Amy's Artsy Articulations

"Get Pushed" Flickr Group

2012-03-11T15:39:00.000-05:00

A couple weeks ago I joined a group on Flickr called "Get Pushed." Every few weeks they have a new round, and here's how it works. 100 people sign up and are paired by twos -- this is a random process, but they do try to make sure you don't get the same partner twice. Next both people check out each other's photos and come up with a challenge for the other person. My partner looked at my photos and noticed that I love bright colors and lots of light, so here was his challenge to me:

Take a low-key shot. It could be B&W, but if in colour, the colours should be restrained. Of course, it is not enough to just shoot as normal and underexpose, you have to think carefully about the subject matter and layers of meaning that it could have: a dark and brooding mood to go with the dark image.

After looking at many examples of low key photography, and throwing around a few different ideas I came up with this image:

This was definitely not my normal style, so it was quite a challenge, but I like how it turned out and had fun doing it! I can't wait for the next round, and seeing what my next challenge will be!

March Photo Hunt Week 1

2012-03-07T19:56:00.000-06:00

Here are the first 7 photos of the March Photo Hunt! I'm really having a blast with this!

Day 1 -- Laughter: You all already saw this one of Emily in the snow, but I thought I'd post it again anyways:

Day 2 -- What I Wore: Fortunately I happened to be wearing my favorite outfit this day. Something more exciting than a denim skirt. :-)

Day 3 -- Games: For this one I really wanted to use the shot of Betz and the chess board, but since I'm supposed to take the photo on the day of the prompt I tried to recreate it using Alison. I still like the other one better, but it was fun to take. (She won the game)

Day 4 -- Green: I had envisioned my "green" shot a couple days before hand, but it turned out nothing like I wanted, so I threw it away. But while I was taking the other shot I noticed a bunch of water droplets on the cucumber, so I used those as the subject instead!

Day 5 -- High Angle: We had a lot of fun with this one, although we did it really quickly because it was rather chilly without coats. :-D I went out on our deck and had the girls go down below me:

Day 6 -- Low Angle: Before supper yesterday Alison asked me if I wanted to go on a walk with her. Last time we did this I turned the walk into a photo shoot and so we didn't really go a walk at all. Remembering this, I told her I'd just stay home because otherwise I'd just slow her up, taking photos of everything. But then she told me that she wanted to take photos too, so I was happy to accompany her! I had always wanted to get a reflection shot using a puddle, ever since our vacation in 2010, where I saw someone doing it at one of the national parks. I love it! (this is also really cool when viewed upside down)

Day 7 -- A Smile: Smiles are so easy to find, and I had already had smiles in a few of my photos for the month, so I had planned on doing something more creative. But when I was over at Christi's house today, the kids and I were playing around with the camera and I got this shot of the youngest girl. Isn't she adorable?

The next seven prompts on the one list are: A Bad Habit, Someone You Love, Childhood Memory, Blue, Sunset, 13 Things, and Eyes. On the other list they are: An Animal, Happy, Favorite Drink, Colorful, Friends, Outside, and Candy. I can't wait to see what I end up with each day! I've also got a new photo project that I'll be telling you about in a few days. Stay tuned!

Em's Portrait

2012-03-07T06:30:00.000-06:00

I know I've been posting quite a few photos of Emily lately, but I have one more that I wanted to put up here. We had an impromptu, five minute photo shoot the other day, and this was my favorite shot.

Coming up next is some more photos from the March Photo Hunt! I'm really having a lot of fun with it!

Chess Challenges

2012-03-05T07:30:00.000-06:00

Elisabeth has recently taken an interest in chess. She mostly plays with Dad, but now she's starting to play with the rest of us, and even a friend in AZ. I don't think she'll want to play with me again, because I don't play normally... My strategy is to slaughter all the other person's pieces. For someone who wants to play a real game, I'm not much fun. :-D It's fun to watch her play against Dad, and concentrate so hard. One of these days she'll beat him every time. :-)

Snow Smiles

2012-03-03T07:00:00.000-06:00

This is one girl who just loves the snow. She (okay, I'll admit it -- we all were) was very disappointed that we hadn't gotten much snow this winter, so this 10" snow fall made her really happy! We had a blast sledding at the city park earlier in the week, along with almost 50 other people who had the same great idea. When we got home we all agreed that half the fun was when you were about to crash into someone. :-D Lots of screaming and laughing!

I love the natural smiles that I can capture when we're outside in the snow! So fun!

March Scavenger Hunt

2012-03-01T15:23:00.004-06:00

Since we're starting a new month today, I decided to do a photo scavenger hunt this month. The last time I did a month long photo challenge was November of 2010! I'm using this list here, but since it only has 30 prompts, I used day 1's assignment from a list here. Throughout the month I might switch on and off between the lists, but I'll probably just stick to the first list for the most part.

Day 1's assignment was laughter, so I'm using this shot of Emily that I took today while playing in the snow. She was having a blast jumping off of the snow piles made by the plow:

The only problem with snow pictures is that their eyes are almost always closed -- either it's too bright, or they're about to jump in/just did! Oh well -- I still like the photo, closed eyes and all. She looks so happy!

Wedding Photo Edits

2012-02-24T19:40:00.000-06:00

All photography by Christi Johnson.

I'm finally getting around to posting these wedding edits. Sorry it has taken me so long! These photos were so fun to edit, because I had quite a variety of things to do with them --- basic edits, extreme edits, and just pure fun edits! I did a few basic color & B&W edits of both the bride and the groom. These were fun because portrait retouching is always fun. :-D There wasn't a ton to do on the bride because she was already wearing make-up, but I still enjoyed it.

I also removed some glasses glare. I don't have much practice in this area, so it was a slight challenge.

Then there were the extreme fun and challenging edits where I had to change the backgrounds. I got to do about 5 of these, and had so much fun on them! I will admit that I got a bit stressed out on a couple of them, but trying again the next day always helped. :-D On this one of the dress I played around with it for a while without success -- it was always looking like it was laying flat on the floor... Then I realized that I needed to add in the shadow on the right side and everything went fine from there. Such a wonderful lightbulb moment. :-)

This last collage has a few more of my favorite edits. Out of around 40 photos, it was really hard to pick which ones to post!

All these photo were just proof photos -- the edits were sort of to let them see what we were capable to doing to the photos. Then when the couple places the actual order, I'll have more editing to do! I can't wait. :-D I'm really excited because now Christi has asked me to take over all her editing! I guess when you have 6 (soon to be 7!!!) kids it's hard to keep up. :-D

Snow Fun

2012-02-21T14:44:00.000-06:00

Last night we got a few inches of snow that were perfect for making snowmen. So while Alison went to her mother's helper job, the rest of us hurried through our school so that we could get outside! The two younger girls had made a couple snowmen with one of the first snows, but compared to these, they were baby snowfolks. Thanks to dad, we were able to build some giants!

After rolling, and using all our strength (plus some of dad's) to get the balls on top of our stack, we'd take a break to pack some more snow on top and make them a bit rounder.

And then after they were all round and beautiful (and maybe a bit lopsided....) we got to do the fun part -- adding on the faces! Emily got mom to give us three carrot pieces for the nose, but other than that we just used sticks and parts from the pine trees. I can't decide whether or not I like the "hair" that I put on mine. I think it kind of looks like earmuffs, or like floppy puppy dog ears.

We have yet to have a big snowball fight, but I'm sure we'll do it soon. :-D

time with Dad // camera update

2012-02-18T16:14:00.000-06:00

This morning Dad and I changed the oil on our van. I've helped him with this a few times before, so it has kind of become my job. I've enjoyed learning a useful skill while spending time with my Dad at the same time! Someday I'd love to be able to do it all by myself, but right now I'm afraid I'd miss a step. Watching and handing stuff to Dad from time to time is good for now. This time I grabbed the camera and took a couple photos:

Screwing the cap back on after draining the old oil.

Pouring in the new oil.

Then after coming in from changing the oil, Dad went outside to play "soccer" with Emily. We have the best daddy!

I love Em's look of fierce concentration!

The camera update is that I'm hoping to get a camera by Memorial Day, which is when we're going to be at family camp. As long as my jobs hold out I think I'll make the goal. :-D I still haven't decided if I want to get a Canon or a Nikon, so I'm shopping around and reading lots of reviews. I did decided that if I choose Nikon, I'll get the D90. I've still got to decide on a Canon, and then the next step will be to find a store that sells them both so I can try them out/see how they feel.

Even though I was obviously never glad that my camera died, I think it has turned out to be a good thing. I've really gotten better at editing since then. I started watching/reading all sorts of tutorials, and as you know, I have started editing for a local photographer! Now I'm excited to get a camera soon and start editing more of my own photos again! :-) I'll be posting some of my wedding photo edits soon.

What to do....

2012-02-14T18:13:00.000-06:00

...when you find yourself stuck in a car for 6 hours. Our favorite travel activites consist of Find all the letters in the Alphabet, Count the Cows, I spy, various license plate games, sleeping, singing, reading, or just staring out the window. Last week we found a new one though! We were on our way to Larimore, ND and discovered that foggy windows can be really fun! At first we weren't too happy with them because we couldn't see out, but then we realized they make great drawing (or scribbling) boards!

If you run out of drawing room, simply wet a paper towel and stick it to the window for a few minutes. This works as a great eraser, until you find that the paper towel has frozen to the window and you can't get it off..... :-p Another fun activity is to take a credit card and scrape the window clean. Most of you might not think that is very fun, but since we came from AZ where we never scraped windows, it's still a novelty to us. :-D

We also were entertained by these "cloud factories", as Emily called them. They were so neat to watch!

What are your favorite things to do in the car?

Photo Products

2012-02-10T01:30:00.000-06:00

A few months ago I got an email from Shutterfly, with a coupon for a free photo mug! I love free things, and even though I had to pay shipping, I jumped on the deal! It's so nice to see my family while I'm drinking hot chocolate!

Then a few weeks ago I got another coupon from Shutterfly with a great deal on a photo-book. I don't remember the exact deal, but it was 50% off or something like that. Ever since our vacation in 2010 I've wanted to put together a photo book of the trip, but I never got around to ordering one! It was an exciting day when the bright orange Shutterfly box arrived:

Shutterfly is actually offering 40% off of any photo books right now! All you have to do is enter BOOK40 at the checkout.

It was so much fun to look through all the photos again!

But my favorite all of all the photo products I've bought was one of Walmart's Faux Canvases. Real photo canvases cost a ton, so I was glad to find an alternative product that looks the same for much cheaper! They print your photo on canvas textured photo paper and mount it on a cardboard backing. I got a 12x12 for $10 dollars (using a coupon from retailmenot.com), and with a real canvas that would cost around $80! I'm looking forward to getting more of these faux canvases in the future!

What are you favorite photo products that you've bought?

Evening Walk//Photoshoot

2012-02-06T20:13:00.000-06:00

Before supper this evening Alison and I went for a walk. Well, that was the original plan, anyways. We walked across the street, through the tennis court and back home. The reason that the walk was so short was that I had brought the camera, and I guess Alison wasn't a huge fan of my version of a walk --- take a few steps, stop to take a photo, etc. After just a couple minutes though, the other two girls had joined us, so I snapped a few photos of them. This one is my favorite of the three of them. I'm getting it printed as a faux canvas from Walmart! More on that later...

I was told that it looks like I photoshopped Alison into this photo, and that her feet don't look like they're on the ground. Although I did edit it (a lot), I did not add her into the photo -- she was already there. :-D

We were only out there for a few minutes before we were complaining that we were cold. I wonder why? Just for the record -- my flip-flops are still in the closet. Not that that keeps me from going out barefoot every once in a while. :-D But it was 40 degrees out today! Who says that's not bare feet weather?

We headed back across the street to our house where I snapped a couple more photos of Alison before heading inside. Remind me to check the white balance before taking a photo next time... Should would save some trouble in PSE!

As much as I would love to have more snow (more like a normal MN winter), I think this weather we've been having is great. I hear it's supposed to get a bit colder later this week though. Maybe I can use that as an excuse to go to Caribou Coffee. *grin*

Edit Me Challenge Week 5

2012-02-02T13:21:00.000-06:00

It's time for the Edit Me Challenge again! This week's photo was taken by Linda from Coach House Crafting. It's such a beautiful scene!

All my editing was done in PSE and ACR. First I added 2 photo filter adjustment layers, played with the blending mode, opacity and used a layer mask. Then I used a levels adjustment layer for the sky, and then a brightness/contrast adjustment layer for some of the shadows in the cliffs. Next I opened it up in ACR, but I don't remember all my steps there. Here's the final result!

Origami

2012-01-25T13:30:00.000-06:00

In the past few days I've been trying my hand out at a couple pieces of Origami. I've done a couple pieces before, but it's always fun to try again! The first one I tried was this shirt:

scanned photo

After that, I tried another shirt, without a tie, and a pair of pants to go with! (forgot to take a photo...) After being successful with those projects, I got adventurous and tried to make an origami SLR camera:

Unfortunately, mine didn't turn out as nice as that one shown above, so I'm not posting photos of it yet! I'm going to do it a few times, and taking photos of it each time. Hopefully I'll get a decent one and post photos soon! Have you tried any origami projects? How did they turn out?

