i Heart faces Photo Challenge - Beautiful Black and White

There's a new challenge at i Heart faces called Beautiful Black and Whites. So I did a little studio session (on the floor next to my computer desk--very professional, don't cha know) and Katie did a little posing for me. I love that she is getting more into it now that she's seven!!! Eek, it seems like it was only a few weeks ago when we went on our Adoption Trip to China to bring our Katie home (*sniff)

Anyway, here is one of the shots I really like--we were going for dramatic black and white.

OMG, I just noticed that she's got sock-fuzz between her toes *groan*. I suppose I could go back and Photoshop it out :D

 This photo was submitted to the I Heart Faces photo challenge – www.iheartfaces.com

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Color Spots Mar 7, 2012

I saw this lovely flower-entwined nest with chocolate truffle-filled eggs in my inbox this morning and instantly thought "ooohh, nice colors, that would make an excellent color spot!" Well, that and mmmm that looks yummy! It also gave me the perfect opportunity to try out the Instant ColorBar action  from the Coffeeshop Blog I downloaded a while ago and hadn't had the chance to use it--it' works fabulously, you should get it.

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Source: Williams Sonoma

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Deep Thoughts

I discovered this really cool website, Kim Klassen Cafe, which is a fabulous resource of tutorials, textures, and photography tips. Every Tuesday, there is a Texture challenge, which invites people to link to their creations using one or more of Kim's wonderful Textures and encourages them to check out and comment on others' work. I love communities like this; they give you an opportunity to view so many other talented peoples' pictures and be inspired in your own work.

So, this is my first time participating in Texture Tuesday and I was excited to try out two textures, Golden and LifesGood. You can download these by signing up for the Texture Lovin' List. I used a picture of my daughter, Katie, from 2009. Not the best and sharpest, but I really love the concentration on her face and the pose and casual look. It just looked perfect for texture application.

I did some cleanup in Lightroom and then switched it to black and white. Then, in Photoshop, I added both Textures with these adjustments:
LifesGood, Overlay, 42% Opacity, Golden, Soft Light, 91% Opacity. I added Layer Masks to both texture Layers and very slightly brushed over the face with a soft, very low opacity brush. Then I ran Sharp People from the MCP Quickie Collection. Lastly, I applied a frame from  OnOne's PhotoFrame (the free version) and that's it. Roll your mouse over the picture to see the before.

 

 

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Spring is here - I hope

Finally, the days where we get (almost) up to the weather we're supposed to be having this time of year, are getting more frequent. Today is actually the second day in a row we can go outside without a jacket on!! Time to clean the yard and garage--but that's another post.

So, last week we had another such day (imagine that!), so we took the opportunity of a couple of hours before picking the kids up from school and went to the capitol in search of some photo ops. Oh, and to try out the new tripods (and heads) we got. We managed to get a few decent shots of the capitol and surrounding area. It was still a little early to get any flowers and I'm not sure they'll be having to many this year given the budget issues.
The picture I'm showing below is a combination of two shots I took; one of them had a better DOF for the background and the other had more of the ledge in focus. I did some basic adjustments in LightRoom and then moved on to Photoshop, where I used a combination of Actions.
I started off with Boost, from the (free) Pioneer Woman Action Set 1 (I seem to always start with that one :D). Then, I used the (also free--yay) Mini Fusion Action from MCP and adjusted the various settings, like contrast, warm tint and then I lightened it a bit.
Then, to bring out the leaf and petal colors on the ledge, I used MCP's Fingerpaint action from the Quickie Collection. Lastly, I added the Dusty vignette from MCP's All in the Details set. And finally, finished it off with the BuildIt Rounded Color Block from MCP's Finish It set. Hmm, can you tell I use a lot of MCP actions? Here is the finished picture.

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New Photo Challenge - Wind!

