Pretty Rocks

These pics are from a trip up north on Saturday. It turned out to be a pretty good day to test out some of my new gear.... an 18-135mm lens & a fong puffer. The pics on this post are mostly benchmark pics; ones that I didn't spend too much time editing, and are mostly for comparisons rather than print-out-and-add-to-the-portfolio pieces.

that being said....

decomposition

What unique find: a leaf showing the natural cycle of life and death. This pic involved getting on the ground & I was able to use the extended focal length to macro-ish up this leaf. I did, though, use a generous amount of photoshop on this one. I bumped up the contrast to make the leaf stand out more, and then increased the saturation to bring the green back to the grass.

18-50-135, eh?

I wanted to see what the lens could do, so I stood in the same spot and took pictures at 18mm, 50-ishmm, and 135 mm, respectively. My old lens was an 18-55mm, so I was curious to see what the extended focal length would look like. I like it

p.s. yeah, yeah, yeah... I know my horizons are crummy. I'm not losing any sleep over 'em.

Oooh, pretty rocks

As we walked the riverbank, I was continually amazed by the colors of the rocks. They were so cool; shades of turquois, splashes of white, and odd shaped rocks with abstract designs were everywhere! I composed this one to maximize the depth of field and the flow of the rocks; I didn't notice the odd horizon until I was editing my pics at home. OH! And I did bump up the saturation in this pic to be able to see those gorgeous rocks.

Fun with editing

At this point, I am laughing at my intro, because I started off with "oh, no, not me, I didn't edit these things..." and yet, as I describe all the pics I am recalling more & more edits. Sigh.

These two pics are an example of what I do when I edit. The first pic is unedited and the bottom one is the same image, edited msg style. (Although, you have to admit; the editing IS rather simple still, huh? msg yo, msg). I was in love with the clouds on Saturday, and was happy to capture them.

Puffer test

For this set of pics, I wanted to compare an image with out flash with a puffered flash. Shoot, I should have taken one with a regular flash for an even better comparison. Next time. The first one is without any flash, the middle one is puffered, and the bottom one was just one that I goofed around in photoshop with because I liked the design of the rock.

Lucky

As my friend Del and I were standing on the beach, a plane flew over us. We both had the same thought.... A tour of Skagit from the air? Man, those people are lucky. I managed to defy the rules of shooting into the sun & snap this pic. And yes, yes I did do some editing. Thankfully, photoshop fill-light brightened up the pic a bit so the river & hillside weren't totally dark. or totally jun.



Spring!

Since Saturday was the official second day of spring, I was on the lookout for buds. This shot here is one of those last-look moments when you've put your gear away and called it a day. Sadly, though, my autofocus was having trouble with the tiny bud. I used manual focus for this, but wish it was little bit sharper. OH! and I used my flashy fong puffer to bring some light to the shot; we were nearing sundown in a shady forest. Not so much light.

And there you go, my first photo shoot for Spring 2009! It was a lovely day. Thank you for checking out my pics, especially since this group was all about learning, so my composition and artistic elements took second-stage to the technical stuff.