This Weeks Challenge Entries

I had a fairly good week with my challenge entries, I got another ribbon and an honorable mention. This first one was my favorite and the one I won a second place ribbon for. It was a really cool evening, there were thunderstorms going on all around me. I was hoping to catch some light from a lightening bolt in one of my images. This is one of the ones I managed to get it. You can't really see the lightening bolt because it is a 5 min exposure but the lit up part of the clouds is were it struck. It was so dark outside that I didn't even know it was raining on the other side of the lake until I got these photos onto my computer and saw the rain falling on one side of the image. You can't imagine the trouble I went to to get this photo, the bugs were so thick I thought I was in one of those horror movies. I would have to get my camera set up and press the shutter button and then run for safety a few yards from the lake. Not all of them were biting bugs but I got my fair share of mosquito bites. Anyway in the end it was worth the trouble since I won a ribbon for it.

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Thunderstorm at Night

This next one was for a minimal editing challenge that means "strait out of camera" no editing what so ever allowed. You can't even crop, so it takes some patience getting everything right. The challenge was called out your favorite window. Since acquiring this cool looking door it has definitely been my favorite window so I thought it would be fun to take it to a cool location and have my favorite window also include one of my favorite views. I did quite well with this one and got an Honorable Mention with it.

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A Door With a Window Into My World

And here is the door again, this is one that didn't turn out very well for the minimal editing but really came to life when I did some advanced editing techniques on it. I entered it in the free study for August and it did quite well I think I will get in the top 20 which is good for free study where there is over 300 entries.

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Left Standing

I had fun with this next one, I don't know if my girls did but it was a technique I had never done before and it was fun experimenting. We drove out to the Copperton/Bingham Grave Yard. It is a really old an quite interesting grave yard. There is no grass just weeds and wild flowers growing everywhere so it looks quite haunted. Plus it is in the middle of nowhere which adds to the spookiness. The grave stones are really old and many are tipped over most have some sort of makeshift fence around them, I guess to keep people from walking on the graves. Some had nicer wrought iron fences around them that were in fairly good condition. This was one of the better spots.

Here is how I did it for anyone curious. I had Kaylee pick a pose she could hold for at least a minute. Depending on the light your model must hold their position for 30 seconds to a minute. then after the minute is up you have your model walk out of the frame. Then you let it continue to expose for another couple minutes. What you end up with is a ghost in a single exposure. You can also add ghosts to images by layering photos in photoshop but this way is much more challenging and fun.

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Not Yet at Rest


This next challenge entry was for "the letter C" challenge. You had to take a photo of something starting with the letter C. I thought it would be fun to do a cornucopia with vegetables that start with the letter C. These crates I found at one of the abandoned buildings I photographed are also coming in handy and crate also starts with the letter C so it was a bonus.

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"A Cornucopia of C's"

That's it for challenge entries now onto a few I took this month that I really liked. This first one is of a sunflower, I really like how it turned out when I converted it to black and white. I think I am going to try and do a grouping of flowers in black and white for one of my walls at home.

Here is my next attempt at a flower for the grouping. It is a Cosmo I like it but not quite as much as the sunflower. But I do think it will work in the grouping.

And one more I am experimenting with. Not sure if the side view works for the grouping or not. But I liked it anyway. It is a Black Eyed Susan.

These next two are just some close ups of some bugs I took I thought they turned out pretty nice.

It's been awhile so get ready for a bunch of photos

I have been slacking a bit on updating my photos, it doesn't mean I'm not taking any. I have been really busy with it lately I just haven't been around on the weekends to post my pictures like I usually do.

I was really excited about this first one. I got 1st place with it and also received my highest score to date. The challenge was "Country Music Titles" and was expert editing, which means you can combine multiple photos as long as they were taken by you during the challenge dates. This shot consists of 4 different photos, one is the main background with me in it. The second is the clock, the third is the moon and the fourth is a picture of a topiary multiplied and re sized several times. Everything was taken during the daytime but editing to look like night, I even added a few stars to make it more convincing.

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Walking After Midnight

These next few of Kaylee were not used for a challenge except the last one of the set which is in black and white. I just loved them so much I had to include them here.

This is the one I used for the challenge, I had to use black and white because it was basic editing and I couldn't do much to it. The colors just didn't look right without help of more advanced editing techniques. So I converted it to black and white. The challenge was to make a six word story with a picture.

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Storms of Life Come...Just Smile

This next set of Sydnie were taken for the high key challenge. She was not very happy during the shoot I was just going to give up but I decided to take a few of her crying and thought they turned out kind of cute.

This is the one I went with:

align="center">I managed to get 1 before she started throwing a fit, but I didn't use it because the focus wasn't sharp enough.

My kids and I took a field trip to the copper mines for this challenge. The challenge was to take a photo that might appear in a National Geographic magazine. I was a little surprised at how well this ended up doing. The wind was blowing so hard I could barely hold the camera still even on a tripod. So I was happy to see I got one usable one.

