Light Room

Tonight I thought I would explore some of the creative options in Light Room. I thought the rose images would be fun to try a Light Room preset, Aged Photo and Antique Light.
These images reflect those presets. I also moved the clarity slider to the left to soften the images, and then processed them a little more in Photoshop..with a touch of Topaz.

A Rose is A Rose

This morning I had an appointment with a client to shoot in Cylburn for about three hours. While Cylburn is under construction, you can still access the gardens but you have to hike in to get to there. This is prime time for rose bloom and I headed straight for the rose garden, overcoming some logistic obstacles. The overnight rains left the roses covered with water and when we arrived there were rose buds just beginning to open. I could have worked the roses for hours and hours if the light had held and the Director of the Rose Garden had not scheduled a chemical treatment for the rose beds to prohibit black spot. I mostly helped my client make compositions and utilize her camera functions for creative exposures. Fortunately the treatment of the gardens was late and very close to the end of our session, so we were able to maximize our shooting time. I did get a chance to make a few compositions while setting up some shots for my client.

These images were processed in Photoshop and Topaz. The red rose is an in camera 9 shot multiple exposure 3 shots unfocused to create a wash of color, three shots super sharp and three more slightly unfocused to create a glowing effect. I also painted out the corners with color so the rose filled the frame.

The rose bud was processed in raw and the clarity slider was moved to the left for a soft effect, then processed in Photoshop and Topaz.

I kept thinking how lucky I was to be out this morning...and there is an old Hymn...that I kept thinking about in my head.......from when I was a child and visited my grandfather was a very devout church man, on Sundays...he would play the piano and sing....."I walk through the garden alone while the dew is still on the roses and the voice I hear falling on my ear is none other I've ever known." Just had to share that...it was a beautiful morning with a super client!

Migration

Every year the horse shoe crabs travel to the shores of the Delaware Bay and lay their eggs. The egg laying coincides with the spring migration of shore birds from South America to North America. This year I just caught some shots on my way home from the beach. The Ruddy Turnstones were having a real feast among the Willets and other shore birds. They move so quickly while gorging themselves for the next leg of their flight it is a wonder they actually gain energy. It was about 6:00 when I arrived at the usual site, and overcast. I coupled my 300mm 2.8 with the 2x tele-converter to get these shots out the car window. I turned up the ISO to 200, anything higher than that on the D2X and I am not happy with the noise. I need a newer better camera! for low light bird shots.
As I drove home on Rt.9 I saw these blue cornflowers mixed in the side of a field of yellow wheat. I had one shot left on the memory card and my camera was still hooked up from the bird shots so I shot this from the side of the road as the wind was blowing.
Me pass up flowers? ; - )

Rain Out

Well, it had to happen! After a beautiful but hot morning, and more home owner chores, I scrubbed the outside shower and hung the shower curtain, I headed out to the beach...as storm clouds were gathering. I was surprised at how few people were on the beach as the morning was beautiful. I noticed the life guards all with their umbrellas pointed south to block the blowing sand and breeze, so I made a few shots. The seas were relatively calm and beautifully colored by the light. As I looked south I could see the rain sheet and decided to head back, but I didn't make it and got soaked on the way. Good thing I had a back pack for my camera. Its been a while since I walked in the rain, wet feet and all, but the smell of a spring storm was wonderful so I didn't mind! Just cut my picture taking short!for now. Maybe there will be some nice evening skies after the storm passes and more tide pools at high tide for reflections. I am still using that wide angle as my photo exercise this weekend! These shots will be part of my beach collection I'll print for the Rehobeth Art League Gallery. Maybe I'll sell some?

Another Day at The Beach

Today was overcast all day and I did more house chores until around 7:00pm when the sky began to break a little and I headed up to the beach for a walk, with my camera and the wide angle lens!

I enjoyed the images of the children in the tide pools so much last night I was on the look out for more....Here are a few from tonight's beach walk.

South Bethany Beach

The unofficial beginning of summer arrived today with the Memorial Day weekend. The highway traffic was heavy and the temperature hit 85. It was a beautiful beach day.
I did some home owner chores and then walked to the beach after most folks had long gone in for dinner. I watched a father play with his son in a tide pool and made some images of the sea as it met the shore. I used that wide angle and enjoyed the perspective. As I was watching the sky and the sea, hoping for some beautiful color a group of children returned to the beach and played by the shore. The clouds were awesome tonight, but by the time the sun cast color at sundown the big clouds had moved off shore. I was happy just to have captured these images.

Delaware Shore

Just arrived at the shore and am taking a break checking e-mails, before heading out this afternoon to get some shots. I went back and look at the last set of files from the time I was here with Annette, and realized I never posted these shots. I like them better now than when I first processed them. ; - ) I was goofing around with a wider angle of view than I normally go for, and I will be doing that this week as well. Normally, I love to pick details out of a scene with my 70-200 telephoto and enjoy looking at the very small details with my macro, and on occasion go for the really wide shots, so this week, I am forcing myself to walk around with the wide angle 12-24 mounted on my lens. So I'll be looking for big sky and big ocean shots and whatever else I might like when I look through that wide angle.

Historic Reisterstown

I met Marie from Penn Camera today to review our schedule of photography workshop day shoots for the fall schedule. Our first shoot will be on July 18 in the historic shopping district of Old Reisterstown. It will be a street shoot teaching students to bracket shots for processing HDR images in Photomatix in the classroom, while making interesting compositions. After our meeting, I drove out to Reisterstown and talked with several shop merchants, Carolyn in Relics of Olde, Lynn and Jane in Tina's Jewelry and Antiques and Dick at the Derby Antiques. I also talked to Alice of Alice's cafe', where I think we will all have lunch together, it's a charming cafe'. It's always a good idea to ask permission to shoot if possible. Everyone was very friendly and accommodating. After introducing myself I got my gear and walked around making compositions. These are some shots from today.

White Barn

Sunday was a great day for shooting with soft light and passing storms. Across the street from Amos Mill was a very old white barn, yes I love barns! So I could not resist making a few compositions. All these shots are three to five shots bracketed processed in Photomatix, then Photoshop, then a touch of Topaz Simplify. I really like the artistic touch of the Topaz program.

Amos Mill, Rocks State Park

Today was another overcast day and several of us from the BCC headed north to Rocks State Park. Arriving at 7:30, before the gates opened we decided to go shoot a mill in Harford County that was near by. Amos Mill is all but falling down and is now almost 240 years old. I made a few exposures there and processed some in Photomatix, then Photoshop, and finally some Topaz simplify. I also made a Lens Baby shot which exaggerated the tilt.
After the gates opened at Rocks we headed down to the waterfall. Since we had some overnight rains the water was flowing nicely over the rocks. It was a great morning for shooting.

Spring Garden

Today, I had a list of garden chores and did none of them! Instead because of the beautiful soft light, I hooked up my camera gear and spent about fours hours playing in the garden. The grass was too wet anyway! That's a good excuse. I composed images and used the in camera image overlay function on an image or two, I opened the Wild Geranium image in raw and moved the clarity slider to the left to get a soft focus impression, the Impression of the Iris buds were made as a swipe and the beautiful apricot oriental peony is a 9 shot multiple exposure made in camera. Oh and, I have now been named the Vice President of the Garden Club in Greenbrier ; - )my neighborhood; in addition to my new work assignment for The John Hopkins Odyssey program in the fall teaching Beginner Digital Photography 1 and Beginner Digital Photography 2 in the continuing education program. I will be working on those class programs over the rest of the summer. The garden has been beautiful with the cool wet spring we have had, it is so green! Enjoy the flowers.