THERE are a lot of ways you can make your photographs look interesting, and these days many compact cameras come with settings that allow you to create special effects.

Some cameras these days come with “filters” which allow you to take a photo of the same subject or scenery, but with different “looks”.

Here are TV host Henry Golding’s favourite creative filters available on the following “value-buy” cameras: PowerShot A3300 IS, A3200 IS, A2200, A1200 & A800:

Toy camera

With the toy camera effect, the photos you take will have a retro feel to them. The image is framed in a dark, cloud-like border, which gives the picture that pinhole camera photo feel.

Toy camera

Monochrome

The monochrome setting dramatically changes the impression of the photo, changing it into sepia or shades of grey, white and black.

Monochrome effect

This effect can be used to create a nostalgic and sometimes sad effect. Some of the more interesting photos in monochrome are pictures of otherwise happy scenarios – children’s birthday parties, a family outing to the zoo and so on.

Miniature effect

This Creative Filter blurs the areas around the objects you want to shoot, making the objects you want to emphasize pop up, three dimensionally.
Think of it as looking like a scale model – this effect is useful when shooting arty photos.

Fish-eye effect

You don’t need a wide angle lense to create this effect, which is quite simply warping the center of an image, making the centre of the photo appear like it’s stretched out.

Try this on your pets, friends and family members (well, maybe not your parents) for a laugh.

Poster effect

The poster effect in Canon cameras merges several similar shades into one color, turning subtle gradations into eye-catching, scene-popping contrasts.
This allows you to draw attention to areas in your photo that you want the viewer to notice right away.

Super vivid

The super vivid effect is exactly that – it makes your photos look unreal in a way that all the hues are intensified, making all the subjects in the photo look extra bright.

This is great when shooting children’s toys, a field of flowers, brightly-coloured street vendors (think Ramadan bazaars and places like the Masjid India area in Kuala Lumpur), a row of colourful houses and so on.