Weekly Photo Challenge: Shine

After a downpour it’s hard to miss the shine of the sun. I got this photo after a fairly heavy rain.  The few raindrops left on the petals stand in contrast to the bright sun:

ISO 800 4.3mm f/8.0 1/1250

I left the editing of this photo to a minimum.  Here is the original:

ISO 800 4.3mm f/8.0 1/1250

The change here was done using split toning in Lightroom.  Split toning allowed me to give the autumn colors a bit of a warm glow by using the highlights to bring out a bit of an orange tone.  I added a bit of the deeper blue in the sky by darkening the blues in the shadows.  Split toning also has a balance slider that allows you to change the balance of the edit you are applying making it either more in the highlights or more in the shadows.  In this case it is adding more to the highlights.  I got the idea to give the balance slider a try after watching this short tutorial.

How do you like the edit?  I like the original, but I really like the orange tones in the edit.  I think they appeal to me right now because it is fall here and orange is a color that I have always associated with fall.  Feel free to leave a comment below.

Cheers!

Weekly Photo Challenge: Local

If you follow this blog you know that I moved over the summer. Again. I move a lot. So I wouldn’t say that I really have experienced being a local. What I like about moving though is the chance to act like a local in a lot of different places. And it’s this faking being a local that brought me to this kitchen:

ISO 800 4.3mm f/2.7 1/800

This nice little kitchen set-up was at Anglesey Abbey which is a National Trust property.  We joined National Trust when we arrived here in England with the thought that we would spend a lot of the next year visiting different sites then the next year we would join English Heritage and base our travels on their properties. A quick look at the two websites will tell you that I’m in trouble, and may have to stay in England a bit longer than anticipated to get through visiting all the places I would like to see.  I’m also thinking I may have to have a membership at both.

But that’s not what I was thinking when I took the original photo of this kitchen:

ISO 800 4.3mm f/2.7 1/800

I was thinking, you could visit England and easily not visit this particular place.  You’d be missing something, but honestly, there are so many more well knowns spots that you’d probably visit instead.  To me a place like this is what you visit when you are a local.

When I walked into the kitchen and saw this set up I immediately thought of the film filter I was going to use. I had an idea of what I wanted the final Picfair version to look like. I knew what color cast I wanted and the grain and vignette I was going to add.  Those things I did in Lightroom.  I also removed a few spots on the wall, counter, and teacup.  I used the spot healing brush in Photoshop to do that.  I know Lightroom has healing brushes, but I just prefer the result when I use the ones in Photoshop.

What do you think of the edit? it does change the feel of the photo quite a bit I think. Are there places in your local area that you feel like might be missed by tourists?  Feel free to comment below.

Cheers!

Weekly Photo Challenge: Happy Place

There is no doubt about it, I love to be outside. I don’t always take my camera with me because I find that having my camera changes everything. I tend to be more analytical with my camera in hand. Sometimes, I find myself looking for photos instead of just enjoying the moment. Then there are the days when I plan to take my camera. A few weeks ago it was sunny and warm after a few days of cooler weather.  I went looking for bees, they didn’t disappoint:

ISO 125 200mm 0ev f/8 1/400

Now there are some who would point out that the light is too harsh in this photo, that I went at the wrong time of day and the light is all wrong. Technically, they are right. My argument against that line of thinking goes something like this, to me this harsh light creates huge contrast between the light and dark parts of the image and that says Fall to me. Fall is what I was trying to capture here.  Also, being outside just makes me happy, the time of day doesn’t matter so much to me.

When I got this photo home, I was pleased with its clarity.  So, in Photoshop I cropped it, messed with the levels a bit to bring down the harshest of the highlights, and then sharpened it a bit.  Here is the original:

ISO 125 200mm 0ev f/8 1/400

I think the crop helps this photo a lot.  I’ll also say that I used my 200mm lens to be able to get in close to the bee, but not be so close that I would bother it.

How about you, do you have a favorite place to shoot? would you consider yourself more of an indoor or outdoor person? Anything you’d like to say about the edits I have done?  Feel free to leave a comment below.

Cheers!

Weekly Photo Challenge: Orange

In terms of this week’s photo challenge, orange, I guess I just got lucky.  Today was the start of Art in Bloom at the St. Louis Art Museum. The challenge for local floral gurus in the area is to create a floral arrangement that represents a piece of art work they are assigned.  It is a fun and very crowded exhibit to see.  For this blog post I chose to show the floral arrangement of Catherine Thoele who was assigned Octagonal Jar with Design of Cherry Trees, Peonies, and Chrysanthemums.

ISO 400 8mm 0ev f/4.5 1/30

ISO 400 8mm 0ev f/4.5 1/80

ISO 400 8mm 0ev f/4.5 1/13

ISO 640 8mm 0ev f/4.5 1/40

Of the ones I saw, this was my favorite interpretive arrangement.  I loved the orange of the flowers, but one of the details that I appreciated was the leaves that had blue paint flecks on them, it was a nice tie-in to the original art work.

The challenges as a photographer to get these photos included low light, no flash allowed, and the crowds.  I chose to take my point and shoot, it is easier to handle in a crowded situation.  I used two different settings to get the photos.  One was Auto.  The other was a program mode that allows me to shoot macro.  I got some nice close-ups of individual photos in that mode.  As far as post-editing, I have kept that to a minimum. I did some cropping on a few.  The biggest adjustment I made was on the vase photo, where I applied an Iris blur filter.  I made that choice because the background was truly distracting.

