Myrtle Beach Memories Made Better with Fotor’s Free Photo Editing Tools

Last week I had the privilege to go to a camp hosted by Student Life in Myrtle Beach, South Carolina with the student ministry at my church, and God did some amazing things there! My church took 73 students and 12 were baptized in the ocean before we left Friday morning.

It was my first time witnessing baptisms anywhere but within a church building. It was an experience that left me with some unforgettable Myrtle Beach memories!

Disclosure: This is a sponsored post brought to you by Fotor, a free photo editing site. All opinions expressed are 100% mine. You can read our full disclosure policy here.

I love pictures, and took plenty of them during my trip. So when Fotor asked me to review their free photo editing tools it was a perfect opportunity to play with some of the memories I captured.

The sunrise picture above was cropped and the LOMO Sangria special effect was applied, partial intensity. I also used the Ventilate and Polsku fonts on the title overlay.

I am not including any pics with friends or students from the trip, out of respect for their privacy, with the exception of one photo from the baptisms, which does show our student minister. He graciously gave permission for me to use this pic of him, which I was happy about because what better memory to share than the baptism of someone who’s life has been eternally changed!

The students who gave their lives to Jesus spoke with their parents by phone regarding the ocean baptism, and I wanted to get pictures for them to have when they returned since none of their parents would be present for the baptism. As soon as I reviewed the images, though, I knew they could stand a little bit of editing. Fotor was easy to use and offers just the right tools to enhance these photos and make them even better.

What a few basic edits can do for a photo

Here is the original:

And here it is after some basic edits, adjusting the exposure and cropping it to a 4×6 proportioned size:

And here I took the original and used a classic special effect, called Walden, on it:

Then I took the cropped one and applied the lens flare sunkissed effect, added a simple border, a sticker and some text:

As you can see, each of these edited photos are noticeably different from the original! Now, keep in mind, I am a very amateur photographer, so imagine the possibilities when you are starting out with a higher quality image!

Fun Collage Features!

I also took some of the other pictures I had gotten during the week and created a fun collage, added a shadow frame and a simple frame and some text:

Top left is an image of Kristian Stanfill on the big screen, who led the corporate worship time during the week. It was my first time hearing him lead worship and I enjoyed every moment of it. Very humble in his style.

We got to hear David Platt preach … also amazing. I wish I’d gotten a picture of him preaching but I was so focused on the message I never thought about it!

Top right is a pic of the salad I had for lunch one day. I know … it seems sort of silly to have that one, but I have to tell you that salad meant a whole lot to me! Most of the food was frozen microwavable food. Every room had a full-size refrigerator and a microwave.

Someone said these teenagers wouldn’t likely eat the healthy stuff we adults prefer, but our student minister took great care of the leaders and asked us if we had any special food requests. Mine were coffee, Mello Yello and fresh veggies. I like some soda occasionally so that was something extra since the only other option was purified bottled water.

It was a very interesting week, food wise, but I will eat like that every single day if it means people’s lives being changed by Jesus‘ sacrifice! I suppose that’s a little bit of what Paul meant about “becoming all things to all people” …

The middle photo shows the sunrise on Thursday morning. Another leader who’s a friend of mine liked getting up early to “prayer walk” on the beach and catch the sunrise. I’m more of a sunset girl, but we were in a worship service at sunset each night. So I decided to drag myself out of bed earlier than usual on the day before we were leaving. I was so glad I did.

The bottom left picture is one I got on the last night from the balcony of the grounds where we stayed, the Spring Maid Hotel Resort. It was really nice, especially for groups. I loved the big grassy area where people can run and play … it’s always good to have plenty of options for kids of any age!

And the bottom right image shows the theme of the week: Who do you say I am? This was taken directly from the Bible from a conversation Jesus had with His disciples after healing a blind man:

Jesus and his disciples went on to the villages around Caesarea Philippi. On the way he asked them, “Who do people say I am?”

They replied, “Some say John the Baptist; others say Elijah; and still others, one of the prophets.”

“But what about you?” he asked. “Who do you say I am?”

Peter answered, “You are the Messiah.” Mark 8:27-29

Hearing David Platt preach on this topic was incredible. My first introduction to him had been from this video, which I saw not long before this trip and getting to hear him preach in person, in which he confronts and challenges modern-day ideas about what being a Christian or a disciple of Jesus means:

Powerful stuff because a lot of the “church jargon” can confuse if you are not familiar with what the Bible teaches, in its entirety, about Jesus and what the call to follow Him means for one’s life. Context is always important!

But back to photo editing …

In Summary, Fotor Free Photo Editing Tools Pros and Cons

The pros far outweigh the cons with what Fotor offers with its free photo editing tools! I will give you the pros first:

1. User-friendly
2. Lots of variety with fonts, stickers, borders, collage options, etc.
3. As a girl, I LOVE the beauty editing feature, something available only to “premium paid” users on the photo editing site I’ve been using!
4. Everything is FREE! They do offer some of their features to only those who create an account but it’s super easy to sign up and you have the option of using your Facebook login if you prefer as opposed to giving your email address.

And now for the cons:

1. I was not crazy about a popup that I had to “x” out of every time I saved a photo, but with all the other great features this is a minor “annoyance” for me.
2. There was one feature I could not find that I use often with the other site I’ve been using - the banner overlay that I can adjust color, intensity, width and height, as shown in my first photo at the top of this post. I use that a lot, so I’m hoping either I missed it or they will consider adding this feature in the future.
3. There are two fonts that I do use very regularly from the other site that were not available at Fotor, but this is another very minor issue for me, as I was pleased with the variety of fonts that are offered.

Give Fotor a Try!

No matter if you would use Fotor for personal photo editing whether images you want to display in your home or on social media or if you use images for business purposes, you can’t go wrong giving Fotor a try!

Which of the features from my edited photos above did you most like?