Edit a photo

After you add a photo to your document, you can clip it, remove parts you don't want, filter it and adjust its exposure and contrast, and much more.


Panels provide a mechanism for clipping photos to let you focus on just the important portion of the image.

  1. Drag the image over to a panel and drop it on the panel.

    The panel will outline itself in orange to indicate that it is ready to receive the image.

  2. To resize the image drag its selection handles.
  3. Drag the image to position the part you want to reveal.
  4. When you're satisfied with the position and size of your image click outside the image to finish.
  5. After an image is inside a panel, do one of the following to manipulate it:
    • Select the image inside the panel: Double click on the panel.
    • Move the image out of the panel: Select it and then drag it out.
    • Resize the panel without resizing the image: press the [Option] key while dragging.

  1. Select the photo you want to filter.

    Remember to double click if the photo is within a panel.

  2. In the Format sidebar, click on the Image tab.
  3. In the Filter section, choose the filter you want to use.

    Many Comic Life filters come with a Level slider that lets you adjust the amount of the effect.

    Note: Filters from earlier versions of Comic Life are available in the popup menu.


  1. Select the image.

  2. Choose Format > Instant Alpha (from the Format menu at the top of your screen).
  3. Click the color you want to remove, and then drag slowly over it.

    As you drag, the selection grows to include the contiguous area that uses similar colors. You can control how much of the image is selected by dragging less or more.

  4. Repeat step 3 as many times as you like.
  5. Hit Enter to finish or click anywhere on the page outside of the image.

Note: You can restore the parts removed from the image at any time. To revert to the original image, choose Format > Remove Instant Alpha. To restore parts of the image removed using Instant Alpha, choose Edit > Undo (from the Edit menu at the top of your screen) until the parts have been restored.


  1. Select the image
  2. In the Format sidebar, click the Arrange tab.
  3. To flip the image, do one or both of the following:
    • Flip horizontal: Click on the horizontal flip button
    • Flip vertical: Click on the vertical flip button

  1. Select the image.
  2. In the Format sidebar, click on the Image tab.
  3. Use the controls to make adjustments.
    • Exposure: Changes the overall lightness or darkness of the entire image. When you adjust exposure, every part of the image gets lighter or darker. Increasing the exposure of an image can also reduce its color.
    • Saturation: Changes the richness of color in the image. Dragging to the right makes colors richer and more vibrant.
    • Enhance: Automatically adjusts the image by spreading the red, green, and blue tones evenly across the histogram.
  4. To see the image histogram and adjust more advanced features like contrast, highlights, shadows, blur, sharpness, temperature, and tint, click

You can open the Adjust Image controls in a separate window that you can move anywhere. Choose View > Show Adjust Image (from the View menu at the top of your screen).

Click on Reset to return all the sliders to their default settings.


See also

Add a photo

Resize and rotate elements

Position and align elements