Flowers and faces.... i heart faces entry.

We recently moved into a new house, so I am, again, horribly behind in posting.  But I saw this challenge and had a cute picture for it.

Here is a cute one I got of Z while planting flowers this weekend.  I wanted to go for a soft dreamy kind of look.  I am not sure I accomplished that.
My favorite part about this picture is that he ended up pulling the flower out of the pot.  Oh well, at least I got a cute picture out of it!

I Heart Faces entry "collages"

Here is a collage I've posted before, but I love it, so here it is again as an entry for I Heart Faces.



I call this one "Evolution of a Sneeze"

NEW CAMERA!!!!

In June 2009 I got my birthday/christmas present (for the next few years):
A spanking new Nikon D90.
I LOVE IT!

My first few pictures:

Nikon D90, kit lens, f/4.8, SS 1/640, ISO 320  (lightened a bit in CS4, otherwise unedited)

Nikon D90, kit lens, f/4, SS 1/50, ISO 320  (unedited)

I'm baaaacccckkk....

You know, it has only been a month and a half hiatus.  We were busy buying a house!  Yay us!

Here are the last few pictures with my point and shoot.  After this, I will be showing pictures from my new Nikon D90 :-)
I am also doing some "collages", tutorial thanks to McMama, see here.

Obligatory cute portrait shots of the kid.... (i love portrait photography).  I get such great catchlights from my awesome patio door (sadly, I only have that door for 3 more weeks before we move, then I will have a south facing window, whatever will I do???).

Who knew I had twins?  Ah, gotta have fun playing with photoshop.  I am **still** trying to learn, but am *still* at the beginning stages.  But, I do know a lot more now than I did even 2 months ago!  See?  I've been busy while on my blogging hiatus.

And, just so you guys don't think we don't have some silliness (and random camera grabbing)....

I so rarely actually ever catch these moments on digital media, I have to celebrate when I do, even if they aren't the best photos.  It's life, what is better than that?

In an attempt to find a ~willing~ subject, other than my darling son, the cats often step in.  Here they are REALLY enjoying some catnip last Mother's day.

We had a nice grill out to celebrate a friends graduation.  I really like the sunglasses picture, but I need to play with it in Photoshop to get the vastly underexposed faces up to par with the sky (you know, without it looking totally stupid).  Perhaps I should send this one into FixIt Friday on I heart Faces.  What do you think?  The second one, well, I just like the angles and I like the look on their faces.  He he.

And since this appears to be something of a silly post....
I shall leave you with this, my husbands brother.  I wish we hadn't been standing in such harsh sunlight... but then again, it's capturing life (look closely at what he is holding).  hhhhhhhhhhhhhhaaaaaaaaaaaa

Hopefully I won't be away for so long before the next post.  I make no promises since we are packing and moving and cleaning the old place in the space of 3 weeks.  Oh heavens.  I hope I even have time to pick up the camera!
~R

lacking time....

but trying to get **something** done and posted.
Flowers... and letters sometime in May 2009

Yes... elementary at best, but I was just beginning my learning.  Here I was trying to work on the rule of thirds and seeing how it changed where my eye goes in the pictures when looking at them.  Do you notice a difference? 

No Picture Monday... Not me Monday!

Not Me Monday!  Hop on over to MckMama's Blog to link up to:




Because I am the perfect photographer... I ALWAYS remember to back up important photos right away.  

I would NEVER leave the photo card in my laptop without immediately backing it up in 4 places, and I definitely WOULDN'T take my laptop on a trip.  Thus, my card would never get accidentally ejected and....
     my card wouldn't get erased.

                      Nope!  NOT ME!

I certainly wouldn't lose pictures from my son's 2nd christmas.
I couldn't possibly lose pictures of my darling son with his amazingly talented great grandmother.
I also wouldn't lose photos of said grandmothers beautiful quilts... you know, pictures I took to help her fill out her quilt projects album.

Nope, not me!  I would never be that careless.

