Saturday, October 25, 2008

Look ma...

Last May on mothers day I mentioned an overwhelming urge to own a really good digital camera to take pics of Lilly and start a new hobby. Those who know me know that I try out new hobbies occasionally looking for some creative endeaver that I am good at. Some annoy me so much I throw glue sticks (hello scrapbooking), some stick. I have picked up some books on photography and have now started to frequent some phtotography websites and am really getting into it. I will now indugle my new hobbie on this blog, which I am sure most people will like because my favorite photo subject is sweet Miss Lilly. I have been taking 10 million pictures just practicing and all the advice tells me and I finally tried some post processing with the free version of photoshop online. In this picture I was trying to work with natural light and shadows and a just woke up from a nap baby. In post process I was able to fill in some back light and do some cropping. Yeah me. Let me know what you think!

5 comments:

Anonymous said...

Hi! Thought I'd drop by and see how you were doing. Good to hear you're taking a TON of pictures! That's the best way to keep on improving. And the improving never stops.. hopefully. :) I like your crop.. the composition is good and it's ok to cut off a bit off the top of the head. I do it all the time. Lily's right eye seems to be near the top left third of the photo so that's good. Contrast in light is good but sometimes too much light can give you highlights that are almost blown or contrast too much from the shadows. Was she in direct light?

I like to shoot in front of my north facing window because I get great reflected light. Reflected light is softer and gives you less harsh shadows. Hope that makes sense!

And keep shooting. You're doing great!

Anonymous said...

Oops... I meant to type "Lilly"... duh! Sorry!

mountainmomma said...

Wow Laura, i feel now super special that you commented on my pic! I have been trying to be very conscious of the rule of thirds as I take pictures, and photoshop gave me a grid as a cropped so that I could be aware of that. I was going to crop more, but that would have put Lilly right dead center and I wanted her a little off. I brighted the backlight and now that i look at it again I am not sure that was necessary as it seems to wash out the light on her face and I lose some contrast. But heck that's why you try this stuff out right?

I have been tring to use reflective light through these big fech doors we have in the living room. I open the curtains and try to get Lilly to cooperate. I alos went outside to try direct light, pics to come once i get them downloaded.

Thanks again for the tips, I am really enjoying this learning process, especially online when it becomes so collaborative!

Anonymous said...

Hi again!

Very good of you to know where the best light is in the home and outdoors.

Shooting in full sun is really tough.. I had to do a shoot yesterday almost all in full afternoon sun... once we hit some shade I was happy. I had to use my flash and reflector quite a bit and I'm still working on that.

You mentioned learning about aperture etc... I wonder if you've seen my tutorials about that?

http://www.dolcepics.com/tutorials/

Hopefully that can help.

Cheers!

mountainmomma said...

Laura,
I have read the tutorials, which are awesome by the way, they best explanation I have read yet. but I am an English professor and the whole numbers thing is hard for me...I will admit it I am a numbers idiot. I am working on it though!

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