Final Project: A Walk on the Beach

More Portraits...

I could not resist taking a few shots of my son playing his DS. It is so cute the faces he makes!

Week 11: Portraits

Here is a start...I actually took these while on vacation a couple of weeks ago. I have been taking other portraits this week, but for now I will share these...My daughter kept her distance from the waves after one knock down, so the one photo is of her watching the others. Then a took a picture of her sleeping. I love how I captured the sand on her hands and just on her face. The other two images are from our trip to the playground. My son giving me a peace sign and then the two of them on the slide.

Week 10: Text

Here is a photo that I added/changed the text I took a picture of a sign in Jersey, then I used the clone tool to white out MTV and put CUMMINGS FAMILY. So, now the sign says "CUMMINGS FAMILY WELCOME BACK TO THE JERSEY SHORE"

Another photo was a scenic photo that I just added Seaside Heights 2010 to document it.

Week 10: Clone Stamp

This image had other people around my nephew so, cloned the waves and erased some if it. Then I cropped it and used the clone tool a little more to even out the waves.

Week 9: Filters

This was so much fun. I love playing with the different filters. The ocean picture I used the neon filter. The other picture is one of my kids at the beach and used the wave filter to create my own wave pattern.

Week 9: Dodge and Burn

Ok, so my first photo is one that I took while on vacation. I first added an adjustment layer and lightened the image. Then I took the burn tool and added a higher tolerance to burn the edges of where the waves were pulling back. I wanted to give the effect of the darker muddy looking sand right after the wave pulls back. I also took the dodge tool to lighten more parts of the sand and the water.

My second image I used only the dodge tool to lighten around only where the campfire and the pit itself.

Week 8: Photo Adjustments

My flower picture I wanted to create a black and white image but keep the color of the flowers. First I copied my background so that I can manipulate the only a part of the picture. I used the magic wand with a low tolerance to capture the yellow in the flower. I created a new adjustment layer and played with the saturation and the darkened it a little. I also used an adjustment layer to play with the color balance. I added a hint of green to the image to bring out the greens in the image.

For my other photo adjustment I used my up in the trees picture I took while on a hike. I wanted to give it a different effect. I used the magic wand to selection a majority of the green in the trees, and I copied my selection to a different layer. Then I used that layer with just my magic wand selection on it and increased the saturation just a little as well as the hues. Then lightened my other layer to give the skies a lighter look.

Week 7: Photoshop Experimenting

I cropped and added some effects to a photo of my dog, Ruby. She my 16 year old rottie/german shepard mix. First I cropped the photo a little, then I used the quick mask tool to outline her and then changed the background effect to be a ripple. I extended by canvas to add a color border.

I created this collage with past photos I took for our assignments. I created a new layer for each of the photos. I added beveled edges to some of the images along with a slight glow. I colored my background a deep green.

Landscape Photos

So, for this week I took a walk on some trails out by my house. A lot of ATVs and dirt bikes use these trails to ride on. Here are some of the pics I took along the way. I am not sure that I know or will even figure out how to take the perfect picture. One of my goals when taking photos is to try different settings while taking the same picture. I feel that this has taught me a lot about my camera and what settings I should use during what times of day, etc.

Reading about what landscape is and how it taking pictures of nature, it seems the possibilities are endless. I enjoy taking pictures of nature and its beauty.

Rule of Thirds

Posting my photos using the rule of thirds, but not as a slideshow:)

Week 5: Rule of Thirds

It is amazing to me how just changing your subject from the center with using the rule of thirds and make your image different and even change your feelings about it. I took a few different ones, like the star on the fence and the rocks on the rock wall and the single tree in front other large trees. This was fun.

This was fun to do. I had a hard time finding things to photograph, but here are a few...I am not 100% happy so I may post more late Sunday, early Monday.

I have been emailing with a local photographer who does our professional shots here at the hosptial. Here are some websites that she suggested to take a look at:

http://www.shootsmarter.com/ It is completely free and you could search composition and get some "smarticles" that could help.
http://digital-photography-school.com/5-elements-of-composition-in-photography
and this http://digital-photography-school.com/5-more-elements-of-composition-in-photography.

Week 5: Aesthetics and Composition

I did some searching and well, first good ol' wikipedia says that Aesthetics is the branch of philosophy dealing with the nature of beauty, art, and taste, and with the creation and appreciation of beauty. It is more scientifically defined as the study of sensory or emotional values, sometimes called judgements of sentiment and taste.

http://www.luminous-landscape.com/columns/aesthetics-1.shtml

So, this website posted above gives you a really nice overview on the aesthetic aspects of photography. Alain Broit gives you a series of nine essays that cover from "seeing photographically" to "establishing your own personal photographic style." The site gave me an overview of what aesthetics is and that you do everyday, just here is how to bring it into your photography.

Now, composition (according to wikipedia) is placement/arrangements of visual elements or ingredients in a work of art.

http://photoinf.com/
This website gave me a bunch of different articles related to composition and photography. The Guidelines for better Photographic Composition was a great overview of what we have already learned.

Just for fun!

I took this photo as my husband and I were coming home yesterday from running some errands. It was so cool. It looks like the letter A or an H. It reminded me of the photographs that people sell that represent different letters to spell a name or word. Just thought it would be cool to share:)

Different Lighting

I used my telescopic lens to take these photos. I took the first one using my flash. The color shows to be different from the other two. The last two I took one early in the morning and then the other mid-day. There is not too much difference in lighting. The last one is a little darker. I have a ton of trees in my area and I get very little sunlight.

Week 4: Color Schemes

So, for my monochrome photo, I took a picture of the trees in my area (I have way too many trees). The different shades of green from the various trees are really pretty.
My complementary shot...The photo of the plant growing from my red mulch looks so bright and colorful, even though it is not exactly welcomed as a weed in my landscaping:)

Starting Week 4

So, I am starting to like this blogging thing. It is kind of fun:) I feel like I am over thinking this week's assignment. Taking photos that represent monochrome, analogous and complementary. I know that it cannot be that complicated, but I feel like it will not be too easy either. I am sure that I will figure it out...any suggestions though is much appreciated. I thinking it will be an opportunity for me to not only focus on shutter and aperture, but the colors and capturing them. I guess it is just adding another piece to the puzzle:)

Erica's Collage

I loved doing this assignment! I enjoy doing collages. Picasa is so neat. Thank you for introducing this new program! So, I did a walk around my neighborhood and took random photos, there was no ryhme or reason. I played with my telescopic lens a little too. I really wanted to grab textures of different things. These are by far not as creative as everyone else's:) I feel very inspired when looking at everyone's collages.