I went looking for birds at North Mountain Park and instead found a beautiful display of red poppies. Most of them were past prime but this one by the house looked pretty good. I had the telephoto lens on for the birds so I had to set up 10 feet away to get this shot. the background was kind of washed out so I added a green texture and blended it to get what I thought was just the right look for the background.
It has been raining almost every day for the better part of two weeks. So, I was forced to spend some time in the digital darkroom. I had shot this image back in April just down the street from my house. Though I liked the composition and subject,I was shooting up the light was not on the blossoms and it needed some work.
First I took it into Color Efex Pro for some detail and to add light on the blossoms. Next I added a couple of textures to bring more color into the sky. Finally, I took it into Topaz Impression for a painterly look. I think this one would look good as a gallery wrap.
Well, I had a devil of a time coming up with an image of the week this week. None of them seemed quite good enough. Of course coming back empty handed from my trip to Klamath Falls to photograph dancing grebes probably didn’t help.
But I like this one I took just down the alley from my house of a neglected garden fence. I gave it some treatments to emphasize the feeling of decay and abandonment.
I showed my favorite picture from this week on the Klamath Basin blog (http://jeannehoadley.com/Klamath). It was the white Pelican in case you were wondering. But I felt I needed to come up with something new. I was afraid I had missed the peak of the pear blossoms but there are still plenty of them out there. My challenge with this image was flat lighting and clouding skies. but I did like the composition.
So, I took it into Color efex pro and did the usual magic (detail, brilliance/warmth, darken/lighten center)) and I still wasn’t happy with it. So I gave it a Film Efex Vintage filter and that gave it more of the look I wanted. I also added a border. Some images just need a border. I still think I need to go back on a sunnier day closer to sunset but I could hang this one on my wall so it passes muster.
The weather was grey and I was a little depressed the other day so I took the Fuji down to the park and just started playing. Intentionally moving the camera, zooming during exposure, etc. Then I went home and started playing on the computer. This was the result.
What I did here was to take a straight shot of a blossoming tree and overlay it with one that I had zoomed during exposure. I didn’t write down all the steps so I don’t know that I could recreate if for you but there was some blending of the two images, some detail and saturation added in color efex pro. And a treatment in Topaz Impression.
What I love about this image is that it just screams spring is busting out. Probably not for everyone but it passes the “Would I hang it on my wall?” test.
Well, the trip to the San Diego zoo has to be considered a complete bust. It seemed like all the animals were asleep or inaccessible for one reason or another and then, of course, I ran out of steam way before I had gotten my $48.00 worth. But then this week after sitting at the North American Nature Photography Association Summit listening to photographer after photographer talking about taking weeks or months to get one good shot in the wild I didn’t feel quite so bad. At least I can show you some photos of sleeping animals.
But in the end I actually liked my plant photos better and this shot of a fern was my favorite. A little exposure adjustment, some detail and saturation and voila art. One thing I have enjoyed about the conference is also hearing photographer after photographer assure me that it is ok to use the software tools to create art. So here you go.
The other day I did a webinar with a photographer/artist who it turned out was using alot of the same software I use to create painterly images of wildlife. I can’t say I learned anything new from her but I did get permission to carry on with what I am doing.
For this image I went back into the archives to review some of my zoo pictures. I’ve always liked the composition on this image but the lighting was off and there were distracting fences in the original image. So, I went to work, starting with cropping out the fences. Then brightened it up and took it into Topaz simplify for a more graphic look. My new test for whether I have a good image or not is would I hang it on my wall. This one passes the test.
Driving south on Hwy 101 along the Oregon Coast I was taken with the graphic look of the trees in a light fog. When I downloaded the image though it had gone completely monochrome. So I decided to add back the color in my mind using a bi-color filter in Nik Color Efex pro. I’m very happy with the result.
I decided it was time for a new look for my weekly photo blog so here it is. Let me know what you think. After much editing and scrolling through files I finally settled on this as my favorite image of 2014. I like it for being simple and graphic with pleasing colors. I had to manipulate the colors some to get this look and I used Topaz Simplify to give it a more painterly look. And he gets the honor of being the poster cat for the blog this year. Though I reserve the right to change him out if I get tired of looking at him.