Photos by DJ

Snap Shots Turned Good

I've been meaning to get out and do another shoot of the little guy here.  Everytime his mom and I schedule a shot date though, the weather goes crazy.  Yesterday we were at the Teacher Appreciation Luncheon and happened to snap some shots of the big guy--boy is he growing!  He's now nine months old; how time flies.  I was really surprised when I got home to find that most of the shots were not bad.  His expressions were just too precious!  I can't wait for when we can get this shoot done, of course wouldn't you know that when I mentioned doing it last night, today turned out to be just awful.

On this one, I was able to remove the bit of his mom's shirt and some of the background.  The lighting was really bad and I need to figure out how to compensate for mixed situations.  The room we were in had some strong flourescent lights, but then we were next to a large window as well.  Thank goodness for RAW.  I'm also practicing with textures too so played around with this picture to get this:

He's just too cute and really finding his personality.  Won't be too long before he's up and walking!

More Photoshop Fun: Actions

I've been on a roll this weekend and have gotten some chances to get out and shoot.  The weather has been gorgeous!  I've been playing more with the processing of my photos and trying out various actions and techniques.  I use Elements 5.0 and I know there are a lot of things that I can't do or know how to do, and that is where the actions are so fun.  As I sit there and watch the process though, it has helped me learn more too.  For the most part, I've been using EZ Actions by Photoblast.

These were from a Christmas shoot.  I got this one between poses and thought it was cute.  Yes, it was nearly Christmas here, but the fall colors were just gorgeous!

This next one is a photo from last year, shortly after we got our 50mm lens and I was playing with it using only the light of the lamp.  The colors weren't great, but I love how it looked in black and white:

I took our 100mm out on our walk in the hills today and I was determined to get some texture shots.  I've seen some really cool texture work lately, and I always enjoy the challenge of photo blending in my scrapbooking.

This one is a nice rock that I layered over the photo.

This one was a bit more challenging.  I used a photo of some leaves and changed the colors a bit.  One thing I LOVE about the 100mm is how sharp it is.  When I get the focus right I can zoom in so far and still have so much detail.  It makes it much easier when it comes to erasing and doing some touch up.

Finally, I got this shot this afternoon.  The little guy was bundled up in his stroller with a yellow canopy over him.  It took some trial and error to get the colors not so yellow, which is why I also did the black and white conversion.

If you zoom in a lot on this one, you can see my reflection in his eyes!  He's such a cutie. 

Newborn Update

The little guy I shot is now nearly six months old!  I did some photos at three months too and here are a couple of my favorites.  I can't wait to do another shoot as he's really coming into his features and and such a wonderful personality, just a real cutie!

Newborn Shoot

I finally got over to the newborn shoot today.  What fun, he's such a cutie and I can't wait to see him grow and take pictures along the way.  I was there about 45 minutes or so and took over 150 pictures!  Naturally, a lot of them just didn't work, but I had fun with settings and angles.  I'll probably be doing more this weekend.  But I'm really happy with the results so far.  These were all taken with natural light and a reflector.  Would love some CC please!