I'm currently on a week long break from the computer (this is a scheduled post) so I'll try to post some more photos when I get back!

First Attempt at HDR

2012-01-20T07:00:00.000-06:00

I've always loved HDR (High Dynamic Range), and lately I've really been enjoying Jason Manion's HDR shots that he posts on his flickr page. You might say that seeing them inspired me to try my own. I had thought about it before, but decided that since I didn't have a tripod, and I was using a point and shoot it wouldn't work. Those were extremely lousy excuses though, because it worked just fine. I would say that it's not the best idea to do it handheld, but it worked this time. Oh, one more thing. Don't take the photo through a window. :-p

Here is what the photo would like if you just snapped a properly exposed photo. It's not too exciting, but it shows you the scene.

First I took five photos --- all were 2 exposure stops apart. Then I opened them in Photomatix and let it go to work making an amazing image! The image that Photomatix produced was obviously an HDR, but didn't have the contrast and normal oomph to an HDR, which is why I edited it. Here's what it looked like pre-edited:

And here is what it looks like as an HDR, photoshopped in LR, and PSE.

It's definitely something I'm going to want to try again, but probably not soon, and hopefully with a better scene! :-D

2011 Photos

2012-01-17T14:16:00.001-06:00

Thank you all for the birthday wishes, and thanks bunches to Laurie and Alison who spent so much time on that wonderful birthday surprise! To some, it may seem as if I didn't have a very good birthday because I got sick, but I think it's been on of my best.

This afternoon, while I was sitting at the computer and going through old photos, I decided I'd post my 12 favorite photo from last year. This isn't really supposed to be a year in review post -- just some of my favorite shots. No guarantee that it won't turn into a review post though...

January:
I had so many photos from January, and had a very hard time choosing, but I finally went with this photo. It's not all technically correct, but we had so much fun skating together, and it was a fun challenge to take the photo too! I will admit that some of that motion blur was added in pse. :-D In this photo we were skating up to each other, and then we'd grab each other's hands and go into a spin. It's sooo fun!

February: February was another month packed with photos, and also lots of events! I kept coming back to this photo though, because I love the little girl's grin, and the photo also has lots of memories attached. We were at a preachers meeting in Payson, AZ and had a blast with this little girl and her sisters.

March: I got a couple strange looks when I took this photo, but what do you expect? We were at a huge library in CA with our grandma, and I was on the floor taking photos, not looking at books. :-D It was such a cool floor that I couldn't leave it un-photographed. I got lots of cool photos that trip in California, but I love this one for some reason -- probably the focusing.

April: April the month we moved, so we were pretty busy, but we still found time to play in the water! I loved how the watering can looked against a big red tub we had outside.

May: I've got two photos for this month, because I couldn't decide which I liked best, and I went over and over and over them.... After moving in, we spent quite a bit of time at the tennis court, taking advantage of the wonderful weather. Our tennis skills could use some major improvement, but it's still fun to play around! Well, some of us played.... I took pictures quite a bit. Dangerous job -- got hit a couple times. :-D

And we also had a ton of storms. Lots of lightning and cool clouds! The sky was really this orange -- not enhanced in PSE.

June: More nice weather found us playing at the park!

July: In July we passed out tracts at a Hmong festival, and also went to family camp, but since my camera died in the first couple days of the month I didn't take photos of either event. I did take photos of pizza making with the J's though! Christi handed me the camera, and I was more than happy to put it to use! This is Winter, the second oldest. Here she is putting butter on the dough for Garlic Cheesy Bread. Yummy!

August: We got to take a trip to the state fair! That was a day filled with fun, noise, crowds, everything sold on a stick (one stand even sold "Nothing on a Stick"!) This was our favorite ride:

September: Fall was on it's way! Beautiful.

October: We had a very fun time with our grandparents from CA. This photo was from our walk through the woods:

November: Even though I didn't take this photo, (my mom did) I choose it as my favorite because I loved the editing that I did on it. :-D

December: The only photos I took in December were from the Day in Photos, so I just picked my favorite out of those. I went with the very last photo -- 11 pm.

It'll be fun to do a post like this next year and compare the photos!

Happy Birthday, Amy!!!

2012-01-14T08:25:00.000-06:00

Happy birthday to a super-special girl! This is going to be a birthday you will never forget. Buckle up and get ready to see what’s in store!!!

When you come upstairs for breakfast, the first thing that catches your eye is something at your place on the table.

“Is this for me?” you ask excitedly, picking up the camera and examining it. You turn it on and start snapping photos of Elisabeth, who is already sitting at the table, eating her favorite cereal, frosted mini-wheats.

“Yep!” Elisabeth assures you. “It’s so you can take pictures of all your adventures today! Happy Birthday!”

After everyone’s had breakfast, Dad tells everyone to load up in the car. After about an hour on the road, we arrive at...

A $5000 gift certificate has mysteriously shown up in the mail, so you can buy whatever you wish!
Dad keeps looking at his watch. After a few hours of shopping, he says mysteriously, “I think enough time has passed. We should be getting back home soon.”

When we get home, you soon realize that someone has been hard at work while you were away! As you step into the house you smell fresh paint. Arms full of stuff bought at Ikea, you make your way into your room. Wow, so the smell of fresh paint wasn’t your imagination. Your room has been transformed!

http://pinterest.com/pin/85568461639525182/

Now you’ll have room for all your books! And looking closer, the shelves are filled with lots of new titles you’ve never read before! You grab a couple of the new books off the bottom shelf and start reading the back covers. Alison runs in, snatches the books away and throws them on the bed. “You can read those later. Come on! We are going somewhere else.” You grab the books off the bed and bring them along to read in the car anyway, wondering where you could be going.

You really didn’t need to bring those books along, because we’re only in the car for about five minutes. The car stops in front of an old warehouse. “What’s this?” you wonder out loud. We all get out of the car, and Dad hands you some keys. “Huh?” you ask.

“Go ahead an unlock the front door,” he says.

“Yes, don’t you want to see what’s inside?” Mom adds.

The rest of us girls crowd around you, urging you to unlock the door so we can all go in. Hesitantly, you insert the key in the lock and open the door slowly...

http://pinterest.com/pin/129689664238954091/

You excitedly explore all the equipment, running from room to room, looking with awe at all the strobes, backgrounds, and everything else. Then it dawns on you--there’s no cameras! How strange. Then you notice your family beckoning you over to a small storage room...you go over, and look inside.

WHOA!!

The entire room is filled with cameras and lenses.

Your favorites are:

The Nikon D3X, and...

The Canon EOS 1Ds Mark III. (You discover Canon isn’t as bad as you thought.)
Not only that, but your parents show you two certificates that say you have a lifetime supply of lenses from both Canon and Nikon.

You’re amazed. But you still haven’t discovered everything. Tucked into the far corner of the big building is another little room. You open the door and peer inside. It’s your office! You notice that already, your desk is piled high with letters from potential clients for MimiBeth Photography. You start sorting through them.

Then you notice that off to the side is a brand new laptop with a box of software sitting next to it.

This is the works! You should be set with this. You can’t wait to get it loaded onto your laptop and start playing with your impressive photos. Then you see another little box:

Wow! You’ve always wanted to try Siri...and now she’ll be especially helpful with all the photography appointments. You discover that the phone is already set up and ready to go! So after flipping through a couple screens to test a few things out, you slip the phone in your pocket so you’ll have it with you to use the rest of the day!

Then you realize your family is standing back at the front door of your...studio (you still can hardly believe it). They call to you to hurry up and get in the car--you have one more place to go. Dad tells you that you might want to bring your laptop along; you’ll want something to entertain yourself for a bit. You take it along, tracing your finger over its smooth contours. You think, “I’ll have to remember to tell Laurie about all this on our nightly chat!” (Not that you’d forget!)

Looking out the window, you realize that the car has stopped at a small airfield--no planes are around except one. And what a plane.

http://www.thelifeofluxury.com/next-gen-private-jets/

Your family jumps out of the car, you along with them, being careful not to drop your precious pieces of technology. You wonder who this plane belongs to--it’s obviously a private jet. Your sisters grab you by the hand and tug you over. “Surprise!” they say. You see that the stairs leading up to the plane are down, and your family leads you up them into the plane. The interior of the plane takes your breath away! This is amazing!

http://www.privatejetdaily.com/201003231506/latest/altitude-to-design-boeing-private-jet.html

http://www.jetscoop.com/private-jet-interiors-90/

http://seattletimes.nwsource.com/html/boeingaerospace/2003986629_superexecjet01.html

Your family refuses to tell you where you’re all going. You can tell they’re all bursting with some secret, but they refuse to be moved. You resign yourself to whatever they’re planning and make yourself comfortable. The one-and-a-half-hour flight to seems to hardly take any time at all. There’s so much to look at! After a while of exploring the plane and staring out the windows, you pull out your laptop and discover that the plane also has wireless internet! You spend a few minutes e-mailing some friends and answering their questions about what you’ve been doing on your birthday, but you doubt they will believe a word of it. (well, truth be told, you’re having a hard time believing a word of it, either!) Strange, Laurie’s not on, and you haven’t gotten a birthday card or anything from her..

Elisabeth and Emily want to play with your new iPhone. You feel a bit apprehensive about handing over your brand new phone, but after a few seconds of thought you decide they won’t hurt it and let them entertain themselves with it for the rest of the flight. Alison asks if she can take some photos with your new camera. Feeling extra generous, you let her take as many pictures as she wants, but you make one stipulation. “No pictures of me,” you say mischievously. Alison laughs evilly and starts taking pictures of you anyway. You ignore her and go back to your computer.

Then the sweet stewardess comes over to you and asks what beverage you’d like. You think for a moment...surely there’s not much to be had on a plane besides water and pop. But then she tells you what the “featured beverage of the day” is:

You happily ask for a Mint Condition Cooler, and after a few minutes you are contentedly sipping away.

Very soon, you start descending as you near... Denver International Airport! You and your family get your things together and prepare to arrive at your final destination.

http://www.inside-lane.com/tag/denver-international-airport/

The scenery is gorgeous.

http://www.worldbestspot.com/Spots.php?id=684&name=Rocky%20Mountain%20National%20Park%20

You can’t wait to get out there with a camera. But the urban area is lovely, too.

http://media.photobucket.com/image/downtown%20denver/Akasha2578/Denver-Downtown.jpg?o=1

The plane lands with a gentle thump onto the runway and the pilot quickly taxis over to the side of the airport, where you jump out to find a limousine waiting just for you. The chauffeur appears and opens the door for you, and the family piles in.

By now it is pretty apparent where you are going. You hardly notice the view from the window as you ride down the freeway. You’ve never been in a limousine before, so this is really cool! Elisabeth opens a little refrigerator, revealing several different kinds of pop inside. Since you don’t like soda, this doesn’t really interest you, but Dad pulls out a black cherry pop and Emily asks if she can have an orange drink. Soft classical music is playing in the background.

The drive takes a little while, but it seems to fly by since everything is so new about this whole experience. You grab your camera and take a few shots of the interior of the limousine to keep the memories alive forever.

Before you realize it, you have pulled up in front of a house. You instantly recognize where you are, not because you’ve been here before, but because of that huge tree in the front that you remember from Google Street View. Of course, you kind of knew where you were going, anyway!

Before the limousine has even come to a complete stop, a girl tears out of the house and waits in front of your door, hopping from foot to foot. You don’t have to guess who this is. IT’S LAURIE!!! Following behind in a more dignified manner are Laurie’s parents. But dignified or no, everyone is excited.

It’s a wonderful night. All you girls stay up late, eat popcorn, play games, and talk about Amy’s amazing, unforgettable birthday. You don’t fall asleep until after 1:00 a.m.
A few days later, after many more adventures, you look back through the pictures you took that are now on your laptop. You stop at this one:

You smile fondly. What a birthday.

* * *

Amy, we hope you are having a great birthday, and we’re sorry we couldn’t really do all of this for you, but we hope you’ve enjoyed your birthday adventure! :) You’re an awesome sister and friend and we love you very much!
-Laurie & Alie

Mall of America

2012-01-11T09:29:00.000-06:00

A couple weeks ago Anna invited me, her sister, and one of her other friends go to to the Mall of America for her birthday! I was sooo excited, and the day seemed to take forever to get there. But finally it was Monday and they came to pick me up around 9. It's pretty neat that three of us all have birthdays within the first two weeks of the year!

(All photos are by PlainJane)

I think I can safely say that we all had a blast! It was so much fun just being together -- laughing and talking the whole time (when you weren't screaming...) One of our favorite rides was the Brain Surge. On that ride you get to decide whether or not you want to spin the whole time. Very fun. :-D Towards the end I enjoyed the spinning more, but at first it can be quite scary! My other favorite was the Rock Bottom Plunge. That is the biggest ride there, with a 61 foot drop at the start... I was dragged onto it the first time, but afterwards I liked it so much that I went 4 more times. :-D It was soooo fun!

