Two boys on a beach.... Take 2

Now this is the 12x12 version of the Wordle LO below. This is for my album (the one below is for my sisters) and looking at it, it's much more 'me'! ... Stamping, hand written journalling block, big hand cut title etc...I tend not to do graphic, but considering how long the LO below took me compared to this one, maybe i should try it out more often!

Wordle LO

Made a LO using this site http://wordle.net/ for the journalling. The photo is the portrait of harry and Max that i was really pleased with. LO is 8x8 for my sisters album, and the word cloud made it so quick to finish.

It won't replace handwritten journalling for me, but using this makes a change!

Kitten......

A new arrival in our house today, 8 weeks old and really cute. Tried to get some shots of her, but it's very dull today, and she's afraid to go outside, so they are a little blurred. Might try again tomorrow.

Used Av, ISO200, f1.8, 1/60, WB set to cloudy, used light (such as it was) from the window.

Green Crafting....

I picked up this plain calico bag in Hobbycraft today, they had some lovely ideas for decorating them...As the bag folds up nice and small I have decorated it nad it now lives in my handbag, so i don't need plastic carrier bags when I go shopping.

I used felt, Sizzix floral dies, some beads in an old set of my daughters, and some embroidery thread. Not sure how well the felt will hold up to being used, I glued it as well as sewing it on... but we shall see!

Scrapbook Page

Well now my course is over I thought I would upload a LO I have completed using a photo from week 2.

Used BG Euphoria papers (love these), Autumn Leaves Scribble alpha, and have recorded the journalling in the style of a play script... for a change!

So....what have I learned.....?

So now the course is over, how has it helped me?

Yet again sharing work, thoughts, ideas and inspiration with others on the course has been great.

Making a blog was great, I probably wouldn't have got round to doing this without the push from the course. I do intend to keep up my blog after the course is over, and use it for both my scrapbooking and photography.

Although I had already read my cameras manual, and was fairly comfortable in using some of the creative modes, the course pushed me outside my comfort zone in using full manual on the camera. I must admit that for speed Av will still prob be my choice if I am trying to get pics of my kids (they get bored if i fiddle about too much!!) but I now know how to use the manual settings if I am not happy with aperture priority shots.

Lightbulb moments... Trying to get shots on a very bright day on the beach, and I remembered that forcing the flash would improve them. Tried in Av, overexposed, so switched to manual, set the aperture to underexpose slightly and with the forced flash I got some great beach shots, perfectly exposed!

Really chuffed with my reflections shots, without the course I would not have tried shooting at night, so glad I had a go!

Only disappointments were that not as many of us completed our blogs as I would have hoped, so there was less to inspire here as I would have liked. I know that I was away for 3 of the 4 weeks, so that meant I couldn't keep up with everyone else's blog, but I did have lots of opportunities to take photographs while on holiday. The time of year was good for me, as I had enough time to complete the tasks and update my blog, not sure about the thoughts of others.

Here's one of the beach shots of my nephew and DS I was really happy with, and I couldn't have got this without the course, so thanks CJ.
Exif data, ISO 100, f13, 1/200, WB set to sunny, flash forced to fire.

3rd edited shot. Portland lighthouse

Portland in Dorset. Always a good choice for a day out when the weather 's not so good! The sky in the before shot is interesting, but as ever (even though I checked my histograms!) my shots are a little underexposed.

This shot was much easier to edit than I thought. I decided to only leave the red band of the lighthouse in colour, so by reducing the saturation on all the other colours this leaves only the red showing, and the rest of the shot in B&W.

I would usually have to achieve this by making 2 layers in PSE, turning one B&W, and then erasing the parts I wanted to see in colour, eyecatching but a bit laborious.

Used unsharp mask, cropped slightly, reduced the light levels in the background by lasooing it. This left the detail in the sky.

Am pleased with the moody feel of this shot, esp the sky. It doesn't look like it's summer at all!

Photoshop pics Number 2......Durdle Door

I went to one of my favourite places in Dorset to get these shots, sadly the weather was not all I hoped for, and it was too early (too much light) to get some long exposure shots of the moving waves. I really SUFFERED to get these pictures, the trek down to the beach is long and steep ( and even steeper on the way back up!!!!) I thought I would need an iron lung to get back to the the car again! Not only that, but I decided to go at the last minute, and had totally unsuitable sandals on! They were OK for walking in, but the beach is made up of smallish stones, too small to walk on barefoot (ouch!) and big enough to constantly get into my shoes and cause me agony!!!

