Going Swimming

This photo of my granddaughter, was taken by my daughter-in-law, Krissy Hemphill, while camping this month. I loved it because of the way the light casts a glow around the cute little curly-headed blond! I asked for a copy of it because I want to include it in the yearly scrapbook I make for each granddaughter. I added a texture overlay and used a mask to frame the page.

Oregon Coast Beauty

This weekend I have the privilege of hanging out on the beautiful Oregon Coast. It is one of those perfect weekends with lots of sun, no wind and gorgeous scenery. I grew up spending many a summer weekend playing in the sand and walking along looking for treasures left by the sea. I never seem to grow tired of the rugged beauty of the rocks and water in this ever-changing landscape.
My goal today was to capture a shot of the typical beautiful water and waves as well as some of the easily over-looked details at my feet. I enjoy the challenge of searching out special textures and shapes in ordinary places and then playing with them a bit in Photoshop to see if I can make a picture that pleases me.

I loved the way the wet rocks in the foreground shone in the morning sun. The tiny dots in the surf, by the way are surfers! There were very few waves this morning, but there were about twenty or so hardy people in wet suits out there!

These are a few of the many photos I took of the details I began to see as I looked more closely around me. I love the driftwood 'bear'! I took a lot of feather pictures and hope to be able to organize them into a pleasing collage of some sort. The shell picture was one of a series that I took while experimenting with depth of field. It actually turned out the way I hoped it would!

Dead Leaves- Blah to Beautiful

I spent a lot of time trying to decide how to begin this blog. Which picture should I use? How much should I share? Would anyone care? I finally decided to just jump in and share what I am working on and tell a little about what I did to create the finished project.
This photo was taken earlier this week while I was out walking in my neighborhood. The leaves were hanging over a fence and I loved the texture of them and their simplicity. As you will see in the following description of my process, they were hanging against a purple fence. I felt that the color really distracted from the texture that attracted me to them in the first place, so this ended up being a tinted black and white project. I also just began playing with a new Photoshop filter called  Fractalius. I use it very lightly, but I love the texture it adds.

I love the way this turned out!