On the Log Ride

After we rode for 5 hours, we stopped in at the caribou shop before heading home. Yum!

Thanks for a wonderful day, Anna!

Candy Making

2012-01-09T10:00:00.000-06:00

I've mentioned quite a few times that we got to help our neighbors with their candy making business. On one occasion Mom had us bring the camera and take photos, so I thought I'd share a few, even if they are a bit outdated now. This first one is of Betz after chopping up chocolate to melt. That stuff was pretty hard, so she got some good muscle strengthening. :-D Notice that she has quite an audience!

Then Betz took the camera and she took this photo of me dipping pretzels. The third photo is of the dipped pretzels. They're first covered in caramel, and then chocolate. Sooo good!

Alison and I have both started our Mother's Helper jobs over there -- she goes on Saturdays, and I on Mondays. We help with anything that needs to be done, but right now the main projects are deep cleaning, helping with shopping, and some painting projects. Us girls have never gotten a chance to help paint before, so we're thrilled! The shopping is especially fun. Taking 6 kids through any store can be quite interesting. Add 3 or 4 stores to the list, and it gets more interesting the farther you go. :-D Alison and I are both very thankful for this opportunity to help Mrs. J. out. The bonus is that we get paid, but both of us hardly feel like we're working enough to get paid -- it's so much fun! It's kind of neat to think how we just met this family less than a year ago, but it already seems like we've known them forever!

Grungy Shoes

2012-01-07T19:02:00.000-06:00

Today I was browsing through old photos again and came across this photo that I took in July of 2010. At first I was just going to delete it, but then I decided to have some fun with it. I could picture in my mind what I wanted it to look like, and was able to achieve that look by playing around in LR for a while.

First I gave it a tighter crop, and then set to work on giving them a grungy, HDR-ish look. Although this is way unrealistic editing, I knew it had to be drastic or I'd throw the picture away. Basic editing didn't do anything for it to make it interesting. I really like how it turned out:

And then I cropped it even closer. I can't decide which crop I like better. I'm leaning towards the full crop, but I kind of like the new angle it gives when cropped closer. Which is your favorite?

Changing your Angle

2012-01-01T19:55:00.001-06:00

Today I downloaded the trial version of Adobe Lightroom 3. I've been digging out my old photos (2010) to play around with! I came across these two, which are a perfect example of how if you change your angle/step to the side a bit, you'll get a whole different photo!

Here was the first photo I took, with the sun behind the tree:

and here is the second photo, where I just moved over a teeny bit:

I personally like the first better, but the sunflare in the second is kind of cool also. Right now I'm editing a photoshoot that I did with Elisabeth in October of 2010. I had edited some of these in PSE but never got as good of results that I am with LR! It's a great program.

Tomorrow I start my job as a mother's helper. I'll be going over every Tuesday for four hours, and Alison is going on Saturdays for eight hours. I just love spending time with this family, and so I'm really excited about it! Also coming up next Monday I get to go to the Mall of America again, but this time with one of my friends! That's going to be soooo fun. More edits coming soon!

Walking on Water!

2011-12-24T15:42:00.001-06:00

Well, not quite... Just technically. :-D Walking on ice. Ice, water, same thing, right? Today we went and walked on one of the many nearby lakes. Here's one of the photos we (my mom and I) got. More coming soon!

Documentation of my Day

2011-12-21T20:23:00.001-06:00

I'll admit it -- I don't have a very exciting life, so I was kind of wondering how it would go taking a photo every hour. I ended up taking more than one photo an hour though, and I ended up with 32 photos to post. I decided to edit them all in B&W, as it hides background distractions better, because it makes white balance problems vanish, and lastly, noisy photos look better in B&W. Of course, this just documents the activities I was doing on the hour, so you actually missed quite a bit of the day... :-p So, I apologize for a long post, but just be glad that I didn't post the original 85 photos! :-D

Alrighty. I got up at 7:30, but started the day with a 7:00 photo, taken once I got up. :-) Open curtains, set camera on bookshelf with self timer, and make a mad dash into the top bunk. Repeat a few times before getting a good shot....

At 8:00 I was reading my Bible:

At 9:00 I got breakfast and ate it at the computer while catching up on some emails:

By 10:00 I had started school and was doing a Social Studies test. I had to list all the states and their capitals, but it turned out much better than I expected!

At 11:00 I was still doing school, but I had moved onto math:

At 12:00 it was lunch time. The problem is that I had no ideas of what to take a photo of, since noodle soup isn't really photogenic (especially when you drain all the broth off and just eat noodles...) so you're getting two boring, blurry, noisy photos.... :-p

1 o'clock! At the computer, editing photos taken earlier in the day:

At 2:00 we went to the library, and stopped at Caribou on the way back. ♥

Normally at 3:00 on a Tuesday afternoon I'm arriving at my piano students' house, but we had to reschedule for Wednesday this week, so we were still driving around in the car. I like how you can see mom's reflection in the clock screen:

At 4:00 I was reading one of my library books:

5:00 was supper time! Food looks so much more appetizing when it's in color... :-p

At 6:00 Dad was reading to us from The Little Baptist as part of our family devotions:

At 7:00 I was playing around with my Genius pen tablet, and PSE:

I really had fun with the 8:00 shot. I was trying to figure out how to get a piano shot without the normal shot of the keys, or the hands, and I also wanted to add in a couple more pictures of me. I finally decided on this:

At 9:00 I was having my nightly chat with Laurie (yes, we do talk every night...) and also reading. Multitasking! :-D

10:00 was time to get ready for bed. You try taking a photo of brushing your teeth without laughing... (Oh, also try laughing without getting a goofy look on your face...) It's kind of a weird thing to do! lol

There, that's better:

In reality, I was still awake talking to Mom at 11, but this is what was supposed to happen. :-D I liked how it started and ended in bed, and really didn't feel like taking another shot for the day.

So there you have it -- my day in photos. It was a really fun challenge, (Thanks Laurie!) harder than I thought it would be, but I'm glad I did it. When Laurie suggested it, I actually was against it, but I'm glad I changed my mind. :-D Which photo/hour was your favorite?

Yes, I took all the photos in this post --- self timer and long arms came in very handy. :-D

Candy Constructing, Photo Challenge, Volunteering, and Sewing

2011-12-19T20:10:00.000-06:00

"Melt-Away Mint Truffles"

Candy Constructing: To be more truthful, this title should be "Candy Packaging", but this sounded funner. :-D Besides being a mother to 6, photographer, and pizza maker, my piano students' mother is also a candy maker. She's been making candy for about 10 years now, and has quite a few customers who buy it as gifts for the holidays. This year we were able to go over and help them out a few times. It's been so much fun getting to spend so much time with them, and helping them out at the same time! I love it when you can have so much fun but bless someone at the same time. :-D In the past few days I packaged five different kids of candy, and helped make two. I also got to play with her wonderful kids! She, in turn sent us home with candy each time, insisting that we take it. I found out that she's also made Reese's peanut butter cups, and Snickers bars. Yummy! If they turn out anything like the rest of her candy, they'd be fantastic! I don't think I've ever had better caramels -- not an exaggeration!

Photo Challenge: Both the photos in this post were taken because one of my friends and I are having a photography challenge of sorts. Well, it's not really a challenge, as in winners/judges -- I have a feeling it was more because I haven't been taking any photos lately.... :-D Anyways, we decided to both take a photo of anything edible. She said she'd use her point and shoot too, to make it even. I can't wait to see what she comes up with! I was having a hard time deciding what to photograph, because I don't eat a lot of photogenic food, but then I decided those truffles were a great subject! We're also both planning on documenting our day in photos soon. The plan is to take a photo every hour, or more if we'd like.

Sorry about all the noise.... I didn't bother to take these in good lighting, so they're highly edited....

Volunteering: I think I've mentioned volunteering at our nursing home before. Now we've been going every week, and we've finally locked in what we do each time. Every Friday we help out with the Coffee Social, and then deliver the mail. It's been really fun to start to get to know some of the residents better. I just love volunteer work! Helping other people out is so fun!

Sewing: All the volunteers at the nursing home have to wear their name tag the whole time, so I decided to make myself a lanyard to clip it to:

I also recently made myself a earbud case/mp3 player case (my mp3 player fits in there too) with this tutorial. Well, I actually ended up making three of them -- they're so easy and addicting! :-D Here's what the first looked like. It was a bit wonky, as I hadn't sewed with circles much, but by the time I had done three of them they looked better.

Sorry for the weird quality/focus... This was scanned, as I was too lazy to find the camera!

Well, that's what I've been up to lately! Thanks for reading!

TeachinFourth

2011-12-10T19:44:00.001-06:00

We pause this blogging break for an advertisement:

Have you ever visited the blog, TeachinFourth? Mr. Z. is the one who took and let me edit this photo. Every time I visit his blog I end up spending quite a while there, reading all the archives. If you want a good laugh, go read his Moments with Joey posts. So funny! He also runs a photography business called Backroads Photography. I love browsing through his pictures -- he does a great job! This week he's giving away 100 free 5x7 prints of a photo of your choice. I'm having a hard time deciding which photo to choose!

Editing News

2011-11-25T08:31:00.000-06:00

This is the reason why I'm always hesitant to say that I'm taking a break... I always find some reason to post again! :-D

Yesterday after Thanksgiving Dinner (we ate it as a late lunch, early supper) we went for a walk, through the woods by the river. I took a couple pictures, but most of the time Mom had the camera. She took these two photos, but I had a blast editing them! When my mom and sisters saw my edits, they all protested, saying that the SOOC is what it looked like in real life (that's completely true). In my mind though, photoshopping isn't about what it looked like in real life -- it's what I wanted it to look like in real life. :-D Because they were so dark to begin with I did run into some problems with lots of noise, but I'm choosing to ignore that. :-D

Here is the first SOOC, which is exactly what it looked like while we were there. The sun had almost set, so there were tons of shadows, making it hard to see much of anything.

After pulling it through ACR, and playing with a few other things in the PSE workspace, I came up with this. It almost looks like a whole different location!

Then I ran another photo filter over it to warm it up. I can't decide which I like better -- pink or blue.

Then the second SOOC. It looks pretty much the same as the first, but from a slightly different angle.

On this one I went way overboard and over processed it. I love getting carried away while editing though, so it was fun. :-D Only problem is that when you over processes such a dark photo, you really get a lot of noise.... I do love the reflections in it though! So many colors!

That's the editing I've been doing lately! No promises that this break is actually going to be official from now on, but at least this way I don't have to feel bad if I don't post for a while. :-D

Also, in other editing news, I finally one first place in the Edit Me Challenge!!! I've placed finalists quite a few times, but never first. I was very excited when I read the winners post!

Snow!!!

2011-11-19T14:30:00.000-06:00

I know I'm supposed to be on blogging break, but I wanted to post these photos that I just took. It's finally snowing enough to play outside! :-) For us kids who have lived in the desert for 8 years, it's a ton of fun, and sooo pretty! Betz and Em had been playing for a while before they convinced me to come outside. I was having plenty of fun watching from the window. I finally did though, and brought mom's camera.

They attempted to make some snowballs, but the snow is too powdery...

I could sit at the window watching it fall all day long. It's so pretty!

Blogging Break

2011-11-15T18:27:00.000-06:00

I've decided to take a blogging break for a while. I don't know when I'll start up again, but it for sure won't be till at least January. I'm just not really into posting anything lately, and I haven't been taking many photos lately either. I will still be reading other blogs -- just not posting on my own. Thanks to everyone who's been reading!

*Note* I will still be participating in the edit me challenge, and from time to time posting my own photos over at my flickr account.

Before and After Edit

2011-11-11T17:07:00.000-06:00

A few days ago, I was reading TeachinFourth's blog, and the latest post was this one. As soon as I saw the picture in his post (below) I wanted to edit it, so I commented and asked his permission. I love the perspective and crop of this photo, and those rays of sun are really cool! Then later after editing it, I asked him if I could post my before and after. First we have the original:

Some of you may remember, I like overly processed cloud photos, so I found it a bit difficult to stop when I did in the editing process:

Please don't ask me how I did this edit --- just play around with ACR and you'll get it eventually. :-D Thanks TeachinFourth for letting me edit/post your photo!

Edit Me Challenge #25

2011-11-09T20:01:00.000-06:00

This week's photo was submitted by Misty from "Through A Photographer's Eyes."

As soon as I saw this photo, I knew what I was going to do with it! First I opened it in ACR and did a bunch of stuff with those sliders, but didn't bother to write it down. Then I edited it again in ACR to get the background just how I wanted it, and used a few layer masks to bring it all together. Then I did some cloning to get rid of a few unwanted objects. Next I ran the Ampad action, Yonkers, and changed the opacity on a few of the layers. Lastly, I clicked on Enhance ---> Adjust Lighting ---> Shadows/Highlights and played around with those sliders. It's a lovely old tractor!

Before and After

2011-11-08T01:00:00.000-06:00

**Note -- I did not take this photo. A friend from the DPS forum took it, and gave me permission to post it. **
Lisa had posted this photo with her edit, and was asking for people's critiques on it. I didn't bother to reply, as the post was over a month old by the time I saw it, but I did edit it and send me edit to her. Then I got her permission to post it! This was a snapshot she took at the park but she didn't like the harsh shadows. I had a blast editing it! Here is the original, and then next is my edit.

