How to Straighten the Horizon in Adobe Photoshop CS2 or CS3

You may take a pretty good photo, only to get home and realize that the horizon is not as straight as it should be. Luckily, an angled horizon can easily be fixed in Adobe Photoshop.

Difficulty: Moderately Easy

Instructions

Things You'll Need:

• Adobe Photoshop
• Open Photoshop Document
• Computer

How to Straighten the Horizon in Adobe Photoshop CS2 or CS3

1. Duplicate your layer.

2. Click on Filter/Distort/Lens Correction from the top of your Photoshop screen. A window will pop up with a few settings on it.

3. Choose the Straighten Tool. You can find this tool as the second of four buttons on the upper left hand of your Lens Correction window.

4. Click on one part of the horizon, and drag a line over to another part of the horizon.

5. Let go of the mouse button, and the photo will automatically rotate to be straight.

6. Hit OK, and return to the main screen.

7. Select the Crop Tool from the left hand toolbar. The Crop Tool looks like a
   framer's square.

8. Draw a box around the adjusted image of your straightened photo, and the crooked part will be trimmed away.

Tips & Warnings

• You can also straighten vertical lines using the same technique - for example, along the side of a skyscraper.
• Always keep a spare file of your image before you start making adjustments.
• Get in the habit of duplicating your layer before you begin.

[Annicedda]

on 5/28/2008 Thanks for the easy how to instructions. For people who do not have advanced photo editors like Photoshop or if you aren't as tech savvy, I recommend using the free photo tools from Snapfish. They have a simple to use Automatic Horizon Alignment tool that does the work for you. Check it out here: http://www.hp.com/idealab/us/en/snapfish.html