VSCO Cam: A Tutorial

The other day I was talking to some of my friends via group text about editing photos on my phone. I use a number of different apps, but I have to say that VSCO Cam is one of my favorites. I was trying to explain it to them via text and after a little back and forth, I decided a tutorial would be MUCH easier! Admittedly, when you first begin using the app, it can be a little confusing, but once you get the hang of things, you’ll be an old pro 🙂

Grab your phone and let’s get started!

To start, download the app. It’s free, which makes committing to it much easier! I store it with my other camera and photo editing apps, which makes everything a bit more organized! #OCD

Next, launch the app and pull up the sidebar by tapping the icon with three lines in the bottom left corner. Here, you’ll be able to navigate around the interface. You’ll also be given the opportunity to sign up for an account, get a username and link social accounts.

Next, click the icon in the bottom left corner that is a box with a circle inside. This screen will pop up.

If you want to take edit a photo you already have in your camera roll, click import. If you want to take a photo and then edit it in VSCO, tap capture. For the sake of examples, I tapped import. When you do this, your camera roll will pop up and you can select the photo you would like to edit. Once you’ve taken a photo or selected one to edit, it will be imported in your library and shown like this. You can import more than one at a time!

To select the photo you want to edit, tap the photo once and a box will form around it.

To actually begin editing it, tap it twice.

Full Disclosure: I usually just tap twice, but for the sake of this tutorial, I single tapped initially.

This screen will pop up when you are ready to edit! 

The paintbrush icon is fun filters and the wrench icon is simpler edits, like cropping, brightness and warmth.

Paintbrush filters can be lessened by double tapping them and using the slide bar to decrease their saturation.

Like I said before, the wrench icon is for more basic edits, but admittedly, it’s the one I use the most! It helps to play around in that section, just to see what your options are. If you’re anything like I am, I had to have a hands on experience before I could really grasp the app.

When you’ve gotten the image to your liking, click the check mark icon.

It took me a couple times of spending time editing a photo, clicking the “X” out of it and realizing too late I had lost all of my edits. Once you hit the check mark, your edited photo (not the original) will remain in your library where you had your original upload.

From here, you can store your all your images, as well as select one by tapping the image once and uploading directly to any of your social platforms (Facebook, Twitter, Instagram). How cool, right?

Because I’m by no means a VSCO master, I’m sure there are aspects of the app that have blown completely over my head. If you’re reading this and have any other fun tips–please share! If you’re reading this and still baffled–reach out! I want to help you 🙂

Do you use VSCO Cam? What photo editing apps are your favorite?