Day 307; Abby on the Pond

I am pleased to announce that I will be spending the summer working as a camp counselor. We started our training period this week, and it's been so fun and I'm so excited for campers to get here. My camp nickname is Grapes, and my roommate's nickname is Jelly. Jelly made awesome flower crowns for myself and Abby, who is the subject of today's photo. I won't have a lot of time for photos and editing while I'm here, but when I do take photos they turn out really well because the camp is beautiful. Here, Abby is pictured looking out over our pond. I liked the angle of her head because it draws your eye across the frame. I also loved the reflection of the trees onto the water and the textures of the leaves, water, and her hair.

Day 306; The Wall

One of the most enjoyable and most uniquely "camp" experiences at the Iowa 4-H Camp is the climbing wall. I've attempted it a couple times, but I enjoy climbing the wall much less than I enjoy watching others do so. This weekend, armed with a camera, I sat with other chaperones under a tree and watched several campers reach varying heights on the wall. I wanted to get a more interesting action shot, but this particular group was very cautious, and I can't really blame them. Even though it wasn't exactly the composition I wanted, I really liked the lighting and colors of this image. The colors in the camper's outfit pull out the blue of the sky and the hand holds, in addition to making her pop from the brown of the wall.

Day 301; Rust and Snow

I took this photo a few days ago after we'd received a light dusting of snow. Today, temperatures rose to 65℉ and it felt like spring for the first time. To get this photo, I put my camera down into a large, rusty basin sitting out in our yard. The bottom had rusted out so that I could see the ground on the other side, and the combination of snow and rusted edges lent a nice contrast of texture and color to the image. For editing, I cropped the original down to the area I wanted to focus on, and adjusted the exposure to best represent the white of the snow and the shadows on the sides of the basin.

Day 287; Ordinary Orchid

My great grandfather passed away last week. I went to the funeral on Monday. My mom and I brought home these beautiful orchids which were red and yellow, which are the colors of Iowa State University, which happened to be where he went to college. I loved the colors, but after being in the car on the way home the flowers kind of wilted and turned brown. So, I decided to make the photo black and white. This also had the added benefit of drawing attention to the texture and structure of the flower.

Day 274; Colors of Cards

 Late last night I got back from spending a week in Texas for the national rabbit convention. Next week I'm leaving again for Florida, so I won't be posting much this month. I wish I could post more, but I'm not sorry I'll be in Florida while my hometown is forecasting highs in the 30's with snow this week. The subjects of today's post are a bunch of thank you notes and envelopes which were in a box on my desk. I loved the lines and texture which you typically don't associate with such bright colors. I liked the shorter, longer crop as it helped make the vertical lines less overwhelming.

Day 261; Into the Void

I'm switching back to color today with this shot into a bright pink cup with convex spots on the sides. I loved the color of the cup and the interest the dots provided. I had tried taking pictures of the shadow and of the sides of the cup, but it turned out that I liked this angle directly above the cup the most. I was shining a small light through one side to get a more dramatic lighting pattern than the standard overhead light provided. I used slight vignetting to draw the eye into the center of the cup and away from the edges.

Day 240; Inside the Iris

Irises are a very popular type of flower where I'm from. My mom has some bearded irises which are blooming right now. I take pictures of them every year, but wanted to try something a little different today. I turned the camera to get a different angle and zoomed in on the inner portion of the blossom. I altered the saturation and exposure slightly to truly represent the brilliance of color I saw in real life which didn't necessarily transfer to the lens.

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 216; Down the Elevator

I didn't have all that much time to shoot today as I was preparing for some interviews I have tomorrow in Ames in addition to my regular school work. I did find time to edit this shot of an elevator which has been sitting out in the hay field for forever. Some of you may recognise it from a photo I posted last year (Day 20). I think This rendition is better, with a more focused angle and better lighting. To enhance the colors already present I applied a slight Dusk effect.

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 194

Sorry I haven't posted in the past couple days, but the whole family has been super sick. I finally seem to have started getting better, or at least I'm well enough to work on photography. I had my brother Elijah with me, and we went outside to get a few portraits. I'm not sure exactly what this pose is all about, but when I'm working with Elijah I usually just let him stand or sit however he wants to. In this case, he opted for a sort of squatting position with his arms folded across his body. Now, I'm not the biggest fan of the color red. But that's what color Elijah was wearing and I actually really liked it against the bright white snow. I added some vignetting around the edges to give a kind of ultra modern look to the portrait.

Day 153

My brothers got together a pile of firewood last weekend because they were hoping to have a campfire. Unfortunately, it was too windy and damp to have one, so the pile of logs is still sitting there. Yesterday I noticed this log which had a lot of small, strange green things growing on it. I liked the colors and strange textures in the image. 

Day 143

My horse Thalia is the most beautiful creature I have ever seen. Even if she is slightly fat, the ins and outs of her body never cease to amaze me. Today's photo is a macro of her mouth and nose, which are very different from our own and extremely fascinating. I did not edit this photo, as I loved the natural colors and lighting already displayed.

Day 137

Today's set up is very similar to yesterday's, the only real change is the subject. This is a piece of modelling clay that I formed into a round disk and then pushed against a fireproof safe that had this cool squiggly line pattern. I really liked the contrast of the random, round lines in the clay and the straight lines in the book's cover I used as the background. Editing also was much the same, a slight Orton effect and then black and white.

Day 126

This photo is a macro of a leather armchair. Today while sitting in said chair I was struck by the tiny lines and wrinkles the leather was comprised of. So I wanted til this afternoon when the natural light coming through the nearby window was at an angle more parallel to the seat of the chair to produce the lighting pattern shown here. I love the bright white highlights mixed with the deep black shadows in the wrinkles and how there are all the tones in between. I only wish the foreground that is out of focus was slightly smaller so the in focus area was larger, but then again that may have been too busy. 

Day 125

This is a macro of a foxtail plant growing my yard this taken this morning. I love the golden and green color scheme, and the lines and focus on the plant. In the original image the entire head of the plant was showing, but I decided to crop it to give a more artistic and interesting look.

Day 123

This morning I'm posting this photo of the face of a immature sunflower that I took last Friday at my grandfather's house. I love the round lines and symmetry in this photo. I focused on the center of the flower, leaving the front of the photo out of focus to draw the eye into the image. I like the little specks of water, and especially like the dark shadows in the part of the flower nearest to the camera.

Day 118

When I was taking this photo I wanted to capture the incredible detail in this one tiny little leaf on a Cottonwood tree in my yard. When editing, I applied very faint dark edges to accent the shadows in the leaf.

Day 115

Since school is starting up again I thought that today I would post a photo of a familiar back-to-school item: spiral notebooks. For this photo I stacked several notebooks on top of one another then maneuvered them so that each ring was catching the overhead light. I used this angle so that the eye was drawn back into the photo, and also for the interesting depth of field with the subject becoming out of focus the farther into the photo you go. Since the notebooks were all different colors I opted to make the photo black and white so the focus was more on the lines and details of the photo than on the colors.

Day 111

This morning we got quite a bit of rain. I went out to get some early morning shots, and found myself continually drawn to my mom's tiger lillies. I loved the reflective quality of the water droplets and the bright orange color of the flower.