Color Adjustments

Sorry the photos were supposed to be under each description but I added the descriptions first and photos second, not realizng that I couldn't move things around.  It figures I finally get the blogger to load my photos instead of Flickr this week... Enjoy!

For the photo of the kids, I "hand" colored the photo after making it a b&w.  To make turn it from a color photo to a b&w I went to Image > Adjustments > Black & White.  This allowed me to have more control over adjusting the reds, yellows, greens, cyans, and blues, which were all sliders in a dialogue box that opened.  I was also able to adjust the Tint if I wanted, which appeared that it turned the photo to sepia, but I did not make any adjustments, because as soon as I did the above it automatically turned the photo b&w, and I was happy with the instant results. From there I followed Karen's advice from the discussion board: selected the paint brush tool, Mode:Color and the proceeded to create what you see below.  I realize it isn't the prettiest "hand" coloring but I just wanted to play around with the tool, since I have been dying to try it, and never knew how.  It was fun, and my oldest daughter loves her purple streaks in her hair :)

For the photo of the view from Robert Frost's summer cabin, I wanted to play around with hue/saturation and color balance.  So first I went to Image > Adjustments > Hue/Saturation and settled on Hue: -6, Saturation: +54 (can you say POP), Lightness: -4.  I then went to Image > Adjustments > Color Balance and after trying different things I ended up with Cyan/Red +14, Magenta/Green +12, and Yellow/Blue +26. Oh yes and I also selected the sky using the magic wand, went to Replace Color and made the sky more like the blue that is in the right hand corner.  I only really know it was adjusted because I can now see a sun spot about dead center of the sky.  There was to much washout (I think) to turn the sky a real crazy popping blue, or I wasn't doing something right. 

Composites

I am not very good with the realistic compositing of photoshop yet.  So I went with the unrealistic route and ventured towards Halloween-ish ones, and just tried to have fun with the tools that I am so clumsy with.  The original photos follow my composited photos.

   

 Graveyard

 

Haunted House

 

Landscape

The photos I took were from the Breadloaf area in Ripton, including the summer cabin of Robert Frost, and some of the nearby cemetery.  After reading the MIT link information, I really liked the one about landscape as history, and this is what I tried to capture in my photos that I took that day.  So here are the four I narrowed it down to.

Framing Slideshow

Rule of Thirds

    

The off center photo of grapes seems to pop out at you more than the ones in the photo were they are centered, which gives them the 3D effect compared to the grapes in the first photo which look flat and 2 dimensional.  Also comparing the two photos the ones on the bottom look more "real", as if they were really there and not added later through photo manipulation.

 

In these photos the tree that is off centered puts it in relation to where it is and why it is sitting on rock no longer with dirt.  If only the first photo was posted you might not even realize that it is actually by the river. (These are photos of the river that was flooded back in August, much has changed on this river.  The flood photos are posted on Flickr.)  The tree in the second photo doesn't appear as lonely either, though I really do like the first photo because of the solitude.  This road that the river runs along is the main road to get off the mountain, and so I have been itching to get photos of this tree before winter comes and takes it down; today I accomplished two tasks at once.

 

Composition Technique

The web site that I found my information on was http://photoinfo.com/general/navy/photographic_composition_balance.htm

This particular article (and there are so many on a lot of photographic subjects that I bookmarked it for a later time and/or future reference) said, "The way you arrange the elements of a scene within in a picture, catch the viewer's attention, please the eye, or make a clear statement are all qualities of a good composition.  By developing photographic composition skills, you can produce photographs that suggest movement, life, depth, shape, and form, recreating the impact of the original scene."  The web site has 7 lessons (brief but informative) and an appendix that explains how the following principles and elements used can achieve a "pleasing" composition: center of interest, subject placement, simplicity, viewpoint and camera angle, balance, shapes and lines, pattern, volume, lighting, texture, tone, contrast, framing, foreground, background, and perspective.  I have read through them all, and decided to share what I learned.  Simplicity was very interesting because it mentioned a lot of the other elements to consider while composing a shot but stated, "The primary object is the reason the picture is being taken in the first place; therefore, all other elements should merely support and emphasize the main object. "  Another piece of good advice that I have picked up along the  way is while composing the photo in the view finder to look beyond the subject(s) to make sure nothing is growing from them off in the background.  For example,  Grandma is sitting by the beautiful apple tree peeling apples, but in the background there are two limbs that look as if Grandma has grown antlers.   It may not be obvious at the time because the focus was on how wonderful Grandma looked sitting by the apple tree full of apples.