The Art of Editing Group Photos: Tips for Flawless Results

Thanks to its advanced face detection software, you can avoid long and laborious editing sessions. Aperty’s built-in retouching tools, such as skin smoothing and even makeup application, are conveniently controlled by dedicated sliders, eliminating the need for complicated techniques to achieve great results. 

Let’s take a look at how Aperty can simplify group photo editing and save you a great deal of time.

What is Aperty?

Aperty is a photo editing software specifically designed for portraits. No matter the style of portraits, you can achieve editorial-quality results with just a few clicks, thanks to its extensive range of beauty and skin-smoothing tools. The app is dedicated to saving you time, allowing you to complete your editing tasks quickly and get back to what you love most—shooting!

All your essential editing tools are seamlessly integrated into the application, including exposure control, color correction, and detail enhancement. This means you don’t need to switch between different software programs to achieve your final results. Once your base edit is complete, you can move on to the portrait-specific features within the app. In addition to retouching tools for the skin and face, Aperty includes reshaping tools for both the body and face. The app automatically detects individual segments of the body, saving you the time and effort of manually drawing paths around your subject.

Aperty also features creative tools to further stylise your images. For example, the Light Control tool allows you to introduce additional lighting effects, with options to replicate gels using customisable hues. These features open up endless possibilities for enhancing your portraits with ease.

Learn more: Editing Portrait Photos Like a Pro with Aperty: A Step-by-Step Guide

How Else Can Aperty Save You Time?

So far, you’ve saved significant time by applying all these changes to an individual photo. You’ve smoothed skin, removed blemishes, applied contouring, and reshaped the face, all with just a few clicks. But do you need to repeat these steps for every photo in your shoot? Thankfully, the answer is no. Aperty offers batch editing, allowing you to apply your edits across multiple photos at once. This dramatically reduces your editing workload, freeing up your schedule for more bookings!

Now, let’s take a closer look at these tools and how Aperty’s features shine when editing group photos.

Special Features of Aperty for Group Photo Editing

Aperty makes use of AI technology to distinguish and recognise faces in your photos. When you navigate to sections such as retouching or shaping, you’ll find a tool called People. Clicking on this tool displays icons representing each person present in your shot. Since every face is unique, broadly applying skin-smoothing changes, makeup application, and other edits to every face in the photo won’t deliver the best results, especially when you’re working with a mix of skin tones, genders, and ages. This is where Aperty truly shines.

By clicking on an individual icon, you can apply your changes to just that person. This eliminates the need to manually draw paths around individuals or apply masks to selectively target one person at a time, saving you significant time and effort.

If you’re editing a large group photo, Aperty offers even more parameters to streamline the process. The software can recognise and filter individuals based on their age and gender, so you don’t have to scroll through a long series of icons to find the right person.

If you’re not happy with the changes applied to a particular individual, you can simply reset them by clicking the Undo button on their icon.

It really is that simple. As you can see, Aperty is designed with efficiency in mind, turning daunting tasks like group photo editing into a breeze.

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Advanced Editing Tips for Group Photos

Now let’s take a look at how to get fantastic results for your group photos to help them stand out. We will walk you through a quick step-by-step guide that will help you quickly get your image looking exactly how you want it using Aperty. Let’s get started.

Step 1: Refine Your Photo with Essential Adjustments

After you have imported your photo, it’s time to apply some basic edits that can help you get your edit off to a good start.

• White Balance: If needed, adjust the temperature of your image by applying cool or warm tones.

• Exposure Correction: Ensure that your highlights and shadows aren’t too distracting by reducing them using the highlight or shadow parameters.

• Depth: You don’t want your images to appear too flat, so increase the contrast of your image slightly to create depth.

• Colour: Stylise your image with colour correction by increasing or decreasing saturation depending on the mood you are going for. Further adjustments can be made to individual colour channels through hue, saturation and luminance. Be mindful that any drastic changes could negatively affect your models’ skin tones.

• Details: If needed, add further detail and texture to your image with the Detail and Sharpen tools. However, applying too much can introduce unflattering details to skin textures. Thankfully, Aperty’s Detail Protection and Preserve Textures parameters help to maintain the integrity of your image.

Step 2: Perfect Skin and Enhance Facial Features

Now that your image looks just as you envisioned it, it’s time to move on to retouching the skin for that editorial-like quality.

• People: First, select the individual you wish to apply changes to. If you’re happy to apply adjustments across all the people in your image, select All within the filters.

• Skin Blemish: Remove blemishes with the Blemish Removal tool. Aperty excels at preserving skin details, avoiding that artificial look often associated with traditional editing methods. Zoom in closely to see how much application is needed for each subject.