Original

Edit

It is almost over edited, but to get rid of all those shadows, it took a lot of steps. Below are images that I saved as I worked --- each step is another photo.

Step 1: First I edited in ACR, just to boost contrast, ect. I know it doesn't look much different from the original, but I'm too lazy to do a mouse over. :-p

Step 2: Next I fixed the highlight on her shirt.

Step 3: Then I used the clone tool, and the smudge tool to get rid of the highlight on her arm. It's definitely not perfect -- in fact I just noticed how blotchy it is, but I hadn't mentioned each step, you wouldn't have noticed. :-D

Step 4: Next I fixed the highlights on the legs, again using the clone tool, and the smudge tool, along with the Gaussian Blur. I actually did this step on three layers, but to save space, I'm just posting the finished leg photo, instead of each step. :-)

Step 5: The next thing I did was to fix the grass up in the top. It didn't really need to be done, but it was bugging me.

Step 6: Here we have the results of 5 levels adjustment layers --- one for the shirt, one one for the face, one for the hair, one for the slide, and one for the background. Each layer had its own separate layer mask.

Step 7: Here I used a Phaunt action called "Sunshine" to brighten up the whole shot just a tad.

Step 8: Lastly, I used the clone tool to fix the blown out highlight on her nose.

Normally I don't lighten up a photo so much when editing, but this time it was easier to lighten it than to try and shadow her whole face. As a result I did blow out some of her hair, but I think that's a small price to pay, as the rest of it was pretty much recovered. After editing this, I 100% agree with the statement, "It is better go get it all right in the camera, rather then editing it later". I know she couldn't help that the shadows were there -- snapshots are like that, but that statement is so true!

Photo Surprises

2011-11-05T03:00:00.000-05:00

Awhile back, when my dad's parents were here, I snapped this photo while at Taylor's Falls. It didn't look like much on the camera screen, but I'm glad I didn't delete it, because when I got home and looked at it on the computer, I got a surprise! That surprise was that there was a spiderweb in the photo. The funny thing is that I don't remember there being a spiderweb when I took the photo... I suppose this is a good reminder to wait till you get to the computer to delete the "bad" shots! Does anyone have any tips on making the web stand out more, without changing the rest of the photo?

Another photo that I took that day was my latest self-portrait:

Does it look much like me?

A Lesson To Learn

2011-11-03T04:30:00.000-05:00

Last week when our grandparents were here, got snapped this photo of my grandpa and my sister walking together. It isn't a technically perfect photo -- first of all, it's blurry. As you all know, with a P&S you can't change the shutter speed, so I was stuck with the slow one that it set for me. It also isn't exposed perfectly with that blown out spot in the center, and I think the composition could be improved too, but over all, I love this photo. A photo doesn't always have to be technically perfect to be a good photo. This photo carries memories of a really fun week with our grandparents. Something that I want to keep in mind, is that right now, even if I don't have a good camera to work with, I can still get good photos -- ones that bring carry memories, rather than being "perfect" in a bunch of other ways.

Linking up to This and That Thursday.

Also, last week I got to go along with my piano students' mother (who is also a photographer) and watch an outdoor family photo shoot! It was a really fun experience, and I'm so glad I got to go along! A few posts back I mentioned that I got to edit some photos for Mrs. J. Now I get to edit a ton more ---- a few shoots!!! I'm so excited that I can help her out, and have so much fun at the same time! It's also a great chance for me to experience another part of what it would be like if I ever have a photography business of sorts!

Weather Collage

2011-11-01T19:59:00.000-05:00

Yesterday morning we had a ton of fog when we got up. I think fog is pretty, but it can be kind of annoying at the same time...

Also yesterday morning I helped Dad change the oil on our car. There were a bunch of water droplets on the car so I ran in for the camera. I love water droplets!

Stacking Images

2011-10-29T19:22:00.001-05:00

Every month I get out our back-up hard drive and re-back up my folder on the computer (including any new photos that I took that month) and I also take a folder of old photos (preferably from 2010) and put it on the computer to edit them that month, and then the next month I replace that folder, ect. This way, I get "new" photos to edit each month, and slowly, bit-by-bit my archived photos will get edited! This month I took last October's photo file to edit. That month was full of photos. I've had all sorts of fun with it, but one of my favorites is this photos stack that I made. I took 2 different photos that I had taken of Emily sliding (while the camera was set to burst mode) and I put them together in PSE. It makes for a pretty cool image and it captures the memory in one photo instead of 2. :-D

I'm looking forward to continuing through the folder and seeing what other creative things I can do to the photos. :-)

Thursday Link-ups

2011-10-27T05:30:00.000-05:00

Last week I was going through a folder of old photos, and I came across this shot:

At first I was going to throw it away because it's pretty bad looking. But then, after studying it for a second, I decided I needed to edit it. Then I could throw it away if the edit didn't turn out. I'm don't remember all what I did, but I know it involved a solid color adjustment layer with the blend mode set at overlay, a texture from Kim K., various layer masks, and my very own bird photo. :-) Below is the finished product. It's still not a perfect, wonderful image, but I did end up keeping it. :-D

Linking up to Texture Thursday.

Next, I have this photo of a Peppermint Creme cookie. This was also taken about a week ago --- when my mom made them, I held one up, squinted, moved around a bit, (got some weird looks from my mom and sister), and decided I had a photo to take! There is only one word to describe these cookies: heavenly, yummy, awesome, tasty, the best, won't last long, photogenic (if made right), winter tradition... Well, that was more than one word, but you get the idea. :-D (No, our wall isn't that blue -- that's edited. :-D)

Linking up to This and That Thursday.

I also have this picture:

For any of you who were curious, below is an overhead graphic of my set up. Maybe none of you care about that, but I always likes seeing it when other people do this. Bedsides, it was fun to design. :-)

That's all for today! I'm slowly but surely getting to the bottom of my "to post" file. :-)

Afternoon Walk

2011-10-25T05:30:00.000-05:00

Our grandparents were visiting us all of last week, and on Saturday afternoon we went on a walk. I took mom's camera along in hopes of getting some good close-ups of the sun shining through the plants, but it wan't light enough for the camera to have a nice fast shutter speed, and that resulted in quite a few non-sharp photos. They look fairly good when you're zoomed out, but as soon as you crop them, or view them largely, they're blurry... Anyways, I liked quite a few of them anyways, so I made them into a collage. Please excuse non even-ness of the the grid....

From left to right, top to bottom:
1. Weed?
2. There were some really pretty trees with berries along the path (or should I say some trees with really pretty berries???)
3. These tracks are at the start of the track.
4. Along the trail is a bridge that is 1/3 mile wrong. The whole thing goes over a swampy bog -- this was found looking down over the fence.
5. I love how leaves look with the sun shining through!
6. Another sunny leaf!
7. Sign at the start of the trial. Someday I'd like to do a series of photos of signs...
8. I probably looked crazy, but for this picture I put the camera (and myself) flat on the bridge and snapped a shot!
9. Lastly is a seed pod. Not shown here, but they have a little divider in the middle of them, so it's two little compartments!

The promised craft tutorial is still coming -- I've got to get a picture of something before I can post it, and I keep forgetting every time I get the chance to take it... Also, I'll soon be posting my new favorite way to edit a photo if all it needs is a quick exposure/contrast/saturation touch-up! It literally only takes about 5 seconds!

Button Bouquet

2011-10-22T14:18:00.000-05:00

These are flowers, right??? Linking up to Flowers on Saturday.

Back in 2009 I came across this tutorial for Whimsical Button Bouquets. I wanted to make it right away, but I didn't have a salt shaker to use! Finally a couple months ago I found one at a thrift store for a price I was willing to pay (50 cents). I made the bouquet right away when I got home! I think I should've gotten the matching salt shaker so I could make another, but until then I can just make new flowers when I get tired of these!

Also, need a boredom breaker? Try making a tower with Duplo's that reaches from floor to ceiling! (click to enlarge) This photo is actually a vertical panorama, with some serious lens distortion..... :-)

I apologize if you get some randomly thrown together posts... I have a growing stack of things that need to be posted, and I'm falling behind on the job... Maybe I should start scheduling some of them....

Edit Me Challenge #22

2011-10-20T13:19:00.000-05:00

This week the Edit Me Challenge has moved to it's own site! The photo is submitted by Kristi at Live and Love out Loud. I went for a simple, clean edit this week, but I forgot to record my steps while editing this time, so you'll have to figure out what I did by yourself. :-D Here is the original:

Here is my edit:

In some other editing news, I get to edit a few photos for my piano students' mother! I was happy for a chance to help her out, especially when it involves something so fun. :-D

Piano Lessons

2011-10-19T21:28:00.001-05:00

I've mentioned a few times how good my piano students are. Awesome, wonderful, the best in the world, etc.... Well, last week I arrived at my students' house and got one of their practice notebooks open to see what I had assigned them. In it I found this sweet note, next to all my instructions:

Linking up to This or That Thursday.

I told you I had the best students! :-D This week after the lessons, I had my weekly smoothie, and an added bonus -- a white chocolate and raspberry scone -- hot out of the oven! Sooo good! Then we (the mother and I) sat on the couch and talked about photography and photo-shopping (like we do each week), and then I showed her how to use layer-masks in CS5. I'd never turn down the chance to tell about layer masks. They're awesome!!!! :-D I also got to enjoy the youngest's (I think he's 1) adorable giggle for a while. He was laying on my lap and I was tickling him. Each time I'd stop he'd start hitting me to get my attention and start up again. :-) I'm so glad that I finally agreed to teach for this wonderful family. I can't imagine saying no!

Jpg Artifacting Example

2011-10-16T13:53:00.000-05:00

Today I'm going to give you an example of compression artifacting in jpgs. When you save a photo in PSE it will show give you a pop-up dialog called JPEG Options (shown below.) I've circled 3 parts of it. That number on the right (357.3K) is how much space the photo is taking up on your computer. Then we have the slider where you can set it to save as a large, medium or small file. You might think that would be great to save it as a small file to save hard drive space (it'll still be the same size width and length), but look at the circle on the left. Notice how that slider is also going to effect the quality.

Here is the box with the slider set at small. Notice how the quality now says 0, and the size says 60.7K.

Here is an example of the quality loss. First we have the image saved as a large file -- Quality 12.

and here we have the image saved as a small file -- Quality 0. See how it has become "griddy?"

Here is another example. Both these photos are zoomed into 500%. This first one has a bit of color noise in it, but it looks like a normal photo would that far zoomed in.

This next one has a lot of compression. This one wasn't compressed while saving it though -- for a while, when my camera was dying, all the photos were coming out compressed already. That was very aggravating, as there was nothing I could do about it!

This loss of quality is called compression, or jpeg artifacting. What has happened is that the computer is taking similarly colored pixels that are close together, and making them all the same color. This is why it starts looking all "chunkish".

So while saving your images as smaller files may seem like a great idea, it's actually not.

Foto Fix-Up

2011-10-13T16:52:00.000-05:00

Yesterday I was going through photos that I took in April of 2010, and came across this one:

A girl in our church back in AZ.

I decided to edit it. Of course. :-D First I cropped it so she wasn't right in the center, and I got rid of the poles in the background.. Then I did basic contrast/lighting touch-ups, and got rid of the shadows under her eyes. Next I copied the background layer and applied a gaussian blur to it. Next I added a layer mask and used a B&W Radial gradient to paint back what I wanted on the mask. Then I added a slight white vignette and it was done!

Linking up to This or that Thursday.

Along with the promised craft tutorial, I'm also planning on doing a post on JPG artifacting! Stay tuned!

10 on Tuesday

2011-10-11T20:34:00.000-05:00

A few of you may remember the few 10 on Tuesday posts that I've done before. They originated from seeing Karli write them. Anyways, I thought it was time for another one! Here is a very random list of ten things for you....

1. I made the Edit Me finalists this week! This is the third time that's happened. I'm averaging once every 7 weeks. :-)
2. I haven't done any graphic design since my post about it... That's how it goes --- I said I do it in phases, right?
3. I may not be doing much graphic design lately, but I have been editing so much that it makes up for it! I've done creative edits (like the one below), and I've also done slight touch-ups.

4. Sometimes my edits are a mixture of creative and funny/cartoonish. Here's a before and after that I did a while back --- I simply took one side of her face, copied and flipped it, and put them together to create a whole face. A very symmetrical one! :-D

5. Lately I've been reading the Abby Lost at Sea books, and the Adventures in the Northwoods books.
6. My latest sewing project is the DIY Dish Dress Form Mannequin Pin Cushion.

(via)

7. I'm paid for teaching piano not only with money, but with a weekly smoothie. Yum!
8. Here is a random photography blog from my google reader. Meet Grethel from Grethel Van Epps Photography! That link will actually take you to her 365 project blog, which is the one I read. I love following her project because all her photos are of their life. At the end of the year she'll put them all in a big photo book. What great memories to have! She also has an etsy shop where you can find some adorable camera onesies!
9. Back to editing.... Here's another one of my crazy, weird edits....

