Day 17: Pine Cones

Before:


Manual setting; f/5.6; exp. 1/60; ISO 400; shade; at 112 mm on 8-135mm lens

After:



I just cropped it in slightly, adjusted levels slightly. Then I select out the background and gave it a slight gaussian blur, and that's it. This was shot indoors, by the doorway, so quite a bit of light was coming in. I wanted to shoot in manual, but thought it still come out somewhat overexposed even when the meter said "OK."

Thanks for all the feedback on yesterday's posts! I really appreciate it! The photos I get right now of my children can be few and far between, and getting your opinions on the treatment of the photos is very helpful!

Day 16: POTD

Photos from Day 15:

Photo # 1


Today, I'm going to repeat a little from yesterday. Some commented that they actually liked the background of the first photo better than the 2nd, IF it was cropped in like the 2nd. I thought I'd give this a try, with a poll attached to my blog. So please vote for photo number 1, with the REAL background, versus photo number 2, with the background from a different restaurant. Thanks for playing along.
Photo # 2



Photos for Day 16:
And now here's my photos for today, Day 16: A lovely ND shelter belt
I shot these from a moving car at 70mph, through the windshield, with a polarizing filter and my 18-135 mm lens at 52mm, in Aperture Mode, wb cloudy, f/11.0; ISO 800, exp 400.
Before:


And here's my after, with levels adjusted, and a light amount of sharpening:



And finally, in the next post I included a video clip that I really like for explaining layers, and some instructions I wrote for working with layers.

Layers Mask Video

This is my all time favorite layers mask video, by Keith Davis! It's extremely helpful, moves along rapidly, explains 4 different techniques. It's well worth watching more than once, and I find myself referring back to it from time to time.



A few things to remember in working with masks in PSE5:

FIRST, duplicate your original photo. When I refer to "first" photo, I mean the one you're willing to work on and modify, never, ever, your real, original, do-not-want to mess with original photo.
1. You work in the layers pallette. Click on the layer (or photo) you are going to make a mask for. Create an adjustment layer, like "levels." Don't do anything to the levels, just click "ok."

2.Above this adjustment layer, put the NEW background or thing you want to bring into your photo. Now you have 3 layers visible(beyond your background); the top NEW thing, middle adjustment layer with 2 little squares, the bottom first photo or layer.

3.Click letter "d" to change background colors to Black and White. Make black the foreground.

4. Select the adjustment layer with 2 little boxes. Click ctrl>i to fill your right little box with white.

5. Now select your adjustment layer with 2 boxes, but hover your cursor IN BETWEEN the two layers, above the adjustment layer, under the New (top) layer,WHILE HOLDING DOWN the ALT key, until a little weird ball-type thing appears. When it appears, LEFT Click. Your top layer will step aside to the right, with a little arrow pointing down at your adjustment layer (mask). In fact, visible in your work space should now be your FIRST (bottom) photo, not your NEW (top) layer. Your adjustment layer (Mask) is like a window, blocking out your top layer. It's all filled with black; you can't see through a black window. But you can see through a white window, and let the top layer show through like magic!

6. Change your foreground color to white. Select the brush tool. Select your adjustment layer (MASK), (layer with two boxes), and paint with your brush on your photo. You are now letting the very top layer become visible in just the sections you want.

All this sounds much more complicated than it is! Give it a try! If you have questions, leave them for me in the comments!

OScraps Paint the Moon freebie!

Jofia Devoe paper and ephemerals; AManning Come Paint the Moon kit; frayed muslin One Haute Momma-Jen Wilson; font-Lucinda handwriting, dwd-Rhonda grungy corners

There's a wonderful new challenge over at Oscraps.com. This week, Ann Manning has a beautiful free kit, Paint the Moon, available, with a layout challenge. I used it for the layout above, and will probably also use it later this week for the LayOut a Day challenge. Lisa at Lexicam has a totally awesome layout using this kit on her blog; mine doesn't hold a candle to the artistic beauty and creativity in hers! On the right side of her blog is a link to her gallery. Prepare to be awestruck!

I'm very excited that I got to sign up for the Jessica Sprague "Now We're Rockin'" digiscrapping class that starts Feb 11th! Hopefully, it'll inspire me to consider some new directions in my layouts!

And another thing I want to point out today is my all-new Weather Pixie. Dawn pointed me in the direction of the little, fashionably dressed, pixies! Now all my Dear Readers can be green with envy of the Grand Forks weather! Today we're boasting a balmy - 32 degree windchill! Now THAT's something to sneeze about!

Day 15: LayOut a Day

KissedTemplate 12
CRenae Art Fusion papers
dwd Rhonna distressed paint
jbolt delightinphoto stamps

I so enjoyed Scott being home for a visit for about 5 days. We hadn't seen him in 1 1/2 years; it's not that we don't like him, or anything like that--it's that he's stationed in Japan in the Navy. As I mention in the journaling for this, I caught Scott by surprise; he usually smiles much more readily, but I did like the slightly edgy, urban look of this photo. I added some grungy stamps to the layout.

