Twenty Days and Counting

Another high school reunion is fast approaching. Conversations are often the same, "So Nancy, what have you been up to?," they will ask. With that in mind, I started thinking about what I've accomplished in the past five years. So here's what I've come up with in no particular order: become seriously interested in photography ("When does a hobby become an obsession?," my sister asks. "When I spend $600. on a lens," I answer.), joined Facebook, taken three photography classes at the Showcase School, taken four on-line photography classes at Kennesaw State, started volunteering at my local elementary school and stopped, spent over four hours hanging out under the Brooklyn Bridge taking hundreds of images while my hungry husband waited patiently... God, I love him,

worked as an extra in a television show (Drop Dead Diva), started writing this blog, spent two weeks traveling around Provence with my sister and brother-in-law,

figured out how to download songs according to the beat onto my iPod for walking, started an on-line shop on Etsy, done several art shows, planted lavender that actually lived, painted our front staircase in black and white, designed my own web page (in html no less...okay, I'm bragging), went to the Oprah Show in the middle of winter and got Gore's DVD instead of a car :(, went to NYC on a girl's trip with my three of my long-time friends, lost two friends to cancer, saw the Chihuly exhibit at both the Atlanta Botanical Gardens and the New York Botanical Gardens,

visited my niece's fourth grade class in Brooklyn and almost killed one student, joined a Bible study at church...still with it, started taking YOGA classes...absolutely HATE the plank pose, began a life-long study of Photoshop, really, and bought my first pair of Chuck Taylor Converse sneakers in RED!

That just about sums up my life for the past five years. I'm ready for the reunion. So tell me, what have you been up to?

Ten Down, Two To Go

For the past five weeks, I have been taking a class on line called, "Creating Web Pages I." This seems to insinuate that there is a "Creating Web Pages II." Whether I dare to take the advanced class depends upon whether or not I pass this one. There are two more lessons to go. They come to me from never, never land. I know the name of the teacher, but his whereabouts are unknown...an undisclosed location.

I won't bore you with the vast knowledge that I have absorbed. All the tabs, titles, jpeg, gif, html stuff, quotation marks and spaces have driven me to distraction. In order to maintain some sort of sanity, I go to my fun place...photoshop. I could spend hours there, but there are things I must do instead. I need a maid and a cook. I need them now.

Here are two images that I played with today. The first one is sooooo boring. You can tell I didn't do any enhancements. I guess I could "pop" the color and deal with the shadows, but I'll save that for later.

Next I changed the image to black and white and did a little manipulation, or two...or three.

All of this playing around was a pleasant break from web world. Tomorrow, another lesson will appear and the stress will return. It won't last long. Only one more week and then the final. Help me Rhonda!

Somebody Just Can't Wait

It's the middle of February and look what's popping out of the ground. It's too soon for this. Maybe it's because we had some really warm days last week, or maybe it's global warming.

I though as long as they're out, I might as well make the most of it and take a few shots. I used both cameras. This one is the fastest and easiest. Later this week I'll post the ones from my rebel.

Then I started playing around and came up with this one.

Gotta love photoshop!

Everyone Needs A Thank You

I must admit that this title was not my idea. My sister, Janie, the one who went with me to Art in the Park, thought of it. As she was watching people enter my tent and going straight for the cards, she told me that we should move the cards to the front of the tent where prospective buyers would have to trip over them. Anything to make a sale! She also added that I needed to make a cutsy sign giving people ideas as to why they should buy the notecards. That night in the hotel, I made the sign and it worked! Will wonders ever cease. Janie should have been in merchandising or maybe even a think tank. She does that a lot, think, not merchandise.

As friends see my cards, some of them ask me to do a set for them. I absolutely love to do them, especially when they give me an old picture that I can enhance with my magic wand. Some call it Photoshop. The card pictured below is one of my friend Debbie and her friend on a lake in Michigan. I used a sepia tone with fancy edges. It makes it look even older than it is.

I used this shot in an earlier post and then made it into a card. This was a shot of our neighborhood gang. It was probably taken in the early 50's. What a motley crew we were.

I've sold several sets of personalized golf shots for Christmas gifts recently. I'll show them in my next post.

Stay tuned.

tripod or iPod?

This really isn't about a tripod, except that I did have to use it during the first part of the shoot at the beach. Instead, it's about shooting at the beach ON the beach.

I started out early one morning. That's a HUGE tip for beginning photographers. Most gurus say it's because of the light, it's not as harsh. However, another reason I go out early is because there are fewer people on the beach. Yes, I could photoshop them out, but it's a whole lot easier if the people just aren't there. I really like to shoot at the beach in October or November; the sand is smoother, and again, people aren't there. My destination that morning was an area north of Myrtle Beach where there is a pier near public parking. It's a pain lugging the equipment blocks away from the ocean. I have shot under piers before but this time I had a plan. Let me back up and explain.

About a month ago, I met this guy (20-30 somethings would call him a dude) at Sam Flax's in Atlanta. I was walking down an aisle looking at the acid-free, archival quality mats when I saw this amazing poster size image on the framing counter. The image was a pier with the ocean looking very creamy-like..not foamy. Etheral would be a good word to describe it. The two guys who were helping him with his selection seemed to be concentrating on the colors for the mat and frame, just like they should have...very businesslike. This is where I enter the picture. I ooohed and aaahhed and began the interrogation. (Read the blog posted on June 27th....I was becoming one of them.) He told me without a lot of prodding where he took the shot, when he took the shot, and the shutter speed. I knew he had a more expensive camera, but I didn't think that would make that much of a difference. I thought I had all I needed to duplicate THE SHOT.


So, off I went on my merry way to take THE SHOT under the pier with my secret shutter speed to make the water look creamy. Using my tripod, I experimented with every selection on my camera....aperture, shutter speed, ISO, etc. Soon the people were waking up and taking their morning walk, thus causing frustration on my part. Why did everyone want to walk under the pier this early in the morning as I was taking THE SHOT?

I planted myself under pier with my bag and tripod. Set everything up. Took the shot and this is the result. Not exactly what I was looking for. My shutter speed was obviously too slow. My aperture was good- 32, and the ISO was 100. The problem was shutter speed.

Here is the second shot. Not really the second, I took 39 and don't want to bore you. This is the second example of my shoot that morning. This time I accelerated the shutter speed, same aperture and ISO. It's getting better. But, where is the water?

The third image shows lots more color, probably due to changing the ISO to 400, the aperture to 5.6, and the shutter speed to 1/640..that's really fast. I love the color, but it's NOT CREAMY!

This is the 4th and last image. The shutter speed is .6, the aperture is 36 and the ISO is 100. I think with some tweaking in photoshop this image will look pretty good. It's still somewhat overexposed, but I like that effect. What do you think?

I want to thank Tom, my guru for so patiently explaining my questions regarding metadata. He is a genius. I also want to thank John for sharing his image with me. It's NOT EVEN CLOSE, but maybe someday.