I did, however, hook up with a fabulous photographer awhile back. I was at an art fair in Evanston and wandered into her booth. She has the most amazing stuff...lots of things that I wish I was taking pictures of. I started to talk with her as I was purchasing one of her prints and found out that she was fairly local and willing to give me some one on one lessons with my camera! Today I had the chance to finally get a lesson and am I ever inspired. I still have no idea what I'm doing, LOL, but I do have to say that with her instruction, I have a better understanding of the functions of my camera and how to use them. Now it's a matter of putting into practice what I'm learning and playing!
I didn't have much time today to take pictures but did happen upon a few places that I thought would make some cool shots. I took these shots in aperture priority and just played around with different f-stops. I have to admit, I'm not sure what I'm seeing in the differences of them, need Sarah (the teacher) to look at them and give me her professional advice on the differences and what she thinks is the best of the shots I took..but to my untrained eye, I picked these. After puttering a bit in Photoshop (Sarah also showed me a few tricks in tweaking shots) and adding some fun actions from Totally Rad Actions...these are the pics I ended up with. Now be kind!! I did this all in just a few minutes, kinda just playing for fun...not sure any of these are really good, or that I edited them well..or heck, for that matter even, took the originals well..LOL...but I enjoyed just playing around and seeing what all the different settings can do!
This barn has been one I've wanted to shoot for some time now...I was always to hesitant to pull off the side of the road and just stand there taking the pictures of it, but today, after my new found inspiration, I gave in to my hesitation and pulled off the road and shot it!! Here is the before picture: (straight out of my camera in RAW)
and here is what I did with tweaking the color balance, the levels, the brightness/contrast and adjusting the tone etc..then adding a fun action called Acid Washed:
This next picture is this sad, dilapidated little building by my house...I have this thing for the broken, dirty, grunged up looking buildings...again, took a bunch of shots with different f-stops...not paying much attention to anything else...lighting or composition or any of that jazz, just trying to learn one thing at a time...then I played around with it in Photoshop and added an action called Grunge Rock.
Before, straight out of camera in RAW:
and after adding the tweaks and action. This one is really severe...not sure I like it all that much, think I want to soften it just a bit but this is kinda interesting...
In any event, I am really wanting to learn my camera so that I can pursue my interest in fine art and landscape photography. I know in time I'll hook into all the technical stuff, heck even Sarah said she does a bit of tweaking because the outdoor lighting might not always be conducive to the picture she is wanting and I totally get that...I mean, Mother Nature has a way of doing what she wants whether we like it or not, right? I would just like to be able to get most of the picture correctly shot so that unless I am wanting to add some fun textures and actions, I don't have to do a ton of post camera processing...
I have lots of other stuff I will share soon...got a busy weekend ahead of me that I am looking forward to. Think I'll head into my room right now though, throw a dvd in and call it a night...dream of f-stops and white balance and shutter speeds!!
Until next time,
Blessings!
"Blessed is the man that trusteth in the LORD, and
whose hope the LORD is." Jeremiah 17:7
1 comment:
Great job Cricket...I've always wanted to stop on the side of the road and take pics too...I just may do it now!!
Way to go...I'm so proud of you!!!
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