More Eyes

I edited a close-up of Mariana to show off her eyes. I also applied a variety of effects to all of them except the first one.

Another Template

Eye Tutorials

I wanted to learn some different ways to make eyes stand out a bit more in my photos. Most of the time I have catch lights, which of course really make the eyes come alive. But I wanted to do more than just dodge and burn. I found a tutorial that was different than many of the other ones, so I gave it a whirl on one of Mariana's photos. I also applied some different effects on each of the photos. The eyes, however, are the same.

My friend Cindy and I attended a seminar given by Tony Sweet. That is where I first really understood what textures were. I was introduced them by a Flickr friend who had taken a Kim Klassen online class. Kim is a master of textures! Anyway, I subscribe to Tony's blog, newsletter, etc. He has been in Washington state and created a video of his breathtaking photos.

Tony Sweet

Working with Photoshop

I've been relying too much on actions, which makes applying Photoshop easier; however, I wanted to REALLY learn  how to use photoshop and customize what I wanted the photo to look like.

Here are some examples of what I have done:

Tierney

Storyboard

I followed along with a tutorial created by Kim Klassen and while this isn't a great photo, I am fairly pleased with the result.

Mariana

Tierney

I took Tierney and Mariana on a photo shoot in Milwaukee's Historic Third Ward, and while the girls' individual photos took out pretty well, the ones of them together will need to be retaken. Here are a few:

 

Be Still 52

I joined Kim Klassen's Be Still 52 class which started 12 weeks ago. I've been following along and enjoying the other participants' photos; however, I haven't joined the member directory or posted a photo on the class site. I like to "stalk" a bit before plunging into anything. I've always been that way.

This week's challenge is to take a photo of something unstaged...messy, even. This morning I was sitting in my comfortable recliner, watching a bit of tennis, and checking my emails, etc., on the computer when I heard a noise. I looked up and the wind had knocked down a small bottle of flowers onto a set of children's dishes that I'm giving to my granddaughter.

When I saw the outcome of the "crash", I thought to myself that I could use it for this week's unstaged challenge.

I used Kim's texture "annie" after a few minor edits. Here is the result:

A Breezy Mess

Blogging Again...

It's fun to get back into blogging, except I don't really write too much. I'm using this blog more for showing my photographs and tracing my journey of photography. I spent quite a bit of time today trying to shoot a still life that I liked. Frustrated, I gave up, and it wasn't until my sister-in-law, Mary,  who was looking at my attempts on my camera and saw one that she thought was pretty good, that I decided to play around with it and see what I could create.

I like it and I hope you do too.

Kelly Larson, Miranda's mother, saw a photo of a young girl in a white dress sitting on a railroad track and really liked the photo. So I decided to surprise her and do a similar photo shoot with Miranda. These are just a few of the photos that resulted from that morning.