Color correction

I really enjoyed this week's assignment... I've been trying different things in Photoshop to familiarize myself with the different tools and I'm getting more comfortable with it. I know there is much more to learn, but it's a good start. In this first set of photos I used the Color Replacement tool and changed the color of the train from red to green. I also used the Shadow/Highlight to bring some of the detail in the blackness (upper right in the photo) and added some light with the Brightness/Contrast. I had to try this a couple of times, but I like the outcome.





























The second set shows a photo of me taken without the flash in which my face came out really dark. I applied the Shadows/Highlight tool and was able to brighten up my face. I adjusted the Highlights, Midtones and Shadows individually and was really pleased because not only was I able to bring light to my face and clothing, I also changed some of the landscape in the background. The clouds in the sky and the mountains in the far back are a little more defined, same with the green in the grass and trees.

Photomosaic

I love Photomosaics... I have actually put together mosaics before with a program I downloaded from the Internet (it might even be the one Karen suggested, it looks familiar). I did this after a trip to Europe a couple of years ago, where I took tons of pictures and putting them in a mosaic seemed like a really cool idea. Looking at them now I feel like they may need a little more work (some of the pictures are too bright and they don't blend well), but at the time I though they were great. I will probably make a couple with the pictures I took for this class. I attached one mosaic here and will be posting some of the other ones on my Flickr page:
http://www.flickr.com/photos/alinar/
:)

Photoshop tools

I apologize for posting this week's assignment so late, but I was out of town for a few days and had lots of homework waiting for me when I came back. And the fact that I spent almost an entire day going through the chapters in the Photoshop book. 

I have to say this assignment has been the most difficult and frustrating yet... going through the exercises was not easy when some of the photos that I needed to use were missing. Anyway, these two photos show the use of the cropping tool. In the first photo, I captured another rock on the waterfront which was left out of focus and looks like it does not belong in there (it's distracting the eye). By cropping the bottom section I was able to clean up the image and keep only the blueish colors. I also resized the picture from 9 to 3 megs.

For the second manipulated photo I took the butterfly from the first picture and placed it in a second one. My intention was to place a seagull in the second photo could not find any seagulls in any of my photos so I just used the butterfly. I used the Lasso tool to select the butterfly, the Move tool to move it and then played with the seize and position until I found the current placement to my liking. When I selected the butterfly in the first photo I could not help getting some of the background as well, and to remove that I used a soft brush with 0% opacity.

That's about all I did to combine these two photos. It was definitely a learning experience. :)

Fall Landscapes

I love fall in Vermont! Everywhere you go, you are surrounded by the amazing fall colors and scenery. The assignment for this week was a pleasure to complete, although, composing and taking the pictures is not as easy as observing the landscape. I had the most difficulty with choosing what to capture. Yes, there are plenty of great places around, but I wanted to include as much as possible in my photos. Only after seeing the pictures on my computer at home did I realize that I was going too far. However, I did manage to get some less "cluttered" shots (I think), which I posted here.

I have also posted some of my other photos on Flickr... http://www.flickr.com/photos/alinar/
or you can see them in the little slideshow I have on the lower right of the page.

Framing

Rule of thirds

When using the rule of thirds for this week's assignment I realized that I was putting more and more thought into composing my photos and thinking about the aesthetics of it. What will everyone else will see in the photo, and will I be able capture what my eye and mind were already composing in my head?

It was a great experience to go through and I think the result is similar with what I was expecting. I have to admit in the first picture I really like how the shadows play out. I'm not sure why the same shadows did not appear in the second, but overall it is more pleasing. I think by using the rule of thirds in this instance the eye is not focused on the single screw, but on the lines formed by the wood as well. I also like the fact that there is a play of geometric figures, circles, star and the vertical lines.

Rules are meant to be broken

For the first assignment I decided to research photo composition. The internet is abundant with articles and tutorials on how to compose the best picture. The Rule of Thirds and the Golden Ratio are among the most recognized guidelines for composing better photos, but there are others to be mentioned like framing, foreground and background, line of sight, cropping.

"In its simplest definition, a composition is a combination, or arrangement, of elements. A photographic composition is the arrangement of visual elements and as such is the product of a photographer's vision and their skill in seeing, identifying, arranging, and framing the finished image. This is a clearly distinct skill from those necessary to successfully operate a camera or calculate exposure."
http://www.naturephotographers.net/np101/gt0804-1.html

The above link I believe is interesting in the fact that although it focuses on landscape composition, it touches on the main guidelines, which can be applied in all instances of of photo composition.