• Face Skin: Use tools to smooth skin, correct skin tones, and brighten faces. Ensure that smoothing is subtle to maintain a natural look. Face brightening can help subjects stand out but should be applied sparingly for a realistic finish.

• Eyes: Eyes are often the focal point of a portrait. Use tools like Iris Flare, Eye Whitening, and Eye Enchantment to enhance your subjects' eyes without overdoing it.

• Mouth: Save time with Aperty’s automatic teeth-brightening tool, which detects and enhances teeth with ease.

• Makeup: Add or enhance makeup with tools like Blush, Contour, Highlights, Eyeliner, and Lips. Feathering options allow for a more natural finish. This tool’s ability to apply changes individually is particularly useful when working with diverse subjects.

Step 3: Fine-Tune Shapes with Subtle Reshaping

While not necessary for everyone, photo reshaping can be a valuable tool for fine-tuning the appearance of your subjects.

• People: Select the individual you wish to edit, or apply changes to all with the All filter button.

• Face: Slim the face with the Face Slim tool, ensuring it looks natural compared to the rest of the body.

• Facial Features: Adjust features like eye shape, eyebrow positioning, nose shape, and mouth size.

• Body: Alter the body’s shape and abdomen, making them broader or narrower as needed. Be mindful of the surrounding areas to avoid distortions, particularly when working with group shots.

Achieving Balance

Aperty’s AI automates complex processes, but it’s up to the editor to ensure a cohesive and natural final look. Overediting can detract from authenticity, so always aim for balance and subtlety. Regularly review your work to maintain consistency across your edits, and you’ll have flawless group photos in no time.

Pro Tips for Editing Group Shots

When it comes to editing group portraits rather than single portraits, there are a few extra things you need to be mindful of to bring out the best in your image. Let’s take a closer look at how you can achieve flawless results:

1. Maintain Cohesion for a Balanced Look

In group photos, cohesion is the absolute priority for your edit. This means no single individual should stand out and distract attention from the group as a whole. The way you treat each subject needs to be consistent throughout the edit. Skin, eye, and teeth brightening should be balanced, along with adjustments like skin smoothing and lighting. 

A good way to check if you’ve maintained equilibrium is to step away from the photo for an hour or a day and revisit it with fresh eyes. Does one particular member of the group immediately jump out at you? If so, revisit your edits to ensure harmony.

2. Use Thoughtful Cropping for Better Composition

Be mindful of your composition and determine if any cropping is necessary. Ensure even spacing around the group, avoiding individuals being too close to the edge of the frame or cutting off limbs. Balanced framing will give your image a polished, professional look.

3. Check Colour Correction for Skin Tone Accuracy

This can be especially tricky if there’s a range of skin tones in your image. While adding certain tones for a stylised look might work well for some skin tones, it could leave an unnatural hue on others, creating an unappealing result. Evaluate each individual in isolation to ensure your colour corrections haven’t negatively affected anyone.

You may also like: How To Work With Different Skin Types In Portraits Correctly

4. Avoid Over-Editing Individuals

While this may seem like an obvious point, it carries unique challenges for group photo editing. Certain individuals in your frame may need more work on their skin than others. Applying the same edit across all members of the group could result in some appearing over-edited. This is where Aperty’s People tool shines, helping you maintain a natural look across all members of the group by applying edits individually.

5. Prioritize the Group, Not One Person

To emphasise the most important aspect of a group photo: no single individual should dominate unless that is your intention. Instead, aim to maintain a balanced and cohesive look across the group. This involves consistent editing choices, ensuring no one person is significantly brighter or more edited than others. Additionally, frame and crop your image so all members are given equal prominence within the composition.

The Bottom Line

Feeling overwhelmed by the workload of editing group portrait sessions is now a thing of the past, thanks to Aperty. With its intuitive tools, you can streamline your workflow and deliver stunning images to clients faster than ever, freeing up more time to schedule additional bookings.

By leveraging Aperty's AI-powered tools, you can focus on individual faces and features without the tedious task of manual masking. Tools like blemish removal, face brightening, and skin smoothing make it easy to clean up your image with just a click, eliminating the need for technical or time-consuming edits.

Don’t forget that maintaining balance in your edits is crucial for group portraits. Aperty’s People tool makes this effortless, automatically detecting individuals in your photo so you can apply tailored adjustments without compromising cohesion.

With Aperty, group photo editing has never been easier. Whether it’s for family, weddings, or other group portrait sessions, give it a try the next time you're tackling a big project. You'll be grateful for the time and effort saved, and the stunning results you’ll achieve.