Day 13: Layout a Day

Moriginals template #7
Meredith Fenwick Posh Crazy Beautiful

This is my 13th layout for the LayOut a Day challenge at www.bigpicturescrapbooking.com. I'm gradually working my way through photos from a trip we took to Alaska this past summer. In Ketchikan, we took a float plane ride over the Tongass Forest. I'm the kind of person who really prefers to keep my feet on the ground. Large planes don't bother me, but I'm not fond of ferris wheels or small little planes or things that might require good human competence to keep me alive. It's just that I know how many errors I might make in just plain old proof reading a post! What about dangerous stuff? I blame it on my middle son; he got me to watch "When Good Times Go Bad" with him years ago on TV. And those little books about things like "How to Survive a Shark Attack," . . . they're just unnerving! (If I could just run a nice little mental status evaluation on the ski lift operator, or find out about drinking behavior the night before) things might be easier. I did feel a bit compelled to follow this line of thinking once with the anesthesiologist before my husband's knee surger, but hey! You would too! He was wearing a bandana!

Anyway, I did go on a float plane ride with my family in Alaska and it was phenomenal! I think this should be a required experience for everyone, like one of the "A Thousand Places to see before you Die' book, but let's not mix death into this. . .

A Tagging Game. . .

First, here is my photo for today for POTD at Angela's Corner

And now, I'll tell you about having been tagged by Dawn and what this means...so I went over to her blog and here we go:

You've been tagged: The rules of the game:
• Link to the person that tagged you and post the rules on your blog.
• Share 7 random and/or weird facts about yourself on your blog, we all want to know them.
• Tag 7 random people at the end of your post and include links to their blogs.
• Let each person know that they have been tagged by leaving a comment on their blog.

Seven facts about myself, or perhaps, "opinions", should the truth be known:

1. As addicted to reading as I have been in my life, it's suddenly taken a back-seat to some of my other interests: like my Nikon D40, digiscrapping, and a lively community of people who share cool knowledge and interests.

2. I live on a frozen tundra. Some call it a state (ND). It's bleak, treeless (OK, except for the one in the photo above), cold, and very rural. But it weirdly gets in your blood. . .It sneaks up on you when you accidentally move here, and before you know it, you're meeting the love of your life, raising 3 wonderful kids, getting rooted in a community of very fine people, making fun of our state with the best of them, and the years fly by . . .

3. I still love to read!!! My SIL introduced me to the Stephanie Plum series last year by Janet Evanovich and she is truly laugh out-loud funny, but definitely NOT any kind of literature. I am strangely fond of Stephen King novels, particularly the odd ones in which he seems to pit good against evil. I have a disturbing weakness for Dummies books. You know, Dogs for Dummies, Blogging for Dummies, Brain Surgery for Dummies. I love the way nuggets of information get broken down into readily absorbable pieces.

4. I can get lost in a paper bag and have the worse sense of direction, and, you guessed it! I tend to be the family navigator. With a map, I can find it, and I really like maps. I also carry a compass in my purse, just in case. (Along with my D40, ouch! that's heavy!)

5. Traveling fascinates me. I've not done enough of it, and hope to someday live much closer to an airport!

6. I really like gadgets. Why everyone doesn't carry a palm pilot around with them just baffles me. The search function alone is worth every ounce of extra weight in your purse. This is how you can figure out exactly when you middle child had a tetanus shot when you get called on your cell phone at 2 am while you're out on a business trip.

7. I have Bose noise cancelling headphones and believe these should be heralded as marriage savers! I hate the sound of football. I just totally dislike the background noise of people screaming (unless it's in a Stephen King movie.) Now I can listen to music on my headphones, digiscrap, sitting next to my DH on the couch, while he watches all the football he wants! Works for me.

so here are the seven i have tagged:
lexicam
heather
lisa
Verona
tablefor6
latz

The last 3 were invited to participate through a thread at www.jessicasprague.com

Photo of the Day posts from days 1-8

It's been a while since I've posted here, partly because I've been
having so much fun over at my other blog, Angela's Corner . That is
where I've been adding posts forthe Photo of the Day challenge
for 2008, sponsored by twopeasinabucket.com. (Using one blog for
photos, and one for digiscrapping is an aftificial division at best,
but I'll use it for awhile to see what will work best for me.) The
POTD thread is a wonderfully active thread, and is really pushing
me to keep using my camera, learning what its capabilities are and
I find that it is really changing the way I look at the world. I'm
noticing framing, color, facial expressions all in a way that is very
different than before. Yesterday's photo was the one of my daughter,
and she has a slightly foreboding smile, but she's softening up to the
idea that letting me take her picture isn't such a big deal after all.
She was horrified, however, to discover that I have 3 blogs! I'm
quite intent, right now, on taking as many photos as possible, because
Scott is home visiting, and this is the first time I've seen him in 1 1/2
years, ever since he left for Japan with the Navy.

And one I like better!

Rhonna Farrer 2peas New Years stamps; Angie Briggs quotes and paper; champignon font

2008!

It's official! My first post of 2008! This is a very odd picture of Christmas lights strung around a sculpture in a small garden in our downtown area. Earlier tonight, I went looking for the ice sculpture to take pictures, and was very disappointed by how puny and pathetic they were. My husband suggested we go look at these instead, and these were much more interesting! Odd, but interesting.