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Turning a mountain inside out, 150 years of mining copper.

And this next one may look familiar to some of you. The challenge was to re-take a challenge photo and make it better. I decided on this one because I thought the first one was a great idea but I just didn't have the know how or the equipment to pull it off last time. This time I improved my score by a whole point and got an honorable mention.

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Rosie the Riveter

This was for a challenge called "Sepia" you had to take a picture that would benefit from using a sepia tone. This did fairly well, I really like it though and may print it out to hang in my house.

This was my free study entry for June. I was in love with this photo. It did fairly well but not as well as I would have hoped.

This last one was for a tripod challenge. You had to take a photo that made it obvious you used a tripod. Which basically means a long exposure. I went back to my favorite place on the lake and got this one. I did pretty well with it and got in the top 10.

Finally this one I didn't end up using for a challenge, I was going to use it for sepia but my peer group thought the gourds would do better. I still like it though.

Challenges

This time all I have to post are challenge entries. I have actually been really busy with paying photo shoots but I don't have them ready to post yet so you will have to make do with my challenge entries.

This first one is one of my favorites. I had so much fun putting it together, its actually a combination of 7 photos taken by me. The challenge was to create something that no one has ever seen. Don't ask me how I came up with this idea but it was fun figuring out how to get the idea out of my head and into a photograph. Brianne was my main model for this one. She got to pose climbing a ladder, and laying sideways in a bathtub. Kaylee helped me by dropping a rock in the wine glass to get a shot with a splash.

"Swimming in Wineglasses"

This next one I took in California, I actually have a couple I like better than this one but I may use them for an upcoming challenge so I will wait to post them.

"Still"

This one is kind of silly, not really my favorite, but others seemed to like it. It scored well.

"Our Family Tree"


This one was for a Calendar Challenge. We had just come home from an 11 hour drive from California. I only had a couple hours to think of something shoot it and edit it. Luckily I had these props on hand and bribed my model with bubble gum. I was trying to go for an "Anne Geddes" look. I was in such a rush it didn't turn out quite how I wanted but it did fairly well anyway.

"May Flowers"

This one I had fun with. It was for a challenge called "lighter that air". I had kaylee jump on a small trampoline I hid in the weeds. We had to do a ton of takes to get one that looked right. The balloons just wouldn't cooperate. But Kaylee seemed to have fun jumping on the trampoline, so for once my model didn't complain.

"Take Off"

This one was for a challenge called "Honey" it did okay, not my favorite shot to do, but I learned a lot about lighting.

"Honey in Still Life"

Building My Portfolio Back Up

I had the opportunity to get back out there quite a bit this week. I got some great new pictures and re-shot some of my favorites. It made me realize that even though I lost some of my favorite photos, there will be new favorites to replace them.

Here is one of my newest favorites. I have it entered in a challenge that doesn't start until tomorrow, but I have high hopes for it. This was shot for a challenge called "square crop" I thought of this location immediately, I had done a photo of this before without a person in it and I knew I wanted to do it again. The location was beautiful, tulips blooming everywhere. I promise I didn't pick them, I brought some with me from my house. But I was so nervous someone was going to stop me and accuse me of picking them.

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It Takes Courage to Walk That Path

Here are a couple outtakes:

This one I took of Sydnie on Easter. The background was really distracting and it took me a long time to figure out how to edit it out and still leave the bubbles showing. Here is the B&W version of this shot:

This week I got the chance to go out a re-take some of my favorite photos. One like these won me a blue ribbon last time and honestly I think these turned out even better. This first one I have entered in this months free study. So far it is doing really well. With 300 entries I won't have a chance at a ribbon, but I am just happy to be getting a good score in a free study, it doesn't happen very often.

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Stormy Night

This is the one I wanted to enter, but there was a big clump of grass in the middle off the water, I had to clone out. The rules on cloning are kind of vague and I was worried about getting disqualified. So I decided not to use it. But I still really like it.

Another out take for free study. I liked the sky in this one but the landscape was a bit boring.

And one last outtake for free study. I liked it but not as much as the one I entered. That is Mount Timpanogos in the background.

I almost didn't include this one. I am looking very lovely in this photo. The challenge was titled "Seven Deadly Sins" I chose Envy. I don't particularly love the photo but everyone seems to be getting a kick out of it, and I am actually doing quite well score wise. I guess it pays to make a fool out of yourself.

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Green With Envy

My Girls

I have been working hard on getting ready for an upcoming boutique, and I finally got done and everything set-up last weekend. So this week I got to have some fun and take yearly shots to hang on my wall of my three cute girls. I mostly just wanted head shots in B&W, nothing fancy, to blow up big 16x20 and hang on my wall in some cute frames I got on sale at Hobby Lobby. They turned out really cute. I found some cool brick backgrounds that I added in after to make the background a little less boring.