So, I guess you now know why this post has no pictures.
                          :-(

I heart faces entry...

Ok, so I am going out of chronological order here but.....

I've started looking at this cool site (www.iheartfaces.com)



And today, for the first time, I am going to make an entry into their weekly challenge... which is "We Are Family"
Now, I realize you can't see any faces here... but this is a family moment that I am so happy to have captured:  One of our very best friends was expecting her 3rd child....  I took these photos about 2.5 weeks ago, and this darling baby girl just arrived about a week ago.  And I am so happy I caught this moment on digital media!  It makes one really realize what can be accomplished in just a week!

Nikon D90, 50mm 1.8, SS 1/3200, F 1.8, ISO 400 (whups, I forgot to turn my ISO back down, darn it!), metered exposure balance to 0 on window light.

Playing with editing...

So here are a few more pictures from Mexico.  I tried to learn a few things about post-editing.

 

f2.8, SS 1/800.  CS4 vibrance, sharpen, magnetic select bouquet to lighten.  Let me tell you how much I LOVE that magnetic select button ;-)

Turned it into B&W by adjusting different color levels in CS4 (nope, I didn't just click a button or use an action (mostly b/c I don't know HOW to use an action yet!)

What do you think.... which way do you like it better?  Leave a comment & tell me what you think.

f4, SS 1/800.  CS4 brightened, sharpened, increased vibrance.

Decreased saturation.  I want peoples eyes to find their way to the bride & groom.  I need to do this again & get their faces to be more saturated... but the magnetic select was being a bit of a pain this day.  I will revisit.

f3.5, SS 1/1250, CS4 sharptened, tightened the curve just a bit to make the sky not so "white".

I LOVE the way the sun hit the glasses , the brides & the glasses on the bar.  I love the casual gathering and "scene".  I love the architecture.  What I don't like is the stupid bartender.  I am not sure how to get rid of him though.

This crop definitely loses part of the scene & makes the picture more boring.

I like this crop better... but I still lose a bit of architecture.

What crop would you use???  

Would you do some different edits? 

Tell me in the comments ;-)

Mexico!!! March 2009

See, I told you I was behind!  And the holidays didn't help.  Sorry it has been so long since my last post.

Anyway.....

aaaahhhhh..... MEXICO!!!!

 

Ok, so did I make you jealous yet?  ;-)  Good.

We were in Mexico for our friends wedding.  I was so excited to take some pictures of something other than my son--- and a wedding to boot!  I was giddy with excitement.  My husband told me to stop being annoying taking pictures of EVERYTHING.  Ah well.  A beginner shoots a few thousand to get a few decent ones.  Thank God for digital "film"... so much easier (and cheaper) to shoot a few thousand pictures!

Mind you, these pictures are STILL with the Canon PowerShot A610 where it is quite challenging to change any setting (and especially manual focus).

But.... here is what I've got (please excuse the grain):

f3.5, SS 1/320

 f2.8, SS 1/250

Darn it... one day I will learn to not crop in so close!!!!  These were un-posed shots (hence the background sun).  Our friends already had a "real" photographer doing their wedding, they didn't need another random person asking them to pose.

 f4.1, SS 1/640

 

f3.5, SS 1/500

The cute little flower girls... I took SO many pictures of them.  I wish I'd know a little more about composition back in March 2009, I would have left the empty space on the right side of the pictures instead of the left.  I till think it is a cute picture though.  One has to LOVE sunset lighting.

f3.5, SS 1/500

f3.2, SS 1/800

f4, SS 1/640

Ceremony set up into the sun.... makes it difficult to get good pictures when you are sitting in the crowd.

f 3.5, SS 1/500

A similar angle shot, but with the sun lower in the sky.... kind of a cool effect.

f5, SS 1/1000

Whups, autofocus gone wrong.  But somehow, I still like it..... does it count as "intentionally" out of focus?

3 word wednesday

Cool MckMama Giveaway!

Check it out... HP TouchSmart 600!!  Click the link words above.  :-)