Enough of my complaining!!

The original shot is underexposed, I took a variety of exposures, but chose this one to edit as it still had plenty of detail in the sky, higher exposure just burned this out.

To edit the shot I used unsharp mask, and cropped it before adjusting the lighting levels, and increasing sat of blue, yellow and green to different amounts.

This had the effect of burning out the sky, so I used the magnetic lasoo to select only the sky, and then I selectively darkened this again.

Photoshopped pics....First shot

OK, so here is where I compare my real (not so great shots) with what they look like after I have fiddled about in PSE. I have probably done more to them than I normally would, but I am pleased with the overall effects!

The shot is of my DD sunbathing on the beach, since she was tiny she has had downy hair on the back of her neck, and I love it! I wanted to get close up to her to capture this so I used my new 50 mm lens, set to manual, f5.0 1/500, ISO 100.

Looking at it in Photoshop I felt that the contrast between her costume and skin was not great enough for a good B&W conversion. After cropping slightly and using unsharp mask, I used enhance, adjust colour/hue, and I used the blue and cyan sliders to increase the lightness to maximum. this had the effect of turning her costume almost white. Then when I converted to B&W using the portrait setting, I felt the contrast was enough for the edited shot. Not sure whether I should have cropped in closer, but when i tried this the shot just looked weird, I still wanted to be able to recognise what it was a picture of!

Week 3 Reflections

I now felt far more confident in using my camera, manual setting was no longer too scarey, so I decided to take some reflective shots in the harbour at night. I didn't have my tripod (the car was rammed full as we headed south for our holiday, so it got left behind) but I did manage to find walls, bollards etc to rest my camera upon for these very long exposure times.

As the weather was so calm i caught some lovely reflections in the harbour water of the working boats.

First shot is of boats in the harbour, Manual setting, f14, exposure time 2.5 sec, WB auto (not sure what to set this on for sodium street lights, but used PSE to remove the yellow colour cast) ISO 800 so a bit grainy, but you can't have everything

Next shot is also a night time one, taken from a vantage point above the town, lots of reflected light in the water.

Much less light here, so pleased that the shot is not too blurred with the really long exp time, good job there was a wall handy!

Final shot is of my DDs enormous sunglasses on the beach, great reflections here, pleased that big shades are in this year as it made this shot much easier. Love her freckles close up, and the clarity of the reflection.

Manual setting, ISO 100, f5.6, 1/400, WB set to sunny.

Week 2 Aperture and Depth

Was very fortunate to have great weather during the first week of our family holiday, so lots of beach shots here.

First shot is of DD2 walking to our fave spot on the beach in Weymouth.

Used a deep dof so that lots is in focus, and I got down low on the beach so that she was in the foreground.

Manual setting, f22, 1/80, ISO 200, WB set to sunny.

Next shot is also of DD2 in the morning, this time a glorious day, not a cloud in the sky.

I again used a deep dof as I wanted to get lots in focus, the boardwalk added depth to the shot. I like this one as it might have been taken abroad, the sea looks a great colour, and seemed to sparkle!

Manual setting, f18, 1/100, ISO 100, WB set to sunny.

Finally a different approach. This time I chose a shallow dof for this shot of my nephew. He found a (live!) crab in the shallows and insisted on bringing it up to show us all. When he put it into my Dads hand the crab started to run, my Dad was so shocked he jumped out of his chair (no mean feat for a 69 year old with arthritis!) I think this pic definately needs scrapping!!

The crab was returned to the sea after a short time in a bucket of seawater being watched by all the kids and fed seaweed!

Manual setting, f5.6, 1/1600, ISO 200, WB set to sunny.

Well I am back from 3 fantastic weeks in Dorset, have put all my shots onto my computer, now just need to trawl through them all before updating my blog fully.

Here's are a couple to start with, without the techy stuff for now (but both taken on manual)!

First is Beach hut, taken on the last day, love the bright colours, typical British seaside view.

DD2 relaxing in a good old fashioned deckchair.

And me (arrrrgh) in the sea taken by OH) !!!!!!