And here's the original... I told you it was crazy!

10. I'll be posting a craft tutorial soon. I'm not saying when soon is, so just keep checking back! :-D

Edit Me Challenge Week 21

2011-10-06T17:05:00.001-05:00

This week's photo was submitted by Amy over at Artistically Amy. Here is the before:

I opened it in ACR and edited it three times -- once for the whole right half, once for the left half of the water, and once for the left half of the trees. Then I put them altogether to get the parts I wanted out of each edit. I could have skipped two of the edits though, because I ended up cropping it so that I was only using the right top corner. Then I added a green sidebar and a word cloud. Below is the finished product. Part of me thinks it's too vibrant, but the other part of me loves the over vibrancy (is that a word?) of it...

Our trip to Sioux Falls was very fun, but also seemed extremely short! We heard 14 preachers, talked to old friends, met a few new ones, and ate some really tasty meals! It was a really fun time with my dad and sister, who btw had a birthday while we were gone! Now she is 17. I brought the camera, but completely forgot to ever use it... I probably wouldn't posted any photos anyway, even if I had taken any, because I don't think you want to see pictures of a ton of people you don't know...

Fall Pumpkins

2011-10-06T11:00:00.000-05:00

Last week we went to an apple stand to by some fresh, locally grown apples. We got some of the best ones I've ever had! They're called Sweet Tango apples. Yum! We were eating slices of them like they were candy. :-) This stand also sells (when in season) strawberries, blue berries, summer & fall raspberries, and pumpkins! It was pretty cool because the stand is at their house so we also got to see their chickens and cows! Here's a photo I snapped of a few of their pumpkins:

I don't usually go for the hazy editing, but I was just playing around tonight and I liked how it turned out. Then I made a mini word cloud using Wordle and put it on the side! After living in the desert for so long, these fall colors are just absolutely gorgeous! I LOVE them!!!!

Linking up to This or That Thursday.

Graphic Design Timeline

2011-10-03T13:03:00.000-05:00

I'm sorry if you've already seen this post in your reader, or if you subscribe by email. I accidentely posted it a few days ago instead of scheduling it like I meant to do....

Since I've been interested in graphic design lately, I thought it would be fun to post some of the things that I made. I also thought it would be fun to dig up my old graphics that I did a few years ago, so I could compare them. It seems like I kept getting interested in the design process for about a week at a time for a few years.

I first got interested in graphics in 2007. At that time I was blogging on homeschoolblogger.com and I was making quite a few templates for people. As a result I visited many graphic sites and I'm pretty sure that is what got me interested. I downloaded a free program called Advanced Drawing and got to work! Below is a collage of what I did then. I used very simply shapes, and solid coloring.

Then in 2008, my grandparents gave me a Genius Pen Tablet and I played around with drawing my characters, and then filling them in with brushes in PSE. I got fancy and even gave my cat a spotted tail! :-D

Then in 2009, I worked a bit on hair. Here's an example of where I couldn't decide if I liked blurred or sharp hair better:

I don't have anything saved from 2010, but then I got interested again this year back in March. I made both of these scenes with Draw Plus.

Then last week I got interested it it all again. What happened was I was talking to my friend Laurie, who was designing a cupcake in PSE. I decided I'd do the same and came up with this, only I decided to put it in a showroom.

I also drew this messy lady whom I call Miss Fitzzleworth. She's a 3rd grade school teacher. :-D

I also created Lollipop Land:

And I made this girl with her camera, which inspired me to make my blog header:

But my favorite thing that I've done this whole time is this flower in a pot. I found the tutorial on Elite TUT and decided to try it. I love following tutorials, but most of them are for CS5 and I end up changing it quite a bit. I'm happy to say that this one came out almost just like theirs did!

I'm excited to try and follow other tutorials, and try out my own ideas too.

Editing the Mountain + Misc News

2011-09-30T20:57:00.000-05:00

I was going back through photos that I took back in January and I came across this photo (below). That was the view from our living room window when we still lived in AZ. My dad actually climbed to the top of that mountain a couple times!

Anyways, I decided I needed to fix it up a bit. First I opened it in ACR and adjusted the sliders, and then I opened it in the PSE 9 work space. Next I used a layers adjustment, and then ran the Coffee Shop action, "Hawaii". Then I cropped it, resized it, and added the border! Just a nice simple edit for the evening!

Today Alison and I volunteered at our local nursing home with our friends Amber and Anna. We have "shadowed" them a few times before, so it wasn't new to us, but it's always very fun. We also got "orientated" (for lack of better word) on the rules, ect., of volunteering there. We're planning on signing for for weekly volunteering in a few weeks. Today I helped Anna in the hair salon. Very fun!

In other news, on Monday, Dad, Alison and I are all going to Sioux Falls, SD for a preachers meeting. I'm really excited for a mini trip with just the three of us! I think that we'll be hearing over 15 preachers in 3 days, and we'll also get to see some friends again! I've been looking forward to this for a while now, and it's hard to believe that it's finally here!!!

Edit Me Challenge #20

2011-09-28T19:25:00.000-05:00

Here is my edit for the Edit Me Challenge this week. Mouse over to see the original. (I don't know if this works in Google reader or by email subscription.)

I had lots of fun editing this shot. First I opened it in ACR and brightened it, etc. Then I re-opened it in ACR and boosted the luminance, and then opened both copies in the PSE work space. Then I used a layer mask to bring back parts of the image that I didn't want the luminance to affect (such as the eyes). Then I made a levels adjustment layer to brighten the background and used the mask to bring back the baby. Next I added a very faint pastel texture to the background so it wasn't pure white. Then I made another levels layer to lighten up the shadow to the left of the basket. I then used the dodge and burn tools to accent her eyes and mouth a teeny bit, and then lastly I used the liquify tool to make her smile a bit more.

I wanted to stay with a rather simple edit this week. I wanted it to look like something I'd buy as prints if that was my little girl.

New Blog Design

2011-09-28T10:14:00.000-05:00

I'm sure the first thing that you noticed when you opened the page was the new blog design, and the new title. I decided that since it's not really just photography these days, I'd go back to Amy's Artsy Articulations --- a few of you may remember when that was my blog title on HSB. Also, since I've been interested in graphic design lately, I thought it would be fun to design a new header for myself! I'm going to stick with the same mimibeth url to avoid broken links and other confusing messes.

Since it seems awfully weird to have a post without any photos in it, I'll share this edit that I did yesterday. There is a website called Pxleyes that has all kinds of contests -- editing, drawing, photography, and a few others. Of course, the editing contests caught my eye right away! Here was the original photo in this contest:

Below is my edit. As usual, I let my creative side run wild. :-D

Stayed tuned for more of my graphics, which will be posted on Monday. You might've already seen the post, as I accidentely scheduled it for the wrong date... If so, I'm sorry, but you'll just get a repeat. :-p

Thanks to all of you who have linked up to the before and after post! The linky will stay open till Saturday, so I'd still love it if you participated!

If you're viewing this from google reader, or from an email subscription you'll have to head on over here to see the new design.

Before and After Link up

2011-09-25T15:21:00.001-05:00

You all know how much I enjoy editing! A few of you might also know how much I enjoy seeing before and afters. This week I decided to have link up for you to display your before and afters! If you don't have any editing software, you can use Picnik, or you can use this editor, right here on my blog. This can also be found on my "Photography Links" page, or at pixlr.com/editor

Here is my SOOC -- I took this photo back in March when we visited our grandparents in CA. Don't ask why the horizon line is sooo crooked.... :-p

Here is my edit -- first edited in ACR, and then in the PSE 9 workspace.

Feel free to make your edit as simple or as drastic as you wish. Use actions, textures, quotes, or whatever else you'd like! Once you're through editing, come back here and link up. I can't wait to see what you do! If you are linking up with a flickr account, please have the sooc and edit side by side in the same photo. I've been spreading the news around that I was posting this on Monday, but feel free to link up early if you'd like. The linky will be open all week.

Fall is in the air!

2011-09-22T18:17:00.000-05:00

Fall isn't only in the air, it's on the trees! :-D We went to Taylors Falls with our grandparents a couple weeks ago and I took charge of mom's camera. I got some decent photos, even if it is just a point and shoot -- editing always helps too. :-D Here are a few of my favorite close-ups:

Linking up to This or That Thursday and And then, she Snapped!

This picture may seem like it was taken at a really strange angle, but it all would make sense if I would've taken a pulled back shot. The town had balls of these flowers hanging along the sidewalk. I liked how the light looked shining through the petals!

On this one I wanted a very blurry background, but since you can't set the aperture on a point and shoot, I had to get it a different way --- by stepping back and zooming in! A very handy trick to keep in mind.

I'll share some of the landscape shots another time -- I haven't finished editing them all quite yet. :-p

Also, since it's a long the theme of fall, here is this week's edit me! Deb took this gorgeously focused photo and we all got to edit it!

Macro Monday

2011-09-19T10:11:00.002-05:00

I was talking to Laurie the other day and she asked me if I had ever the Coffee Shop "Color bar" templates. I had seen other people use them but had never tried them for myself! Today I pulled out a couple of photos from the archives again, and put them in the templates. Which is your favorite?

Linking up with Macro Monday.

From the Archives

2011-09-18T16:38:00.001-05:00

Taken in March, at the Long Beach Aquarium:

Good to Wow --- Edit

2011-09-15T08:35:00.000-05:00

It's time for the edits in the Good to Wow challenge! Here's how this challenge works: you link your SOOC on Monday at Jill's blog, and then on Thursday you link your edit over at Ashley's blog. Here's my SOOC that I posted on Monday...

...and here's my edit, which I ended up with after (who knows how many) hours of working in PSE, and many layers later!

To achieve this drastically different photo, first I cropped it, and got rid of a few remaining corners of shoes and blankets with the "Spot Healing" brush. Then I edited it in ACR, and after that I can't tell you what I did... Here's my finished layers panel:

Here's one last side-by-side view:

Head on over to Ashley's blog to see some more edits!

Edit Me Week 18

2011-09-14T15:34:00.000-05:00

Here's my edit for this week's edit me challenge!

Photo by Kathryn

I first edited this in ACR, and then I ran two actions on it that I had seen Karli use, and asked for. :-) Then I re-sized it and added the black border!

Good to Wow --- SOOC

2011-09-12T09:22:00.000-05:00

I decided to enter the "Good to Wow" editing challenge this week. I'll admit right now that I'm breaking a few rules.... First off, my sister Alison took this photo. Secondly, it was taken about a year ago. Lastly, I'm not following the theme of "night photography", but since that is just a prompt I don't feel too bad about it. :-) What happened was that I was browsing through our old photos looking for one to edit and I came up with this one. This photo might not look like much, but I have a really cool edit ready for you on Thursday! Stay tuned. :-D

Tutorial -- How to open a JPG in ACR

2011-09-10T14:27:00.000-05:00

My grandparents are here for a visit right now so I only have time for a quick tutorial. A scheduled one might I add --- this was written on Monday. :-D Today I'll show you how to open a jpeg in Adobe Camera Raw. You might wonder why you'd want to do that when you could just edit it normally, but sometimes it's really nice to just do a touch-up with ACR because all of your different settings and sliders are right there in one place! I'll be using Photoshop Elements 9.

Step 1: Open up PSE and click File --> Open As, or type Alt+Ctrl+O. Then browse your computer for the photo that you want to edit. As shown in the screenshot below, you'll want to change the "Open As" drop down to "Camera Raw". You do not want it set at "Photoshop Raw" which is farther down the list. Then click "Open".

Step 2: From here you can start editing by changing the sliders on the right! Have fun experimenting with the different icons at the top and to the right. When you're done, click on "Open Image" down in the bottom right corner. This will open your edited image in the PSE editor for you to continue editing.

Here is the before/after touch up of the above photo. Nothing much, but then this photo doesn't need anything fancy!

Top: SOOC --- Bottom : edited in ACR (as if you couldn't tell)

Thank you to my grandpa and Laurie for testing out this tutorial for me, and for Christi J. for letting me use her camera!

Edit Me Challenge #17

2011-09-07T09:09:00.000-05:00

This week's edit me photo was submitted by Jill at Jill Samter Photography. Isn't this scene just gorgeous! I'd love to live there!

SOOC

Below is my edit. I opened the photo in ACR and did my magic (hehe) and then I ran the CoffeeShop's action over it. I then saved the photo and opened it again in ACR did more of my magic (sorry, it's a secret) and then used a layer mask to bring back the grass. If you've been reading my blog for a while you'll know that I love bright and vivid colors, which is obvious with this edit!

More Fair Edits

2011-09-05T09:26:00.000-05:00

Time for some fair photos! We didn't get many photos, but we sure did have a good time! We ate ice cream for lunch and other unhealthy food for snacks, but who cares? It isn't like we do that everyday! :-) We got to watch 4 shows --- the Lumberjack Show, a horse show, a dog agility show, and a Police K9 show. We also went in quite a few buildings, rode the rides, and just walked around!

