When I was out on a walk this past Sunday, I thought I would look for photos that spoke to the change of season. Autumn is asserting itself in a beautiful way my part of the world right now:
ISO 800 f/2.7 1/20sec 4.3mm
Even just looking on the ground you can see it. But sometimes it helps to look up as well:
Added to A Photo a Week Challenge, Changing Seasons.
Cheers!
I tend to take a camera with me everywhere I go, even if it is just my iPhone, because while I think you can come back to a place and photograph it many times, I also think that it will not ever be exactly the same. While I was out running the other day, I saw this spiderweb and decided that if I did stop right then, I would never get this photo:
ISO 25 4.15 f2.2 1/900
While you could make the argument that I will never be a better runner if I’m always stopping to look around, you’re right! I wouldn’t disagree. But I also know that one of the reasons I run is to be present in the here and now, and that includes looking at my surroundings.
Now, before you get to thinking that I am some purist about photography, have a look at the actual original unedited photo:
ISO 25 4.15 f2.2 1/900
Can you tell I am sorry that summer is over? Sorry enough that I edited in some warmth. In this case I used split-toning and added a copper tone to the shadows. I also cropped and sharpened the image. I’ve added a graduated filter, in this case from top to bottom, and a vignette to darken the corners. While I did the cropping and sharpening in Photoshop, I did the other edits in Lightroom. I felt that the graduated filter was an important edit, that’s what brought a bit of texture and interest to the sky.
I was happy the graduated filter worked in part because I had used it recently when editing another photo and ended up removing the edit because it worked so poorly in that case. As a result of that edit gone wrong, I had a bit of a discussion with another blogger about the use of that filter. I think with editing tools, sometimes you just have to try the edit and see if it works. The results can be interesting, if not always what you wanted. That’s what your digital trash can is for I think. It was another blogger named Amy that I was talking with, and I’m including a link to a recent post of hers that I enjoyed. A version of this photo is available on Picfair.
What do you think of my edits? do you liked the warmed up version, or do you think I should just face facts and stick with the original? Do you sometimes have conversations with other people that influence what you are doing in your own work? Feel free to comment below.
Cheers!
I really enjoy the changing seasons. The other week I was hiking at Babler State Park and I took some pictures of wildflowers. I love to see the changes and imperfections in their petals as the weather is getting cooler. When I saw that delicate was the theme at Where’s My Backpack? I thought that these photos would fit nicely:
ISO 640 50mm 0ev f/5.6 1/250
Here is the original photo that has been cropped but not really edited much. I have the f-stop set at 5.6 because I wanted to get the two blooms in front in focus but I was OK with the ones in the back being out of focus. If those back buds had been in focus I think the surrounding greenery would have been distracting. I chose a fairly high shutter speed because it was a bit breezy and I was bracketing my exposures as well. I bumped up the ISO a bit to help the exposure as it was a bit dark.
Since I had a bracketed exposure I decided to make an HDR image using Photomatix. This shot below is with the “creative setting”.
ISO 640 50mm 0ev f/5.6 1/250
I like the detail in the petals but it wan’t really what I was going for. Since there is also a HDR setting in Photoshop, I gave that a try:
ISO 640 50mm 0ev f/5.6 1/250
I’m using the “regular” setting for this image. I then had to use the burn tool to bring in more detail in the petals. I’m not crazy about the way the background flowers turned out in this one though.
It’s funny because there are elements of each photo that I like, but I don’t really have a favorite. How about you? Does one appeal to you more than the others? My other photos from Babler State Park are here and here.
Cheers!
One of the things that I love about the change of seasons is the transition flowers go through. I chose to photograph two wildflowers that are in the yard. One looks like it is done for the season and the other hasn’t gotten the memo regarding the frost we have had.
ISO 160 50mm 0ev f/3.2 1/100
This is my flower that is done for the season. When I was shooting this flower and the one you will see below I set my f-stop to 3.2 because that was enough to capture the detail of the flower and blur out the background. Because the f-stop setting like that will let in a lot of light I used a high shutter speed and a low ISO to keep the images from being overexposed. Both images were edited using Camera Raw. I converted them both to greyscale and then applied some split toning. For this first flower I have my color settings on blue but at a low saturation. I felt like this helped convey the cold of the approaching season.
This flower, processed in a similar way but with different settings:
ISO 160 50mm f/3.2 1/100
Here I used a combination of yellow and orange and a high saturation. I was hoping to convey the fading warmth that this flower is pretty successfully hanging on to.
This post was written in part as a response to Sonel’s Split-Toning Challenge. Her theme for this week was change of season. If you are interested in split-toning at all I would encourage you to visit her blog, she has a lot of helpful hints and she uses a variety of different programs to edit her images.
What do you think of my flowers? Kind of hard to believe they are right next to one another in the yard isn’t it?
Cheers!
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