Top 14 Free Photoshop Actions for Photographers

Check Out Our Top 14 Photoshop Actions

Photoshop can be confusing and frustrating, especially when editing photos. It’s hard to know what looks good and when to put certain steps in place. Photoshop actions are a great way to simplify the photo editing process. Custom actions can be installed similar to brushes and can be used to provide a filter to the images. Here are our top 14 free photoshop actions that will change your photos from good to great!

1. Cold Nightmare

Cold Nightmare relies on deep contrast and aims to enhance the drama of a scene. This action works best with images of forest, misty or foggy backgrounds, and any image that has some kind of contrast. It also works to make the image more hyper real to increase the drama.

2. Lecream

This action works to provide an overall warm yellow tone to your image. It is great with pictures that are not overly vibrant and can enhance them significantly. Lecream can improve vacation photos that lackluster or an image that needs a splash of colour.

 3.  PP Sunrise

Capturing the perfect sunrise can be difficult, especially trying to get in all of the colours. This action helps to enhance the colours of your sunrise shot and make it brilliant. It enhances the purples and oranges in the image to create a stronger shot.

  4. Vintage Matte

For those that are fans of instagram filters and sepia tones, this is the action for you. Vintage Matte aims to darken an image with an opacious filter while creating a warm, brown tone. This gives the image a vintage and almost nostalgic feel.

  5. MEGANJOYWINTERBREEZE

Winter is a great time of year to take stunning contrast shots of snow storms and snow covered buildings. Winterbreeze intensifies the black and white contrast and also adds more snow to the overall picture. This is a way to take an image of a first snow fall and turn it into a true winter wonderland.

6. Technicolor

Technicolor feeds into history by emulating the technicolor colour palette of the 30s and 40s. This action strips certain colours from the image to create a single tone picture. The result is a toned down vintage representation of photos from the past.

7. Summer Haze

Playing on teals and oranges, this filter enhances cool and warm tones while still maintaining a summer feel. This works best on images that are already light but rich in colour such as shots of flowers or outdoor portraits.

8. HDR Strong

HDR is a very trendy look in photos but can be hard to achieve organically. Actions are a great way to enhance the sharpness and hyper realism of your image. This action works to improve images that are softer such as waterfalls and other bodies of water, fog, and vivid skies that need slight enhancement.

9. Vibrant Film

Sometimes your image just needs a pop of colour and the vibrant film filter works to enhance the colour in your pictures. It lightens the image and decreases the shadows, making a dark image much lighter while also pulling out the dominant colours.

10. Lomo

Inspired by the camera of the same name, lomography focuses on oversaturation, quirky imagery, and vignettes. Traditional lomography is captured with an actual lomo camera but is quite frequently replicated in photoshop. The best results for lomography are typically on images with some colour such as a landscape or pictures of cars or other vehicles.

11. Old Photo

If you are a fan of the vintage postcard look, this is the perfect photoshop action. Using a blue tint and adjusting the contrast of the image, it creates a vintage feel. This action is perfect to transform those dull vacation pictures into something worthy of a postcard.

12. Vintage Wedding Action

Despite the name, this filter works for more than just weddings. It works to soften the image and add a purple tint to the picture to give a more romantic and dreamy feel. This action can work for weddings, formal events such as prom, and for anything that could use a softer look.

13. Popper

Can’t quite get that image sharp enough? This is a great simple action that makes your image pop with the click of a button. It enhances sharpness and lightens a dark image. It isn’t a super dramatic filter but helps when your picture needs a little boost.

14. Vintage Heaven

Similar to popular Instagram filters, Vintage Heaven adds a hazy filter to pictures. It works to soften the image almost like a sheet of fog whilst providing a vintage filter. It makes the image warmer and takes away its sharpness. This is great for waterfront pictures and images you want to add a filtered layer to.