Top Left: SOOC --- Top Right: 1st Edit in ACR --- Bottom: 1st edit edited again in ACR.

We went on the Sky Flyer twice and the Ferris Wheel once. Emily wanted to go on a mini roller coaster type thing until one of the cards go stuck on the track and the people had to carefully climb down the track.... No more interest there! :-p Here we are waiting for the sky flyer to start. I think I could've ridden it all day long!

Both pics are SOOC except for a head swap in the top photo.

While we were riding the Ferris Wheel we played a game where each person finds somebody walking around and has to keep track of him/her. I picked someone in a bright pink shirt so they were easy to find each time we were at the top. :-D We also were commenting on how un-realistic it is in the Boxcar Children books when they're at the fair and the see the thief while they're at the top of the ferris wheel -- There are WAY too many people at fairs to be able to do that. lol.

Top: SOOC --- Bottom: Edited in ACR + 1 action (don't remember what it was)

We also rode the Big Slide, but I don't have any pictures of that. I think they should put that kind of slide at every playground. :-D It ended way too soon!

Top Left: SOOC --- Top Right: Edited in ACR + a Tiffany Walensky action --- Bottom: edited in ACR.

We came home very tired, but happy. :-) I don't think we'll be going again next year, but maybe we'll go to the county fair instead!

Tutorial -- Striped Background

2011-09-01T22:02:00.001-05:00

I just recently noticed that I had written this tutorial in December last year and never posted it! Sorry about those messy arrows! :-p I hope you can make sense of it all. If you try it out, please let me know!

Here's how to make a striped background for your photos. I picked this picture of some spools of thread because it has so many colors in it. Below is my finished project.

Step 1: Open your image in your editing program (I am using Photoshop Elements 9). Click on the Retangular Marquee Tool and make a selection that is as wide as your photo, but only 1 or 2 pixels high.

Step 2: Then click on the Move Tool, or type CTRL T and stretch the selection vertically. You will want it to cover the whole image.

Step 3: Next you need to paste the original image on top of this. As you can see, it makes a new layer. Then making sure that you're on the right layer, type CTRL T again and resize that layer so that you can see the background. Position the image how you like it. You can be finished here, or you can go up to Layer---Layer Style---Style Settings and add a drop shadow, and stroke like I did. Below you can see the finished product, and what the layer panel will look like.

Another fun twist to this project is to make another layer with horizontal stripes -- just follow steps 1 and 2, but make your selection vertically instead. Then set that layer's opacity to 50% or so (play around with it) and you'll get a cool crisscrossed version! You could also play around with the blending modes to get more effects.

Edit Me Challenge #16

2011-08-31T20:56:00.000-05:00

A few months ago I found the Edit Me Challenge, hosted by Branson and Kathryn. It's now my favorite weekly challenge out there in blogging land! Each week someone sends in a photo, anybody can edit it, and then there are 3 winners posted the following week -- 1st place gets a prize! This week's prize is the book: The Key to Taking Pictures like a Professional Photographer.

Photo submitted by Stephanie.

While editing this week's photo, (top left) I didn't think it needed anything more than a touch-up. I edited the photo with ACR, and then used a very light photo filter adjustment layer. But as I usually do when editing, I got carried away and created a whole bulletin board! All photos are from Stephanie -- board, papers, and push pins are from www.fuzzimo.com -- ribbons are from a couple scrapbooking sets -- Font is from http://www.kevinandamanda.com/fonts/.

Fair Pictures Preview

2011-08-30T20:03:00.001-05:00

We had a great time at the fair on Monday, and I'm having more great times editing a few of the photos we took! Here are a couple rare b&w edits that I did this evening. I'll be posting color shots sin a few days -- after all, what's the fair without all the vivid colors?

Back to Blogging

2011-08-28T19:33:00.000-05:00

Yep, that's right, I'm going to start blogging again! Even though I don't have a camera anymore, I've been keeping busy with lots and lots of editing. I'll be posting a few tutorials, and before/afters in the upcoming weeks. You won't be seeing any recent photos, but there are thousands in my archives that you haven't seen yet. :-D You might've noticed that I changed my template around a bit. I took out the sidebar so that I could post my pictures bigger, and I also updated the "About Me" and "Photography Links" pages. I'm also planning on changing my header soon, but I've got to make a new one first. :-)

Tomorrow our family is going to the MN State Fair. Sounds like you can buy any kind of food there either deep fried, or on a stick. :-) It should be a very fun day! If my mom brings her camera I'll try to get a few shots.

Piano teaching (mentioned in the last post) is going very well. I actually have 3 students, and they're all very enthusiastic about it, which makes it easy for all. :-) It's fun to watch their progress! We've also gotten to babysit for them quite a few times (and are going to again on Thursday) so I'm around them quite a bit. A plus about teaching them at their house is their mom always makes me a smoothie afterwards. *grin*

Since I can't have a post without a picture, I'll leave you with another abstract that I made today. Everybody in my family has a different opinion on what it is. I see lots of dogs running all over the place, and the others see colored ghosts, chairs from a restrained that just went through a tornado, shoes, screaming rabbits, etc... lol. Each time you rotate it by 90 degrees you'll see more interesting things. What do you see?

Update & PSE fun

2011-07-22T18:33:00.002-05:00

Hello all! I just thought I'd post a little update on what I've been up to. My camera died a couple weeks ago. It was still having problems even though the new card seemed to help at first. Then it got knocked out of the car into our driveway and that was the end....

So since I haven't been able to take pictures, I've been editing my old ones, and having some other fun with PSE. My first project was some modern art. It's definitely not what I'm used to, but it was fun to try. Here are a couple of my pieces (there are a few more on my flickr page). Can you find any little people hidden in them?

My latest project is Digital Scrapbooking. I put together the pages in PSE, using free sets from the Shabby Shoppe. I've made two so far. This is the one that I made today:

I can't wait to make some more! Maybe eventually I'll make a whole book. The good thing about scrapbooking digitally is that there's no mess. :-D

The only other news I can think of is that I'm going to start teaching piano to a couple kids in a couple weeks! I can't wait.

Flickr

2011-06-04T21:03:00.000-05:00

I figured out that the problem is my camera card, not the camera (yay!), but I've decided I'm still not going to start blogging again yet. For now I'll post pictures on my favorite photos on my flickr account every once in a while. Just thought I'd let you know!

Blogging Break

2011-05-31T13:08:00.000-05:00

I know I just took a long break because of the move, but I've decided to quit blogging for a while. I've noticed that the image quality on my camera has dropped from what it used to be and I really don't want to post them looking like they are. Also we're kind of busy till the middle of July and it might be nice to not have to feel like I have to keep this updated every few days.

I'm not sure if it's the camera or the memory card giving me troubles, but hopefully I'll figure it out soon, get it fixed, and start posting again!

More Spring Spinning

2011-05-28T19:59:00.000-05:00

The other day it was really overcast so I thought it would be good lighting to try the spinning photos. Betz wasn't too enthusiastic about being my model, but I think she had fun. Look at her smile! I was thinking that this might be fun to make into a GIF image or set a really slow shutter speed and have a spinning blur. I'll have to experiment!

Today we got to make chocolate truffles with a lady from church. It was sooo fun, and everything taste absolutely delicious! I might post pictures one of these days.

Mystery Location Revealed!

2011-05-27T16:21:00.000-05:00

The picture from yesterday was taken in Sioux Falls, SD. We went there for my Dad to preach at Empire Baptist Temple on Wednesday night. That afternoon our family got to visit the falls for a little while. They were very beautiful! I'd love to go back someday.

Spring Spinning

2011-05-27T08:26:00.000-05:00

Yesterday I thought it would be fun to get some pictures of Emily spinning but I wanted a clean background so I went on our deck to get an "above" view. I love these three although I wish that the sun hadn't been quite so bright and washed out so many parts. We tried it again later in the afternoon in the shade, but I didn't like the result quite as much so I put a radial blur on it with PSE. Mom and Alison say that this one makes them dizzy to look at...

I'll post the answer to the Mystery Location soon -- hopefully tomorrow.

Mystery Location

2011-05-26T15:47:00.000-05:00

Can anyone guess where this is?

Meet Sallie Marianna

2011-05-23T12:23:00.000-05:00

This is Sallie Marianna, my latest doll. Last week I was unpacking my craft stuff and I found her body already made with the dress cut out. I immediately got to work embroidering her dress. After that I painted her face and stuck on some hair that I found in my box. Give her a hat and she's done! These dolls are so much fun to make, and they're also a very fast project.

I also made a hair clip (below). First I covered a plain hair clip with denim by mod-podging it. (Mod Podge is my new favorite craft supply). Then I made the flower and mod-podged the edges to keep them from fraying. After that I sewed them together with the button and glued it onto the clip! It works well in the front, or I can clip it onto a ponytail in the back. I meant to glue a snap onto the clip and flower so I could change the flower once in a while but I forgot to do that. I guess I'll have to make another one. :-D

Goodbye Birdies

2011-05-19T21:38:00.000-05:00

Yesterday evening we said goodbye to Rochambeau, Ricky, and Ronnie, the three baby robins under the porch. I'm hoping they're all boys.... I was out taking pictures of them again, when all three of them decided to try flying. Bad timing guys. They kind of flew right into me. I'm not sure who was more startled -- me or them!

Rochambeau posing for a picture earlier that day.

At first we were a little worried about them, but I saw them flying around today, and even finding worms for themselves. It was great to watch them for a few days and we're hoping next year we'll get more birds to watch!

Not sure which bird this was... I think it might've been Ronnie, but there is no way of telling.

This is the neighbor cat, Fatty. (what a name...) He watched those birds very intently, and kind of looked sad he couldn't have get at them. We weren't too worried about him though, because he had just torn his paw open a couple days ago and so he wasn't really in shape to go after birds. Thankfully.

We're Here!

2011-05-16T15:41:00.000-05:00

I'm now an official Minnesotan! Well, I sort of was before because I was born here but you know what I mean. *grin* We had a great trip up here, stopping at a preachers meeting KS for almost a week. I had such a good time there! When we got here, Plainjane's family helped us move in. It was so fun to see them again.

The first Sunday we were here it snowed, and then the next week we almost had a tornado. It didn't hit us, but we did get a great thunderstorm. I had fun attempting to get some lightning photos. They aren't really in focus, because taking pictures with a shutter speed of 1 second, with no tripod, through a window is pretty hard.... Here's what I got:

One really nice thing about living here is the tennis court across the street. We've attempted to play quite a few times, but in the end I usually resort to taking pictures. So much easier! Here are a few of my favorite shots. The top two could make some neat headers -- you could put the blog title in the over exposed parts.

While catching up on my blogging, I came across a photo of a dandelion -- from its eye level. I thought it would be fun to get some from underneath. Below are the results. I really like the top right one. The leaves kind of look plastic!

My bedroom window is right under our porch which goes off the living room. I love the window because from it I can see a robin's nest under the porch. Today we noticed that there were babies in the nest! I love watching get fed -- the parents fly up with a worm and 3 heads pop up from the nest. :-D Their feathers look so soft! I want to watch when they learn how to fly. :-)

Well, that's basically all I've been up to lately, except for playing the piano. The other day I found a Mozart piano book at a thrift store for only 25 cents! It's from Schirmer's Library of Musical Classics --- Nineteen Sonatas. Sooo much fun. :-)

That's it for now! Hopefully I'll get back to posting more regularly!

Update

2011-04-12T10:49:00.000-05:00

No folks, my blogging break is not over yet, but since I had 20 comments on the last post, I thought I'd give you a new post to let them sit at. :-D Thanks for all of them, BTW. It's nice to get comments even when you're taking a break! :-)

We move in 10 days. Wow, it's only ten days! Time flies. Our music room as turned into our box room. Finish a box and it goes in there. That orange duck tape means that we need that bag right away at the new house. Speaking of those bags, it's amazing how much stuff you can put in them! (They're the vacuum pack kind)

Sorry, it's unedited. Takes too long... haha

A couple weeks ago we had a friend come over for a sleepover. It was sorta warm outside so we got out the hose and filled that big pink container that you see above full of water. I tried not to get too wet, but you know how it goes. :-D I did get a couple neat pictures though, this one being my favorite. I had forgotten we owned a watering can! lol

Last week we had our 5th Annual Homeschooler's Fine Arts Recital. It was lots of fun to hear everyone play and see how they'd improved from the last year. I also got to meet Brittany P., who is also interested in photography. We've now been emailing back and forth and I found out that we also both like sewing and play the same musical instruments! Too bad we didn't meet earlier. :-)

One last picture before I go. Dad got mom a bouquet of flowers last week. They're very pretty and all the flowers still look great! Yesterday I took them outside (natural lighting is so much nicer...) and had a 30 second photo-shoot with them. Here is my minorly-edited favorite. I can't wait to see more flowers in MN! Here if you see one it either came from the store, or it's a weed. lol

Well, that's all for now. I can almost guarantee you that there won't be another post till we move in, but you never know... I might get a great picture I have to share. :-D Hope this post all makes sense--I didn't have mom read it before I'm posting it... eek!

