Before and After

I always appreciate when other photographers reveal how they processed their images, so I thought I’d briefly share how I processed one of the images we took tonight. Not that I’m an expert, but you never know what tips might help someone else. So, here’s the before (SOOC, straight out of the camera) and one of my final edits.

I had left the camera on Shutter Priority (should have been shooting full Manual) and this was right before we lost all daylight (on a very cloudy, rainy day). The original is underexposed and the color is too blue. This is what I did using Photoshop CS3:

- adjustment layers for Exposure, Contrast
- ran a Sharpening action (from Totally Rad)
- worked on color correcting her skin tone using CMYK values (in the Info palette), plotting individual points and using several curve adjustment layers to get the CMYK values in the correct proportion. (Method used by Chris Orwig in some of his Lynda.com training videos)
- created a new layer, blew out the exposure, inverted the layer mask, painted with black (to reveal just a bit of the overexposed layer) to help cover up a bit of her dark, under eye circles, added a gaussian blur to the layer to blur out the edges so you wouldn’t see a distinct line, and dropped the overall opacity of the layer a bit. The difference is subtle, when looking at the original and I might go back and work on this some more.
- a few Healing Brush spots on face
- added a Vignette
- ran Totally Rad!s Antique Tone action

Done for now, but I’ll probably mess with it a bit more.

Punkin’ Head

No, I haven’t gone crazy. We had a little cold front blow through and decided to try on Daphne’s fall sweater and pumpkin hat. Everything was purchased last year on clearance (Janie & Jack hat, Gymboree Harvest Leaves cardigan) and I’m so glad it fits!!

Little Cheerleader

Today I wanted to get a few quick snapshots of Daphne in her OU cheerleader outfit, mainly because I knew several of our Sooner fan relatives would get a big kick out of it. I always have a hard time getting her to look my direction if I don’t have someone helping me. Like this, she’s giving me a “what do you want?!” look.

So, I decided to sing Itsy Bitsy Spider hoping that I could at least get her attention off the UPS man next door. Here’s the “itsy bitsy spider” part:

And the “down came the rain” part:

And another just for fun so you can see the whole outfit:

Daphne is all ready for this weekend’s OU-Texas game. Go Sooners!!!

New Baby

No, no… Daphne isn’t going to be a big sister or anything. Don’t look for that announcement until later this year/sometime next year. Anyway, meet my new baby:

Yep, the Nikon D90 with optional battery grip. I’m in love. Excellent image quality (equal to the D3 according to some online reviews) and HD video. And I know I said I was going to hold out for the body only release in October, but the more I thought about selling our D50 with the kit lens (18-55mm) and read the reviews for the 18-105mm D90 kit lens, I decided to go ahead and order. And something else I appreciate… the smaller size. When I’m using my husband’s D200 with the battery grip and a monster lens I feel like I’m carrying a bowling ball. The D90 is better for my small hands. I highly recommend it.

1 Year

Ok, technically we are almost at 13 months, but between out of town guests, birthdays, roseola and hurricanes, we haven’t had a chance to take any 1 year photos. This is one of my shots:

Images of Downtown

Taken by my husband just after the storm.

Live!!

Photomojo.info is officially live. Even though we still need to add info on several of the pages (about and pricing) and possibly delete/add more images from the galleries (which we are debating, I say fewer images.). Whew! Chris has been wanting a more professional website for quite some time and I kept trying to talk him into waiting until his portfolio was a little more full (especially with portraits since that’s a new thing for him). And he had set up quite a few portrait session in B’ham, which of course had to be cancelled due to our unexpected move. Anyway, I think we are both happy with the site for now.

FYI- bludomain said it could take up to 72 hours to fully propagate the site and it is completely normal for some to see the site, and not others until it’s fully up. So if you see a blog and not a proper photo website then keep checking.

I NEED This

Really, really, really, really want this. And you can’t borrow it, Chris. Just kidding. But I do totally deserve it after all those late nights up processing photos for my husband.

Another Edit

I think I like this one better in black & white:

OK Chris, your turn.

Today

We have been discussing 12 month photos of Daphne for a while now. Of course, I have no idea when Chris is actually going to have time to take them. So today I took some test shots in the outfit I think I want her to wear. It’s hard to tell from the pictures, but the color of the top is great on her. She definitely can pull off darker colors. And the matching shoes? A happy accident. I actually bought the outfit last year in Rogers, AR when I was 6 months pregnant. The shoes were purchased a few months ago from Amazon. They match exactly.

The whole ensemble (including matching sunglasses):

Such a silly girl:

And a just a few days shy of a year old: