A Christmas Baby

My friend and neighbor had a little boy about a week ago, I have really been wanting to practice taking pictures of babies so I asked her if she would mind if I shot a few of her new little one. I had big plans for some sleepy shots since newborns usually are sleepy and its hard to catch them with their eyes open. He had something else in mind, and it was a lucky thing because he has such amazing blue eyes. I didn't get to use all the fun props I brought over but I got some fun shots anyway.

Here is one of my favorites. I added a few embellishments to make it even more Christmas like. Talk about baby blues!

I did manage to get 1 sleepy shot. He is so alert for a week old baby I couldn't believe it:

This is what he was doing most of the time. I thought it was cute anyway:

This is what he wanted is Binky and blankey. So I just decided to go with it and take a few more of his beautiful eyes.

One more he was almost asleep, but anytime I got that camera anywhere near him he would pop those eyes open:



Another one almost asleep, but he just couldn't let go and close those eyes. His mom said he slept for 4 hours strait after the photo shoot. He must have wore himself out trying to stay awake.

One more:

I took Sydnie Christmas shopping at the outlet malls last week. I dressed her up cute for a photo shoot I had to do for a challenge called window shopping. I really loved the way these turned out I think I am going to frame one for my wall. However they are not doing well in the challenge, not because they are bad pictures but because I cropped too much of the window out and it is hard to tell she is window shopping. Oh well that's a mother for you, I just couldn't help cropping it down to what I thought was the best part of the picture.

This is the one I entered. I wish I could get her to smile she did when the camera wasn't pointed at her but whenever I pulled the camera out she would get mad. Poor girl is going to have a camera phobia because of her mother.

Titled:

All done shopping.

Here are a few more. I love them all despite her grumpy looks.

Here is another challenge entry for a challenge called "from the ground up" This didn't turn out quite as well as I had imagined it. But sort of interesting anyway. It is doing fairly well but not exceptional.

Title:

And we all float on

Here is one I took for fun it was sort of an ordinary photo until I played around with it a bit. I really like it now and I can't even explain why.

I woke up to a spectacular sunrise about a week ago here is one of many great shots of that sunrise I took. I may enter it for my free study, I haven't decided yet. At any rate it needs a bit more editing if I do.

More Textures

I have had fun playing with textures this month. It is fun to play with them I think I might use one of the shots below on our Christmas card. I like using textures but they are not allowed in the challenges I enter, so that is why you will never see a texture on any of my challenge entries.

The pictures below I shot for a challenge these didn't work out because the lighting was bad. They are perfect candidates for textures. They hide most of the imperfections and highlight the good parts of the photo you want to show.

This was at the end of the photo shoot and Sydnie was getting tired of posing, so she started to play with her hat. I think they are really fun shots of her.

The goal of these pictures was to try and get some cute shots of Sydnie holding Lu Lu. The lighting was bad so they ended up a little blurry, but you can't tell with the overlay.

This one I just liked because of her cute smile and her eyelashes.

This weeks challenge entries

This one is for a challenge called "Faces in Houshold Objects". It took me a while to figure something out but I finally pulled our Wii out and saw that the disk opening looked a little like a mouth, but what to use for eyes. I looked through the basket of Wii stuff and found the numb chucks, perfect! This one is doing pretty well, it is just above a 6 and any time I get above a 6 I am really happy. A low 6 means you have mass appeal and most people like your photo. High (like a 6.8) and you are in ribbon territory.

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Wii see you!

This one is my Free Study entry for the month of November. Generally you save one of your best shots from the month and enter it in the Free Study. This is the one I chose. It is doing pretty well. Currently it is at a 6.2 and for a Free Study with over 260 entries that is really good. So I am happy I won't win a metal, but my score means I am on the right track as far as my photography and editing skills go.

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A Tranquil Autumn Lake.

This one hasn't gone into scoring yet it is for a challenge called "Horizons" I had a hard time finding a day when the mountains would give me a good horizon. Finally early one morning I looked out my back window and saw the sun reflecting on the fog over the lake. I ran out in freezing weather but managed to get some pretty great shots. I am going to start to try and predict my scores this one I predict will score around a 6.4 or higher, part of the reason I think it will do so well is because of the low number of entries around 70, when there is less competition your score tends to be higher.

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A Misty Morning Horizon

Here is another shot from that morning, I am not using it for a challenge but liked it anyway.

This one is for a challenge called "celebrating life" I took my girls and some of their friend sledding to take some pictures. They started sledding down the hill with just their coats and so I laid down on the hill and waited for them to go zooming by. I just love their faces in these. My girls were right behind them and you couldn't see their faces so I had to cut them out. This one is harder to predict because the photo quality isn't as good, but it has a lot of emotion so that will get me points. I am predicting 5.8 or higher, but I am hoping it will surprise me and get me above a 6.

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Who Needs a Sled?