News, News, News :-D

2011-02-24T10:44:00.000-06:00

First of all, I've decided to take my blogging break after all. And I've also decided to quit the 365 Project. Well, I actually quit a couple weeks ago, but I'm finally am telling you! The reason for all of this is that we're moving to MN in a couple months, and we'll be very busy. We also might not get internet back right away once we're moved, so it will all work out better. I might start over on 365 later in the year, but probably not. I decided that I'd like to document more of our life instead of close-up shots of our stuff. Know what I mean? As for the blogging break, I'm not sure when I'll start up again. I will still be taking lots of pictures though!

Before I go though, I have to tell you about Gavin Hoey. He's one of those photography/photoshop experts. I watched quite a few of this photoshop tutorials, and these are a few of the things that I made. They're a bit different than his because he's using the real photoshop and I'm using Elements, but it was fun anyway.
First is this film strip. It was lots of fun to make, even though I couldn't actually finish it because PSE 9 didn't have the right tool....

Then I made this photo cube. If you look closely, you'll notice that I didn't do a very good job matching up corners.... That's what happens when you're in a hurry! :-D

Then a couple days ago I made this, whatever you want to call it... He was explaining clipping masks, and all though I'd already used them in storyboard templates it was a fun project.

Then lastly, we went to the Grand Canyon last week. I took this picture of my parents:

When I got home I decided I didn't like the composition, because you couldn't see enough of the canyon in the background. So I made this. Much better!

Well, that's it for now! I'll be back after a while!

Giveaway!

2011-02-21T11:55:00.000-06:00

There is a giveaway over at Seven Sisters! They are giving away some adorable fabric covered notebooks--perfect for jotting down photography tips. :-D

I'm planning on posting a "real" post on Thursday. Sorry to make you wait!

365 Project ~ Days 38-44

2011-02-13T21:28:00.000-06:00

38. This is a fruit off one of our cactus.
39. A shingle nail coming out of our shed's roof. For some reason I have lots of pictures of that roof...
40. You're pretty desperate if you're taking pictures of a gummy worm....
41. For a few days there was a puzzle craze in our house. Then all of a sudden that stopped.
42. This is a very old book that my mom is selling on Ebay. She asked me to take a few pictures for her.
43. Another violin picture! This is my older sister's.
44. Alison and Emily started the day off reading the Bible together.

My blog has sort of turned into a 365 blog, which is what I was hoping wouldn't happen. I might just take a short blogging break for a while and then catch up on 365 collages later, but I'm not sure yet... I'll make a final decision in a few days. :-D

365 Project ~ Days 31-37

2011-02-06T21:41:00.000-06:00

31: On Monday we went to Boulder City, NV. We dropped my dad off so he could bike home and us girls had fun at the library and browsing through stores. I saw this mirror in a quilting shop and since no one was around I snuck a picture. :-D
32: Tuesday we had 4H. This cat is one of a few at the house we meet at. It's the friendliest and I've gotten quite a few pictures of it.
33: Believe it or not, this is the only picture I took on Wednesday... Pathetic, I know. I had gone into the kitchen to get breakfast and I saw this water drop sparkling. So I took a picture. The sunflare wasn't supposed to be there, but oh well. I think all the "flare-resistant" stuff has worn off of my lens.
34: My two younger sisters were playing their own version of Balderdash. Instead of taking pictures of Elisabeth like normal, I got one of Emily. I need to watch where I focus with faces though --- I kept focusing on her nose, not her eyes.
35: This paper clip is probably my favorite one around. It's the treble cleft sign!
36: I was sorta panicking over what to take a picture of that day, so I took a picture of our neighbor's car. For some reason I think old cars look really cool....
37: This is what happens when you are taking pictures of a 3 year old and you tell her to smile. *sigh* The white frame around her is my doll house window--I thought it would be cool to take some pictures through the window but she moved around too much.

Pictorial Representation Paraphernalia #2

2011-02-02T14:41:00.000-06:00

It's time for another "triple p" post. This one is more of a RPPB --- Random Pictorial Representation Babbling. :-D Title Translation: Photography Stuff.

First off, what camera batteries do you all use? My camera takes 4 AAs. It can go through them quite quickly! We've always used recharge-ables though so that's not a problem. Our favorite brand is Eneloop. My dad uses them for his bike lights too. I not only like how long they last, but also how they look! I know that doesn't really matter though...

After you've bought some new batteries, if you still have money burning a hole in your pocket, The Photojojo store is the perfect place to spend it. They have all sorts of cool gadgets! One of my favorite things is this Super Spy Lens. For the most part I'm satisfied just starring at it all, but I wouldn't mind having some Photoshop Fridge Magents. Mom might even get her computer back for a bit! haha. :-)

Notice the Golden Spirals?

The other day when I had to spend three and a half hours at the orthodontist, I was reading through a Birds and Blooms magazine. I saw an article about this guy doing the 365 project, but he was only taking pictures of flowers. I went over to Blooming Daily and immediately loved what I saw! His pictures are absolutely stunningly beautiful! Go check it out! He's almost done with the year, but I'm going to enjoy seeing a new picture each day for a few more weeks! While you're there click on the Free Stuff Tab. He has some bonus pictures and a few tips!

When we went to the library a few days ago I found a book called Digital Photography Composistion for Dummies by Tom Clark. It's been really good so far! Another book I got (recommended by Laurie) is Digital SLR Photography All-In-One for Dummies by Robert Correll. Even though a DSLR isn't in my immediate future, I really enjoyed it. It was so easy to understand, and just made me want a DSLR more than ever. :-D If you have any trouble understanding DSLRs, I'd advise you to get that book. It's awesome.

It seems like I'm always learning something new about my camera or PSE 9. Today I discovered two new things on my camera, and the Inspiration Browser in PSE! So many tutorials. :-D I have a feeling that I'll be spending a lot of time there. Do you any of you ever use the Intervalometer on your camera? That's one of the things I discovered today. I can set the amount of pictures I want the camera to take within a certain amount of time, and it will do all the work. I suppose that's mostly only used for time-lapse type things, but it's handy to know about! The other thing I discovered in my camera was exposure bracketing -- very useful if I ever start doing HDRs!

I'm really glad that I decided to do the 365 Project this year. I've had quite a bit of fun so far, and I think that over time it will make me think more...

365 Project ~ Days 24-30

2011-01-30T22:01:00.000-06:00

Contrary to last week when I said that I thought it had been the worst week so far, this might be my favorite! I had to re-create the storyboard template to fit a vertical and a horizontal, and I think I'll be saving it for later on! Very handy.
24. On Monday we dropped my dad off at for a bike ride. (We drove him up the hill so he could bike down.) :-D and then we went to the library. I got a couple really good books, but I'll tell you about them in a post soon to come. I'm not exactly sure what that bike part is called, but I liked how it looked.
25. We've been doing a ton of roller-blading lately. I thought that the focused skates with the blurred road was pretty cool.
26. More skating. This was my attempt at taking a picture while spinning... Sounds kind of dangerous, don't you think? It's kind of hard to focus on your spinning partner when she doesn't stay the same distance away from you the whole time. :-p
27. Watch out for this guy! It's our ocotillo -- my favorite plant in the yard. This is the one plant that we can touch without getting spines in our fingers--the rest are cacti.
28. This is my favorite picture this week, maybe for the year. That cutie is Claire's sister, Greta. She smiled for about 2 seconds, and then decided she didn't want me to take her pictures after all. Too late! :-D
29. Mom bought us these heart marshmallows. I don't really like how they taste, but they looked better than normal ones for my picture. I know that it looks like my cup is half empty, but that's all I made. Maybe I should retake the shot with a full cup of cocoa...
30. This plant is actually in our neighbor's yard, but it's right next to our fence so I can still get pictures of it. I love the shallow DOF in the picture!

Hopefully I won't let another week go by until my next post.... I do have one in my drafts, but I keep getting writer's block. :-(

365 Project ~ Days 17-23

2011-01-24T10:07:00.000-06:00

It's my opinion that this week was the worst so far. We now have two violins, and two pictures of Claire.... Oh well. :-p

17. This is a picture of some pipes, with a fence in front of them. I was trying to get the squares and circles together, but I think it would've worked best if I had gotten a head-on shot, not from an angle.

18. My necklace.

19. I had a photoshoot with the tobasco sauce.

20. This was the worst day of the challenge so far. I only took 4 pictures that day, and none of them really turned out. When I brightened this picture, it really brought out the noise. Oh well -- not every day is going to be great. :-p

21. Here's our second picture of Claire. We were playing with our Tiny Dreams and I told her to smile. Maybe this next week I'll get a picture of her sister. :-D

22. I had originally chosen an action shot (sorta) for this day, but then decided I'll get it later, and used this bird. The clouds kind of look fake...

23. This is my older sister Alison's violin. She plays the violin along with the congregational singing at church. I love the color of the wood.

Well, there you have it! I'd like to start doing more people shots, but sometimes my sisters get tired of me taking their picture...

Before/After with Pixel Perfect

2011-01-20T10:57:00.000-06:00

I love before and after blog hops! It's so much fun to compare the original to the edit.

This week I choose this picture that I took of my camera necklace that my sister gave me for my birthday. I took the picture on a plate--a trick I learned a while ago. Unfortunately my white plate didn't turn out so white.

Here's the after photo:

So much better, and I only did a few things with PSE 9! Here's what my layers palette looked like when I was finished. The gray layer is what sharpened it. You simply copy the background layer (Ctrl J), and then hit Ctrl+Shift+U to make it black and white. Then go up to Filters-->Other-->Highpass and set it to a number 1-5 on the slider. Then change the layer's blending mode to Overlay, Hard Light, or Linear Light. Linear light is usually too much, and Overlay is often too little. That might've been a bit confusing, but it works. :-D I learned about that trick from a photography magazine.

365 Project ~ Days 10-16

2011-01-17T12:26:00.000-06:00

This week seemed to fly by. It was busy, but very fun!

10. On Monday we went shopping at the mall with our grandparents. This picture was taken looking down into the food court. That lady will never know I took her pictures. :-D

11. I usually go for a clean edit, but I thought this looked pretty cool. It's a target drawn onto a white board, with those foam-bullet-dart-suction thingies stuck on. We had lots of fun shooting them!

12. On Wednesday we went out to eat for supper with our grandparents. These smiley fries are a big hit with us. :-D Unfortunately the only have them with kids meals. I traded Emily a few normal fries for one of these.

13. Oil and water pictures.

14. My birthday. It was one the best birthdays!

15. These Reese's Pieces were a gift from Betsy. They're so good!

16. Another bird picture for Sunday... :-p This is what happens when you see the perfect bird sitting on a tree. When you take the picture you can almost guarantee he'll fly away. grrr

Photo Challenges

2011-01-16T22:02:00.000-06:00

Thank you all for the birthday wishes! I had a great day. A few pictures will come soon.

Yesterday evening I went outside to throw something away and saw this sunset. I ran inside to grab my camera! It was so pretty.
I took this picture on our vacation this summer and it was one of my first edits with PSE 9. I've been meaning to post it for a while and this is the perfect time!

Before

After

Happy Birthday to Me!

2011-01-14T11:21:00.000-06:00

Cards are from Monopoly Deal

Sky Watch Friday

2011-01-14T11:15:00.000-06:00

Does any one know how to get a sharp, in focused picture of the moon without anything other than a point and shoot? This is the best I could do, but I like it anyway.

Water and Oil

2011-01-13T15:05:00.000-06:00

Lately tons of people are doing water droplet pictures and water/oil pictures. I tried the oil pictures today and here is what I got. My set up looked something like Karli's, except I didn't use a tripod and I was on the floor--not the table. I took all of them except the first one with MF. They were all edited.

whoops--forgot to crop this one...
This one is probably my favorite .I love how the oil bubbles worked as magnifying glasses.

I should've used a less busy background, but I don't feel like taking them over again. They are nothing like everyone else got, but it was a fun experiment.

FREE Class!

2011-01-11T23:11:00.000-06:00

I'm was very excited to find this FREE photography class type thing for next month! Click on the picture for more details.

The 365 Project is still going fine! I can't wait till Monday to post this week's photos!

365 Project ~ Days 4-10

2011-01-10T13:02:00.027-06:00

I have successfully finished week one of the 365 Project! (sorry about the pink in that one corner. When I downloaded the template I didn't bother to change it to a color that matched better...)

4. My project for the 4th was to clean up my desk/area. Once I finished, my sister decided to copy me and the whole room got cleaned! It doesn't look quite as good anymore though... :-(
5. Mom made cookies! Those were soooo good.
6. Elisabeth had left her violin out on the keyboard and I was taking a few pictures of it. This was my favorite.
7. On Fridays I get to babysit one of Alison's violin students while her sister has a violin lesson, and then I watch the other girl while the first one has her lesson. I enjoyed taking pictures of the younger girl while we played. I'll probably post more of them eventually.
8. The weather was perfect on Saturday. We called up our friend Miss Kahoobajaz and asked her if she'd join us at the park. We had lots of fun!
9. Another pigeon picture for Sunday. I have a feeling that Sunday will often get pigeon pictures. :-D
10. We have an old player piano that we're going to get rid of. Mom had taken the front off so she could find some numbers inside and so I too a few pictures.

