Day 280; Hickory Tree

Today we had a gorgeous sunset. Unfortunately, the best of it only lasted a couple minutes. Even though I didn't get any good sunset shots I did get this one of a hickory nut tree with an old shed in the background. I liked the lines and textures in the shot, so to pull those out I used black and white. I loved how the sky and remaining snow are so bright, and to balance that out I used vignetting.

Day 262; Cat's Eyes

The good news is we have cats again! We got two kittens last Sunday and the whole family is enjoying having some house pets for a change. The bad news is the cats don't like being photographed. At all. They refuse to sit still and hide when they see the camera coming. I finally got this shot which came out of the camera blurry, boring, and downright bad. With some editing I wanted to make a very unconventional, artsy shot. I cropped to a more interesting angle, applied black and white effects, then did an HDR effect which made the photo look somewhat like a sketch. I'm going to keep working on it, and hopefully I'll get some really good cat photos taken in the future.

Day 248; The Silver Butterflies

I like butterflies in real life, but don't like to wear them on jewelry or clothes or anything. Usually. But I do love this hair pin, even though I haven't been able to wear it for a long time since I cut my hair short. I put it on a light yellow pillowcase for today's shot. I really like the detail in the pin, and wanted to bring attention to that with a black and white filter. The Holga effect was a good fit for this shot, since it added some drama to the lighting which was otherwise somewhat flat.

"Well, I must endure the presence of a few caterpillars if I wish to become acquainted with the butterflies."
~Antoine de Saint-Exupéry, The Little Prince

Day 244; Beaded Bracelet

My county fair is just around the corner and I have been starting to put together my 4-H projects. Yesterday I finished this bracelet made from safety pins and glass beads, and have been working on the paperwork today. The beads are shades of blue and white which are very pretty in person, but not so much on camera. Thus, black and white was the direction I went in. I used a combination of a Holga and Infrared to get the look I wanted.

Day 238; Zebras

Zebras are one of my favorite animals. I love the great contrast between their black and white stripes, and highlighted it with a Holga effect just as I did last year after our trip to the zoo. To make sure the focus was on the zebra on the left I added a focal soften.

Day 221; Joy in the Dark

I think I'm going to try to do a series of all my brothers and sister in the same style in the dark. Here you see the oldest of my younger siblings, Joy. Again, it's not as good as the one of Noah, but I still think it was worth trying. Joy has similar coloring to Noah, so the faded holga effect turned out pretty well. Joy was wearing a dark shirt which covered her neck, so it looks like her head is floating in midair, which I don't really like.

Day 217; G On Canvas

The background for this photo is a painting of a rose my sister did on canvas. For the main subject I used a charm in the shape of a letter G which I bought years ago to wear hanging from my back brace. I haven't worn it in quite some time, but I saw it sitting on the shelf today and thought it would be a fun subject to shoot. I didn't like the yellows in the photo due to the lighting, so I used a black and white Holga effect from picmonkey.com which also enhanced some of the details in the canvas.

Day 213; Up the Cedar Tree

For this photo I wanted to emphasize the peeling texture of the bark on this cedar tree. I put my camera right up next to the tree and angled it up so you could see the trunk carrying up toward the sky. I also liked how this angle gave some different depths of field - closest to the camera which is out of focus, the middle ground which is in focus, and then farther out which is again out of focus. This angle showed the undersides of some of the pieces of bark as being quite orange, and each patch of color stuck out. To reduce this distraction, I applied a faded Holga effect to give a washed out look while still retaining some of the original color and depth.

Day 212; Stacked Bark

When I was out looking for subjects this afternoon I noticed the textured, bumpy bark of this tree. It looked almost like the ridges had been stacked on layer after layer. To really enhance the details I decided a black and white effect would be best, and I ended up layering infrared and holga to get the look I wanted.

Day 202; Sherman the Puppy

I'm so sorry I haven't posted for so long - life distracted me. Since my last post I've turned 16 in addition to my regular obligations for school and 4-H. Not to mention we've still been sick. In any event, I haven't been posting and now I'm going to change that. Today's photo is of Sherman, one of the three puppies we're the proud owners of. This photo was actually taken a few days ago, and the puppies have all grown a lot since then. I used the Holga effect from picmonkey.com to give a more artistic look to this snapshot, mostly because I didn't care for the red color of the coat in the background. I didn't realize until I took this picture with a flash how shiny the puppies' coats are.

Day 196

This old barn isn't really used for anything anymore and is really falling apart, but it still looks pretty neat in photos with the unique topline. I don't like the mass of weeds cluttering up the right side of the frame, but there wasn't much I could do about that. I used the Holga effect to add an older feel.

Day 195

Today I'm going to keep it short and sweet - it's cold outside, I'm still pretty sick, and there's snow everywhere. This is a landscape of a field and the woods behind it. I liked the one tree that stood out and was taller than all the rest. I added the Holga effect because the blue snow and sky didn't look very nice with the brown weeds and trees.

Day 193

We're in the midst of a snowstorm at the moment with snow falling from the sky in ridiculously large quantities. I braved these wintery conditions to see if I could get any good shots and the short answer is - no. With the snow falling between the lens and any subjects landscapes were blurry and indiscernible. The thick, even layer of snow covered up most potential macro shots. Finally I discovered this portion of a wooden fence sticking up out of the snow and I thought the pictures ended up looking pretty neat. I used a flash to reveal some of the detail of the already fallen snow, and it picked up on some of the flakes still in the sky which accounts for some of the round lights scattered across the photo. I knew I wanted the photo to be black and white because the flash had given a really yellow tint. I settled on a Holga effect from picmonkey.com because I liked how it really added to the dramatic aspect of the photo.

Day 156

Snow on a wooden plank I found outside yesterday morning. I love the contrast between the dark, rough wood and the white, grainy snow.

Day 139

For school I am currently reading "The Adventures of Huckleberry Finn." For those of you who don't know, it is about a boy who lives on a raft on the Mississippi River with a run away slave named Jim. To show my understanding of the novel I will be making a creative project featuring photos I take. Today I took my little brother to portray Huck and got some shots in the river. I also got this shot for today's post. I cropped it down to give a more dramatic view, and added a faded Holga effect to add age and artistic quality to the image.

Day 112

Today's photo is of a weeping willow tree and a bench by the pond at the house of one of my mom's friends. I applied the Holga effect but faded it so the original colors were just subdued. I loved the ripples and reflection from the pond and the elegant, draping quality of the branches.

Day 98

This morning I was with my brothers and sister waiting for my mom to pick us up, and I decided to use the time to take some pictures of the giant ragweed that grows around my house. I love taking macro images of plants because there is so much detail to capture. I liked the Holga effect on this picture because it decreases the noise and adds an air of elegance or refinement.

Day 32

I went back to that bridge construction site today. I got this kind of abstract photo of 3 cranes in the sky. I added the Holga effect.

Day 30

Last night I was about to trow out two black boxes that a hair brush kit came in, when I thought they might make a good background for a photo. I put this buckle bracelet on one and set the other up as a backdrop. The lighting was the light from the ceiling fan in my room.  I used the Holga effect.

Day 24

The snow has been coming down like crazy all yesterday and so far today.  This is a fence along the side of the pen where I keep my pigs. The fence has become covered in these vines. I added the Holga effect to this photo, I don't know why, but I've been using that effect a lot lately.