There's a new photo challenge over at iheartfaces--Wind. As soon as I heard it, I knew I had the perfect picture for this. I took this picture of my daughter, Katie, last year on the Ferry from Seattle to Bremerton. We were on our way back from a trip to the Lego store in Bellevue and had a full day of activities, so everyone was pretty tired by this time. Katie just found a good spot and started to sing (really loud) while bobbing back and forth in the wind. It's not the sharpest picture, since it WAS windy and we WERE on a ferry :D, but I just love this shot.

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Earth Laughs

Earth Laughs a photo by scrapgeek/NKMphotos on Flickr.

I got back to cleaning up my hard drive and organizing pictures. I had categorized many pictures and created collections in Adobe Bridge and was quite happy with it. But then I got Lightroom 3 through one of Adobe's special offers and now I have to re-think how to organize everything again. Not that I'm complaining--I really love Lightroom.
So I started creating textures from lots of close-ups of trees, moss, grungy concrete and rusty barrels. I'll be adding these to my flickr stream for download.
For this picture I used my Rusty Pail texture and the Rust Overlay. I also added one of ShadowHouse Creation's bokeh textures (love these) to finish it.

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Day 48 - 365 Fishing

Day 48 - 365 Fishing
Originally uploaded by scrapgeek/NKMphotos

Still stuck at at home with a cold, going through the house looking for stuff to take pictures of. Here is my little trio of 'fishing buddies' sitting on a bench on my shelf. :D

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Day 46-365 Doodles

46-365_Doodles.jpg
Originally uploaded by scrapgeek/NKMphotos

Just doodling around showing Katie how to draw hearts and then we moved on to pigs. Of course when you do pigs you gotta do the Angry Bird pigs--I love those guys. I got the face down, I think, but the ears still give me trouble. Hmmm, got to work on that. I was trying to draw a hippo for Katie; the schnaaz was ok, but then I sent wrong somewhere with the head and body and it turned into Snoopy--oh well. :D

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Day 45 - 365 Scribbles

Day 45 - 365 Scribbles
Originally uploaded by scrapgeek/NKMphotos

Too much work, not enough time for pictures :P And, once again, it's almost midnight--I need some time off!

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Day 43 - 365 Candy Hearts

Day 43 - 365 Candy Hearts
Originally uploaded by scrapgeek/NKMphotos

I like this vase. I got it for V-day a couple of years ago and now I'm keeping some dried flowers in it. I decided to do a close-up of just the candy hearts and try out the new free Mini Fusion action from MCP (thanks Jodi, these are great). I also played around with the Photo Tools and Photo Frame tools, available free from onOne.

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Day 41 - 365 Photogs

Day 41 - 365 Photogs
Originally uploaded by scrapgeek/NKMphotos

I love to find an opportunity to take pictures of my What the Duck photo ducks. Here they are, hanging out after a successful photo shoot.

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Day 40 - 365 Action Ruler

Day 40 - 365 Action Ruler
Originally uploaded by scrapgeek/NKMphotos

So, it's late (again) and I haven't taken a picture for today (groan). Picture...think...think...think...hmm, what's this? A ruler? Ok, not that exciting. But wait, it moves when you move it--it's like a little Posing Stick Figure Movie. Whoa...moving!
Did I mention it was late? Hey, I get excited about the little things late at night when I really want to go to bed,
So here we have it, a stark, contrasted piece depicting the struggle of the athlete.....er, or, perhaps it's just a fun little ruler--you decide. I'm going to bed.

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Day 39 - Peas in a Pod

Day 39 - Peas in a Pod
Originally uploaded by scrapgeek/NKMphotos

Ok, I'm slowly catching up with posting the pictures I took over the last week. I would get a lot more done, if that silly distractor, aka work, didn't constantly rear its ugly head!
Ah, but then I would be able to (occasionally) buy camera-goodies. :D

So, the actual picture was cute and as is, but I thought the pod and the background, well everything, was just a bit too colorful. Other than adding my logo and, of course, the hidden day-number, I only used the Branding Iron action from MCP's Finish It set. To get the lovely tone, I tried the (free--whoohoo) Pretty Presets Brown LightRoom Preset. I'm definitely going to have to buy some of them.