After we went to the park on Saturday I was looking at my pictures and I noticed that they weren't as clear as normal. More "gridy"... Here's what I found when I zoomed in. It was fine again yesterday, but today's pictures are turning out "gridy" again. I'm starting to wonder if the camera is going to last much longer, so I might end up dropping out of the 365 project.... :-( I'm probably going to contact Canon soon and ask if it can be fixed. (The camera is 7 years old, so I'm thinking I might just need to get a new one...)

Giveaways!

2011-01-05T09:50:00.001-06:00

Head on over to Paper Heart Camera for an awesome giveaway! She is giveaway a camera necklace and a $25 giftcard to Pamela Toppings.

Also, if you head on over to Pamela Toppings there is another giveaway! Go check it out!

Touch Up Tuesday

2011-01-04T15:48:00.000-06:00

For my edit this week I tried to clean up the background a little bit, and then I got rid of the shadow on her face. For my first shadow removing edit I'm pretty happy with it! To do this, simply click new layer adjustment, then Levels. Make it a bit brighter and then use a layer mask to put everything else back to how you wanted it. Here is a tutorial from the Coffee Shop Blog that I followed. Complete with screenshots to make it easier!

Below is the original--mouse over for my edit.

If you have an advanced point-and-shoot like me, and have never gotten the chance to shoot/edit in RAW, I have the perfect thing for you! Head on over to Morgan Kervin right now. She has a free RAW image to download and edit. I had never edited a RAW file until this morning. I can't wait to get a DSLR and shoot in RAW! :-)

365 Project ~ Days 1-3

2011-01-03T12:47:00.001-06:00

Day 1: I thought this picture would be fitting for the first day. :-D I had set up Scrabble tiles and done different things that said "Day One", "Ready Set Go" and stuff like that, but this was my favorite:

Day 2: On Sunday mornings we pick up a lady for church. Across the street from her house is this power line. Every morning the birds gather there. They are never there any other time of the day! (At least that I know of...) I don't remember quite what I did to this, but it is edited. They weren't silhouettes when I took the picture. :-)

Day 3: When we were moving here 7 years ago a lady from our old church gave us these bowls. There were two yellow ones and a green one. There were also mugs to go with them. One of the mugs has its handle broken off and they have quite a few paint chips but I still like them.

Memories, Dreams, and Reflections 2010

2011-01-02T22:28:00.000-06:00

Me! - I'm not sure what I'm most "proud" of accomplishing this year... I am very happy that I was able to pretty much master manual mode on my camera though!

Can anyone tell me why this picture is so noisy? The ISO was only at 200. Maybe the mirror was dusty. :-D

I Love You -- I took this picture of my dad this summer on our vacation. It's now my favorite picture of him!

Winter Wonderland - This picture was taken on the way home from CA last week. I love how you see the desert we live in, and then snow. The two don't seem to go together very well in my mind.

Birthday - I love this picture of Emily on her birthday. I ran it through Noise Ware, and as a result it got a very soft focus. It wasn't really in focus to start with though. I just love her expression!

Friends - We spend so much time with our friend Miss Kahoobajaz. She's tons of fun to be with, and she creates excitement wherever she is!

I Was Inspired... I saw an article on a photography forum about water droplet pictures and was inspired to try it myself. It didn't turn out quite how I had envisioned, but I had a fun time.

Spring Fever - Flowers and blue skies! Playing outside! That's spring! (We get blue skies all year around though... And we can play outside pretty much all year around too. Oh well. At least this picture was taken in the spring!)

Travel or Vacation - Travel for our family means a very full van. For our trip this summer we bought a car top carrier. It was so handy!

Summer Days - We live really close to a lake, and every summer we go there numerous times. This is my dad relaxing in the boat he bought us a few years ago.

A Day In My Life - If you popped in to say hi, most likely I'd be at the computer with PSE 9 open. The screen my look something like this. Blending modes, layer adjustments and layer masks are sooo handy! Especially layer masks! Oh, and the opacity slider too! :-)

All Smiles - I love this picture and the family in it. I love their smiles! They were so much fun to make, and got sent to some very good friends. It just makes me smile when I look at it.

Autumn Harvest - We don't have any leaves to rake here, so my sister enjoyed doing the job for my grandpa when we visited.

Family - I took both of these on our vacation this summer. Sorry, no faces... They were too busy enjoying Bryce Canyon, and Cedar Breaks.

Celebrate! - I really like how you can see the flame being blown away in this picture.

Let's Do it Again... Ice skating! It was sooooo much fun! It was my first time ever and I hope I'll get to do it many more times!

I Miss You - This summer, while on vacation we finally got to meet some good friends. We had talked on the phone weekly for a year or two, emailed, and read each other's blogs but we hadn't ever met. We had so much fun together! Then in October they came to visit us! I hope we can go visit them again sometime soon! (I didn't actually take this picture, but figured since it was taken with my camera I could cheat.)

Beautiful - Capital Reef National Monument was soooo pretty! It's pretty much a miniature of Bryce Canyon National Park.

Dress Up - I wasn't really sure what to do for this one because we don't do Halloween. Then I found this picture of my oldest sister juggling her stuff before our recital. Doesn't she look nice? (I just noticed how noisy it is! grrr)

Macro - I love taking close ups of flowers! Here are a few of my favorite:

Holidays - I love the 4th of July. We always have a big church picnic in the mountains. It's sooo much fun! This was the first year that I got some decent pictures of the fireworks!

My Favorite - It would be impossible to find a favorite photo from this year.... My favorite thing that we did though was go on our vacation. We were gone for 3 weeks, and got to see so much, and so many people. We'll remember it for a long time! I really like this picture of my younger sister that I took on the way home. It's really too bad that most parks have taken out these merry-go-around things!

Don't Ever Change - I love being able to spend a morning/afternoon doing something as a family.

Just Because...So There! - This one is for sharing any picture that didn't fit in a category. I was browsing through pictures that I had taken on our summer vacation this year and found this one. (mouse over for original) It was too dark to do anything with so I made this silhouette! I really like how it turned out. (I have no clue who that little boy is... He just happened to be in my picture!)

Hopes and Dreams - I don't really have any hopes and dreams for this year. I'm very content!

Sorry about the messed up formatting. I tried over and over to get what I wanted but finally gave up.

365 Project

2011-01-01T11:20:00.000-06:00

This year I decided to start the 365 Project. I'm not sure if I'm crazy, or if it's a good idea. :-D Below is something you have to post if you are joining. I'm joining the weekly posters group. Monday will be my first post. Stay tuned!

I am participating in the 2011 Mommytography 365 Project! For this year long project I will be posting an image a day, to get me out shooting, using my camera and learning new things with it daily. Anyone interested in photography can join, no need to be a Mommytographer. We have teens to adults, male and female, as well as people from all over the world. Come join the fun!

California Collages

2010-12-31T15:40:00.000-06:00

I had so much fun in California! It was my grandpa's birthday on Monday so we got to make a special trip to visit them. We got there at lunch time on Monday. That afternoon we went shopping and Emily got to ride the carousel in the mall. That evening we had a birthday party with all my aunts and uncles and cousins.

On Tuesday we went to the park. There are about 4 parks that we like to go to in CA when we visit. This one has a giant rope climbing thingy. :-D That was soooo much fun.

After the park, we headed to the library. This library is humongous. It has about 4 stories, a gigantic fountain in the middle, and who knows what else! I'm always afraid I'll get lost. It costs a lot to get a library card though, so my grandma just takes us there for the afternoon. I read a few books and then went sneaking around taking pictures of people. hehe.

Tuesday evening I was sitting on the couch half watching the football game, and half taking pictures. :-D My grandparents had strung lights around part of that room and I had lots of fun taking pictures of them! (the picture in the top right corner wasn't those lights. They were one of the neighbor's house lights. :-D )

Wednesday was the hightlight of the trip -- ice skating! Ever since we watched the olympics last year we've wanted to go ice skating. We had sorta wanted to go before, but that's when we really started wanting to go... (that sentence is really weird sounding....) Unfortunately my youngest sister caught the flu in the middle of the night and didn't get to come with us. We spent 3 1/2 hours skating. It was soooo much fun!

Since we live in the desert where it rarely gets cold (okay, not really true) we didn't have any warm leggings of any sort to skate in. Alison and Elisabeth got tights, and I got over the knee socks. I LOVE them! I would've worn them to church last night, but....... Well maybe this picture will help you see why I decided not to. lol

Early Thursday morning we left for home. On the way we were treated with a snow on the mountains!

There is a basic summary of our trip! The first 5 five collages were made with the Coffee Shop's free storyboards. I love those! I made the last one myself though. Happy New Year!

The Sun is Shining....

2010-12-31T10:58:00.000-06:00

....and it's a beautiful day. I really should be finishing my Memories, Dreams, and Reflections post (hosted by Ashley) but I think I'll edit photos instead. I can finish that later. :-D We just got back from California yesterday afternoon, so I'm also working on a post for that. Hopefully it will be up later today!

Rain, Rain Come Again Soon!!!

2010-12-24T17:39:00.003-06:00

You might've noticed that the song just changed! Here we don't sing

♫ Rain, rain go away!

Come again another day.♪

I love rain. I love the clouds that come with the rain. I love water droplets,

Mouse over for original.

and all the other things that come with rain -- more drops and splashes, clear skies, birds singing in the trees, air that smells clean, green leaves, and fog the next morning! The moon wasn't really brought by the rain, but I couldn't help including it. :-D

Does anyone have any idea what this fuzz might be? It shows up in the same spot under our carport each time it rains. It's not cold or wet, just powdery. If you mouse over you can see what happens when you touch it. You'll just get a fingerprint!

On to other topics. I made a storyboard template! The collage up there is it. Very simple, but very handy. It would've taken a while to crop nine pictures and arrange them just right. Now I don't have to, thanks to clipping masks. :-D If you'd like the template, let me know, and I'll give you a link to where you can download it. Here's a great tutorial on using them. I'm hoping to make a few more soon, because I love collages!

I'm entering a few of these pictures in weekly photo memes. The first picture is for Macro Friday and Foto Friday. The clouds in the collage are for Sky Watch Friday.

Before/After with Pixel Perfect

2010-12-23T13:46:00.001-06:00

Yesterday I had a blast editing this photo with PSE 9. Here's the original.

I don't know all the steps that I used for the edit, but I do know that first I copied the layer, set the blending mode to "Soft Light" (I think....) and then put on a high pass filter with the slider at 5. I also smoothed out her skin a tad, tried to get rid of the kool-aid mustache, got rid of a few strands of hair in her face, and got rid of the wrinkles under her eyes. I think I might've overdone the lips though.... I also whitened her teeth, and the whites of her eyes. That should be it. lol. I think that if I were to do this again, I would brighten the eyes a tad. What do you think?

Here's a closer view. Mouse over for the edit:

10 on Tuesday

2010-12-21T10:16:00.066-06:00

Last week Allie tagged me. You had to post 7 random things about yourself. I'm not really into doing tags, but I thought I could merge it into this.
1. I'm a couple inches over six feet tall. Everywhere I go people tell me how tall I am.... :-p
2. I really would like to be able to play the harp. First I'll have to find one though....
3. I like taking pictures of the moon, but never have much success. I took this one last year, and rediscovered it today. Mouse over to see the SOOC. Any tips on getting a sharper shot? This might've had the digital zoom on, so that might be the case, but I don't remember.

4. I said in my first Ten on Tuesday that I didn't think I'd try sewing clothes for our 4 inch dolls again. Some how I couldn't resist the other day and I'm back at it... I'm using a lot of knit fabric right now because it doesn't ravel. Very handy! Pictures will probably come soon.

5. I used to have the hardest time spelling definitely. Then I found this site: http://www.d-e-f-i-n-i-t-e-l-y.com/ Never again have I had problems. :-D Once in a while, when I'm in a hurry I still spell it wrong, but if I think about it I'll get it right.

6. If you've never been to The Bonnie 5, you must. Karli is the lady who started 10 on Tuesday. Her photos are absolutely wonderful! She's been doing the 365 Project, and day 353 is stunning. I love it! Head on over and check it out, along with all her other great posts. She also has the most adorable little girl ever. I could look at pictures of her all day long!

7. I do not like doing English in school. When I read the "rules" they hit my head and bounce off. grrr.

8. As I write this, my sister is rolling coins down a chair and seeing which ones roll the farthest.... (please ignore that awful blurring job. I was trying to get rid of the messy background, but failed miserably...)

9. I love playing Scrabble, or Fast Scrabble. Both are great fun. I also love taking pictures of the tiles!

10. I've recently learned how to make my own brushes with PSE 9, and use actions, and story board templates. Lots of fun! Here's a before and after of my sister. Unfortunately I didn't write down my steps... I can't decide which I like best...

That's it for today! I'm hoping to post a tutorial soon, so stay tuned. (Soon doesn't really mean anything... It might be a few weeks. :-p)