Photo Fun Day 1:

I saw a friend doing this on a blog and thought I wanted to try.  Basically I am bored, and need something to focus on!  She had it all mapped out to do in February and to do 1 photo a day for 29 days.  Well, it is March, so I missed out on that.  Plus, I can't commit to taking a picture a day so my Photo Fun may drag on for a while.

Day 1:  Your view today.
Today, I watched Jordyn without her noticing me for about 5 minutes.  She cracks me up.  She is so meticulous about things.  She sees and notices details in everything.  She knows when her diapers are not stacked nicely in her baskets.  Before sitting on my lap, she gets a sippy, then her blankie, then her puppy, and only then will she let me pick her up.  She knows she needs her things.  She is not ok if her jackets come unzipped, or if the velcro on her shoes comes undone.  Basically, she knows how things should be and she wants them that way.  Today I as watched her, she was moving her ABC magnets from the fridge, to the dishwasher, and back.  As she  moved them, she put them in lines and when was as long as it could get, she made a new line.  She knew how she wanted the magnets to be.  Very particular.  I love that this gets to be my view today; her work, her little particulates coming out through magnets on my fridge.

Proud Moment

This post has nothing to do with photos, and everything to do with photoshop.  I have been a freakin photoshop maniac this week.  I got this project in my head and it just kind of spiraled.  It started when I wanted to make a family book for Jordyn so she could know her cousins.  I hi-jacked some photos off blogs and facebook and put their names on them, then but them in little cheap photo album.  She likes it I guess.  Then one day I was trying to do animal sounds with her and she was so not interested.  I thought to myself that I need to get her an animal book.  Then I thought, I should make one!  And I did!  I copied a whole bunch of animal clip art online.  One thing I learned was to look for png files because they are already cropped if that makes sense.  They aren't copied in a square box, they are copied in shape.  Then came the photoshop.  I learned so much from this project.  I did so much with backgrounds, frames, graphics, text and fonts, and all in layers,  It was a HUGE learning process.  But after the first few cards it was all routine and the hardest part was thinking of animals and matching sounds.  Here is just a sample of my favorite one.

I belong to a facebook group called 'Mommy Talk' and told them I would post some printables.  I need to print them off myself first and make sure they come out ok.  It makes me nervous though.  Sharing stuff.  It is good enough for me, but is it good enough for others?  My standards might be lower than the general public.

On another note, does anyone read this blog?  If so, you should leave a comment so I know!

It don't matter if your black or white.

Sometimes I think black and white solves everything.  I wanted to take a picture of Jordyn to put on a valentines day card to send to family.  And as I have expressed, I have such a hard time taking pictures indoors with lighting.  I took these during the day with all the curtains open in the room in hopes that I would not have to use a flash, and I didn't!  I also have an issue with backdrops.  For some reason I always think I need some kind of prop or backdrop or something to give character to the scene.  But I got lazy with these and just put her on the blanket chest against a plain old wall.  And I am so glad for my laziness!  I love the simplicity in these pictures.  I love the the black and white pulls the focus to Jordyn and the great smiles she was having that afternoon!  When taking these, I had the aperture as open as I could get it to let enough light in, while still keeping a pretty quick flash.  Some turned out blurry because of it, but some turned out great!  In editing, I really exaggerated the light/dark contrast before I put it in black and white.  Then I added a teeny tiny bit of a glow.

This is her "whoa" face.  She his this high pitch little "whoa" while she raises her eyebrows and purses her lips.  She saw the garbage truck drive by and was absolutely amazed.  Glad I caught it!

Side note:  I printed these and realized a few things.  1.  It is very beneficial to print quickly while I can remember the photography and editing process I went through.  I usually wait and I was quicker with this one.  2.  These looked a lot grainer printed than they did on my computer.  I remember having the graininess set high, but it did not seem to look like anything on screen.  In print, I can see that it would have been better had I relaxed with the graininess.

Another version...

I like this one better because you can see the text a little more.

Tears!

Luckily this photo was taken outside so I did not have to deal with lighting so much, cause dealing with the kids was enough.  I feel bad cause this one focused on Dillon crying, but in truth, Jordyn, Porter, and Dillon all shed a fair share of tears during this little shoot.  Then top it off with Brooks showing off his rock and roll side and a few more grandkids to bored to look at the camera.  All in all, you have the makings of the average christmas family photo!

Christmas Pictures

These are the first pictures I have taken indoors for a long long time.  It sucked.  I had read a tutorial about how to take good photos of a christmas tree.  The trick is to leave the shutter open for a long time.  That is impossible with a 1 year old.  These 4 pictures are about the only ones without a blur.  Eventually, I just gave up and turned on the flash which completely washed out the tree.  With all of these, thankfully, a spotlight focused on the tree brightened up those lights and made the pictures with the flash turn out ok.  But oh boy, these were some frustrating pictures to take.

Another thing I had going against me here was the window.  In almost all of them, you can see a horrible reflection of the flash.  So, I did my best to copy a section of the window that was not destroyed by the flash and lay it on top of the flash invested mess.  Lucky for me, it turned out ok! 

Christmas Card

So, I have never altered a photo as much as I did this one.  I had my mom snap this when she was visiting us during thanksgiving.  I so wish I could take the picture and be in the picture at the same time to get it just how I want it.  It is just in our backyard against our fence.  To make it work with the card I had printed I reversed it.  Jordyn's face is pasted from another picture.  My face is pasted from another picture.  I added some light coming in from the right.  It played with it for days before I felt ok about it.  And still, I only feel ok about it.