to be blurred.

If I chose “linear,” I’d have a blur across the middle of the photo but I only wanted the trees on the right to be blurred, so I chose “circular.”

Step 4: Decide the intensity of the blur effect. The blur’s default is over 90%, which was too high for my liking. I lowered it to 50%.

Step 5: I used “1-tap enhance.”

Step 6: I added a box as a background for my words by going to Stickers: Shapes. Your color choices are seemingly infinite, but I used one of the default colors for the fill. I added a navy blue frame around the box.

Tilt-shift is an important function. This feature enables you to focus on the important part of the image. In this case, the subject was the tripod. The photo tells the story I wanted my camera to tell: the leaves are being filmed. However, due to the blur on the leaves, it’s clear the dominant part of the picture is the tripod.

Example 5: Photo Montage

Photo Montages are a helpful feature of Fotor. You might have the need to create beautiful collages. Use Fotor to make a photo montage.

Go to http://www.fotor.com/features/montage.html. Click Get Started. I decided I wanted a pre-designed collage, so I clicked “Collage.” I chose a Classic Collage.

Step 1: Choose the dimensions of your project. I chose 683 X 1024 since I know that is optimized for both Pinterest and Twitter.

Step 2: Click Import to bring in the photos you want to use. At the top of the screen, you will see numbers and the word “More.” Simply select how many photos you want in the collage, and a template with that number will appear.

Step 3: I clicked “fill in” and Fotor added the images for me! You can move the photos around in the boxes. Click on them, and a hand will appear. You can move the photos into different boxes as well.

Step 4: I brought in a shape and put a border around it. This time, I modified the default color. You can use the transparency feature if you want the colors in your collage to shine through. I typed my text.

I am planning this for a post on photography techniques. This collage would demonstrate The Rule of Thirds: None of the subjects of the photos are in the middle. They are all off to the side. That’s why Fotor’s “hand” feature is so helpful. I could make sure the subjects of the photos did appear off to the side like they did in the original photographs.

Example 7: Dominant photo

For the dominant graphic for this post, I wanted to show a compilation of all the projects I made with the Fotor Photo Editor. This time I chose a Funky Collage.

Step 1: Follow the steps in the collage project above.

Step 2: Click Fill In.

Step 3: I clicked the “X” on two of the photos and switched their location in the collage.

Step 4: Again, I chose a background but this time one with a different color and more textured look.

Note: This collage might be helpful for a travel blogger who is trying to show the highlights of a particular location.

Are you satisfied with your new masterpiece?

Download to your computer. Additional instructions exist if you want to change the location of a downloaded file.

You can share your graphic or the link to your graphic on five social media sites.

Wrapping Up: Fotor Photo Editor

Over 200 million people use the Fotor Photo Editor for their photo editing and graphic design needs. These people know a good thing when they see it.

I hope you enjoyed reading about the creative ways you can use the Fotor Photo Editor.

I absolutely enjoyed making these graphic designs.

You can have fun too. Make an account at Fotor.com. today. This review merely scratched the surface of all you can do. The possibilities are endless with the Fotor Photo Editing Tool.

As you can see, this tool is valuable for bloggers in every niche.

Updates

June 2021 Update

Fotor has Snapchat location geofilters. In other words, if you want to advertise a specific location, Fotor has templates for you to use.

March 2021 Updates

Features of the Fotor Photo Editor

• Use Fotor on Windows.
• Use Fotor on the Mac
• Use the Fotor app
• Use Fotor to crop
• Use Fotor to rotate

2020 Updates:

This post was published in 2017. I am still using the Fotor Photo Editor years later, happily.

In fact, every holiday I want to send my online connections an electronic greeting card, the Fotor Photo Editor is my go-to tool. It will be yours too.

Update: December 2020

Click here if you want to get Fotor free.

Wrapping Up: Fotor Photo Editor

Please share so other bloggers and people in need of a superior photo editing and graphic design tool know the ways the Fotor Photo Editor can spruce up their content.

I look forward to hearing about your experiences in the comments section: Are you already using the Fotor Photo Editing tool? Which of these projects would be good for your content?

Fotor Photo Editor: FAQ

Is the Fotor Photo Editor safe?

Yes, of course. I have used the site for years, and I’ve never had a complaint.

How can I edit my photos like a free professional?

Use the Fotor Photo Editor!

What is the best free online photo editor?

I like Canva, PixTeller, PosterMyWall, and Fotor. However, when I need holiday graphics, my first choice is the Fotor Photo Editor.