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Great Picture, but--ewww!?

I'm finally getting around to processing some of my first pictures taken with the new Extension Tubes I got for my Anniversary. I took my camera out on one of my daily walks around the building after lunch using my Tamron 70-300 Zoom Macro lens (love that one).  Ok, this is not really that unusual, since I always take my camera, because the two times I didn't, I missed out on some great shots.
Now, there isn't that much to see along the walkway if you do it every day, except for the occasional squirrel and bird, which I've captured pretty well I think.
So, I was trying to find something really small to try it out and the only thing I could find was this spider! Ok, fine, not the cutest subject around, but it'll have to do--I had get back to work, you know?
I was amazed at how close I got without getting too close--does that make sense? Of course it does :D
Anyway, here is one of the shots that I think came out amazing, except for the up-close creepiness.

If you zoom in, you can see three sets of eyes; if you can get past the fuzzy legs up close :)

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Seattle Butterfly House

Yesterday was a full day for Family Activities. First stop was the Harry Potter Exhibit. Nick really enjoyed that--Katie--not so much--too scary I think. Then, we went to the Butterfly House and I think I managed to get a few good shots despite the inconsiderate masses who didn't seem to care when people wanted to take pictures (don't get me started). Anyway, this little guy really liked my husband's cap, cause he decided to stay for what seemed like a long time :D.

I just did some cleanup in Camera RAW and used these actions: Boost (from PWAction Set 1--my fave!), and the Crackle and Bring out the Eyes actions from MCP's Quickie set.
The last stop was the BSG Exhibit at EMP. I got a few shots, but not too great; they had a no flash rule plus the lighting was really dark. I'll post more pictures as I clean them up.

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JHP Action Review - Retouch

For part two of my JHP Photoshop Actions review--Retouch Lab, I used a close-up up my daughter Katie I took at the playground. One of the few times she actually stood still for a picture :D

I used a number of actions from the set, so I thought I'd list the steps showing how I got to the final image. This set has a number of other actions as well, like beautify and tanning bed, that will be great for dramatic fashion-type shots. There are several skin smoothing and refinement actions, so you'll be sure to find one that's just right for many different looks. As with the last review, hover your mouse over the picture to see the before image. Click here for a larger view.

Read on for the how-to:

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JHP Action Review - Vintage

Since JHP Photoshop Actions has kindly sent me their Complete Set to play with and review, I thought I'd spend a little more time on each set and show some examples from each set. I started with the Vintage set because I had an image that was perfect for it. I ran the EverydayBoost-Vintage action and then added Intensify from the Color Lab set. Then I applied a radial gradient to the mask of the Intensify Layer to bring out the vehicle. Lastly, I added a SimpleVignette - Dark from the Creative Lab set; applied a gaussian blur (around 90 pixels) and lowered the opacity to about 30%.
The image shown below is the after. If you hover (thanks to this wonderful tip from ShadowHouse Creations) your mouse over it, you can see the before.

Here is another example using four more actions from the Vintage set: Instamatic S-10, Vintage Power, RetroMagazine and Turn Back the Clock (with Intensify from the Color Lab set). Click on the image for a larger view.

These are quick and easy one-click actions giving you excellent results with little effort. One thing to note, though, is that if you're using CS5, you'll run into a few snags where the actions are looking for filters that have been removed. But you can just click Continue to skip the step and finish the action. And if you feel up to it, you can always open the action and uncheck the misbehaving step. I'm told that a CS5 and an Elements version will be coming soon.
Well, that's it for today. I think I'll try the Retouch Lab Set next. Remember to check out the free actions
at JHP and if you decide to purchase the Complete Set, here is the 15% discount code again ==8473988B

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Coming Soon - new Action Review!

I have some exciting news! I just got a set of JHP Photoshop Actions complete set (yay). I'm working through them and will post a review with Recipes and examples here shortly.
In the meantime, you can download their free actions and give them a try.
If you like them, use this code to get a 15% discount for the complete set: 8473988B

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