I think it is because I enjoy looking at interpretations of art that this is one of my favorite exhibits of the year at the St. Louis Art Museum.  What do you think? should interpretations like this be featured in museums? Also, it was mentioned in the challenge to try a different gallery format for the photos.  I generally insert my photos one at a time in a fairly large format, so this gallery is a change for me.  What do you think of the format?  I think I can get away with it in this post, but I don’t think I be changing my normal format any time soon.  Your comments are welcome below.

Cheers!

Travel Theme: Ancient

This week’s travel theme at Where’s My Backpack? is ancient. I was at the St. Louis Art Museum this past week for a special exhibit where I saw this painting and a floral interpretation of it:

ISO 1600 10mm 0ev f/4.5 1/15

The painting is Sadak in Search of the Waters of Oblivion by John Martin, painted in 1812.  The floral arrangement is by Ivy Baebler of the Federated Garden Clubs of MO.  To be honest, I wasn’t sure what I was going to think of this exhibit before I went.  It turns out, I really liked it.  Of course, because the flowers fade quickly, it is an exhibit that lasts only a few days and is very crowded.  The difficulty in shooting something like this starts with those crowds.  I was also kind of surprised at the number of people who were touching the flowers.  I guess to me it just seemed like the floral arrangements were created works of art and touching them would potentially mess up the composition.  That aside, it was hard for my point and shoot to capture all the detail of both the floral work and the painting.  I tried though, just to give the feel of the exhibit.

Have you ever been to an exhibit like this? I’ll admit I hadn’t.

Cheers!

Searching for Spring

I know Spring is coming.  It has been a bit slow in getting here though.  We have had a lot of (needed) rain.  The other morning I went running at 7am and it was 29 degrees and windy, not my ideal!  With that in mind I went for a walk in the park searching for signs of Spring.  Here are two photos I found:

ISO 800 4mm 0ev f/8 1/1000

I deliberately blurred the background because I found it distracting from the buds on the trees.  The fast shutter speed gives away the fact that it was windy and I needed the speed to freeze the motion of the branch.

Here is my next shot.  I was a bit sad to find these on the bench.  Someone picked them and then left them there, I’m not sure why you would do that.  Although given that this is at a playground, it is possible that it was a little someone who just didn’t know any better.  Anyway, daffodils are my favorite:

ISO 800 4mm 0ev f/8 1/800

I liked the color in the flowers contrasting with the lack of color in the bench.  I didn’t arrange this photo at all, the scene was just like this and I took the picture.  Kind of neat when that just happens!

I took both of these photos with my Canon Powershot ELPH.  In Aperture I cropped them.  No other editing for either photo.

Cheers!

Phoneography Challenge: My Neighborhood

Well this week’s challenge from WordPress is a bit different.  My neighborhood is the theme but the photos also need to be taken with my phone.  So, I am giving it a try.  We were off to Home Depot, so you can come with me:

You wanted to run errands with me right?

Pretty much always open

Not what I am looking for, but pretty no?

This is what we “need”

I’m easily distracted

How nice

I just loved the hint of pink

Not bottled for the US, but here it is.

We are finished

This was a fun challenge, but I am not giving up my other cameras anytime soon.

Cheers!

Travel Theme: Gaudy

Gaudy? hmm… for a travel theme? I have to admit that the first place that came to mind when I thought about this challenge was Las Vegas.  So, I decided to post this photo:

ISO 100 28mm 0ev f/4.5 1/60

I really liked this snail.  It doesn’t seem gaudy at all in the garden at the Bellagio.  Of course, it is among other floral displays like it and huge glass flowers.

I’m just thinking it would look pretty gaudy in my front yard.

Cheers!

Weekly Photo Challenge: Illumination

I am posting a few pictures today that I took awhile ago that fit the theme of illumination:

ISO 250 30mm 0ev f/13 1/500

ISO 250 30mm 0ev f/6.3 1/125

ISO 100 38mm 0ev f/7.1 1/60

For me, these photos are nice, but not exactly what I was hoping to create.  They were taken at the Bellagio which is nowhere near where I am living now, so I can’t walk down the street to try again.  Here is the other thing, my brain was on vacation at the time.  That doesn’t make for stunning photography, but as nice reminders of my time off they are perfect.  Is there somewhere you wish you could visit again just to take better pictures?

Cheers!

Just the Basics: With editing this time

I am talking about photo editing in this post, something that I know very little about.  I tried photoshop a few years back, and they ended up having to give me my money back (I insisted) when they were unable to get it to import my RAW files. So, now I am using GIMP which is free, click on the link to check it out if you like.  This fall I will be going back to school (a habit of mine) this time for photography.  Since photoshop is the industry standard, I know I will be having to use it eventually.

That, I guess was a paragraph of background that is somewhat relevant to what I am writing here today.  From my post yesterday I took the two photos and edited them in GIMP.  Here is the result:

This is the image using my 28-135 lens

This one is the 50mm lens image

Both images have had various color changes made to them.  I also did quite a bit of cropping.  I then picked a different “artistic” filter to put them through.  I am just sort of going through the various settings to see what is there.

Thoughts?

Cheers!