Giving the Lilacs Some Love

The kids were the focus of my last post, here are the few lilac shots I snagged in between takes with the girls!  So beautiful!

Lilac Shoot

Took Teagan to the park to get some photos with the lilacs in full bloom.  She was a semi-cooperative model.  Not quite the nice bokeh shots I love but with a moving toddler its hard enough to get her in focus even with a deeper DOF!  The second shot is my favorite.  Also below are some photos of the lovely Miss Evelyn, including some backlighting shots - you can almost feel the warmth of the day through the photos!!!  As always, settings available upon request.  Shot with a combo of 35mm f2 and 24-70 f2.8L lenses.

Edit Challenge - from the archive

I dug some old favorites out of the archive to do some practice editing.  Plus it's always fun to revisit this cute face and remember all the stages Teagan has been through.  I wont post all of the post processing steps but if you want to know what I did to a specific photo just ask and I will try to remember!  :)

~3 Months

Original:

Color Edit:

B&W Edit:

Fresh out of the womb....

Original:

B&W Edit: 

(no color edit for this one - I wasnt happy with the white balance and couldn't quite get it to look how I wanted, but I think the B&W looks pretty good)

One Year Portraits

Original:

Edit:

A Single Candle Burns Bright

I took this photo for a special project - a special family in need of a little inspiration.  I hope it helps!

“Life is not a flicker of a candle, but a splendid torch that I have taken hold of for the moment." 

~ Author Unknown

Canon 20D, Canon 35mm f2

f2.2, 1/160, ISO 100, tripod mount

Edit challenge take 2

There looked like a nice difference between my edits on this photo yesterday.  Then I looked at my blog from my laptop and saw NO difference!  So, I took what I did and gave it a little more boost in the hue/saturation layer adjust. Now I think it pops a little more.  What do you think?

Original:

Edit:

Edit Challenge

A friend sent me some special photos and I wanted to see how I could enhance them in PSE.  I have some more playing to do, but here is my initial attempt.

Original:

Edit:

Edit steps - did hue/saturation adjust, upping master (+10), yellow(+10), green(+10), blue(+15) and cyan(+15), then curves adjustment although I forget what my final version was, I think I adjusted midtone contrast and upped shadows a little for a more moody effect.  Then finished off with noise reduction filter and unsharp mask.  The before and after isn't very dramatic, but it does make the sunset pop a little I think.

Original:

Edit:

Edit steps - did hue/saturation adjust, upping master (+15), yellow(+10), green(+10), blue(+15) and cyan(+15), then curves adjustment.  Also used the straighten tool to straighten the horizon just a tad. Then like above, finished off with noise reduction filter and unsharp mask.  The before and after is a little more dramatic than the first 

Sharp!

This lens is sharp!  This is a ~100% crop of the eyes, they are tack sharp.  It also shows the beauty of the speedlite, bounced off the ceiling/walls gives great catch lights and a wonderfully exposed photo.   Of course, the Aunt standing behind me was blinded but a small sacrifice for such a gorgeous photo :)

Canon 20D, Canon 35mm f2

f4, 1/50, ISO 100, speedlite