Kaylee age 10

Brianne age 7

Sydnie age 3

Challenge entries for this week

This first one was for a challenge called "Two Colors" I decided I would do a cool paper curling technique called quilling. It's mostly used to make cards and decorations, but I thought it might look cool to make a larger one and light it from below. I placed the pieces of paper on a white cutting board and put my flash underneath, so it sort of glowed from beneath. It turned out cool and is getting a good score, but not good enough to ribbon.

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"Shades of Purple and Green"

This next one is for a challenge called "Half" you had to take a photo of half of something. I had an idea to take a picture of Sydnie and one of her cute little friends holding hands. They turned out cute. This is the one I entered.

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Best Friends, Two Halves Make a Whole

This is the one I wanted to enter, but got talked out of it since it wasn't "half enough" I wish I would have I like it much better.

This was for a really fun challenge called "Day taken at Night". In this challenge you had to take a photo at night in the complete dark and expose it long enough for it to look like you took it during the day. I had never done anything like this before and it was fun to try. This one I took at 9:00 p.m. and exposed it for 15 min. The results are really surprising, it really does look like day, the only thing that gives it away is the star trails. The big bright globe behind the silo, is the moon although in this photo it looks a bit more like the sun.

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"A Moonlit Silo"

Just so you can understand how very dark it was outside, here is a test shot I took of the exact same spot this one was exposed for just a few seconds.

I'm glad this ended up turning out well because I sat in the dark by myself with only a headlamp for light, for almost and hour and a half. It was pretty cold and kind of in the middle of nowhere. I had to hike about a 1/4 of a mile away from my car to get to this spot, and I usually don't get scared over things like this, but I have to say this was a little spooky. I just kept thinking of the mountain lion Shaun saw by our house a few years ago. I did have an annoyed Raccoon that kept chirping at me, I think he didn't like my headlight and wanted me to turn it off. I was sort of glad to have the Raccoon around because I thought, "if a Raccoon is around making noise it probably means there are no mountain lions in the area." Wow! what I do for a photograph.

One last note, I purposely held back a couple photos because there is a chance I might be getting a ribbon for them! Stay tuned to see if I do.

Not there yet...

In the past few weeks I have started to feel a lot more comfortable in Manual mode on my camera. You have some success, and it really gets you excited. Then you take more pictures, thinking you are starting to know what you are doing, and realize that you are not there yet. I had so many frustrations with picture taking this week, it just made me realize how little I still know about it. I managed to get a few photos to show you this week, but these are the best out of literally hundreds I took.

Some of my failed attempts include: a beautiful sunrise (part not knowing what settings to put it on, part getting set up a little late.), indoor birthday pictures of my daughter ( I tried some new things out with my flash, but still couldn't get them to look the way I was hoping), and a portrait session I did today with my three daughters. We were going on a trip up the canyon to see the changing leaves, so I decided to do their hair a little more than I would have, and take my camera along to snap a few photos of them. I still am not sure what I did wrong, the settings seemed to be right, but when I got home I was really disappointed with the majority of my pictures.

I managed to get a few good ones of my oldest daughter, here are the best of the worst (of course I am speaking of the photo quality not my daughter, she manages to look cute despite the photographers shortcomings):

This next one is not quite in focus but I actually kind of like it that way, she has kind of a dreamy look on her face, and the soft focus plays into that mood. I guess sometimes accidents work in our favor.

This one was a bit of a surprise. On a photo blog a friend recommended, a famous photographer said she had been given a challenge to take photos from a moving car without looking through the viewfinder. I decided to give it a try. Most of my attempts were not worth a second glance, but this one I loved! And I would have never have gotten such a great shot if I had stood there and planned it. I love how crisp the background is, and then the blur of the foreground from the moving car. I may have to try this experiment more often.

This was an unplanned photo as well. I was trying to take some landscapes of a waterfall, (they all turned out okay, but uninteresting) Then I happened to see these honeybees buzzing around at my feet, and I stopped to take a few pictures of them. They turned out way more interesting than the waterfall.


Okay, I must be obsessed by bugs, just be glad I didn't get my hands on a tarantula that was in my neighbors yard. This guy was on my driveway. I gave him a ride to some of my flowers and then took his photograph. My girls loved this one. We zoomed in really close to look at all the details. I do think Praying Mantis are pretty cool bugs, and really great pest killers too.


The neighbor boy left his bike laying in my driveway. So before running it over with my car (just kidding) I took a cool close up of it. I did the fake HDR technique on it, and liked the effect.


Speaking of miserable failures, I even borrowed a tripod to take pictures of the full moon. But with no telephoto lens, they just were not that great. My plan was to take photos of the moon rising in the evening, then get up early and take photos of the moon setting. The photos of the moon failed miserably. So instead of wasting more time on the setting moon, I focused my camera in the opposite direction. I ended up getting a much more satisfying long exposure shot of my neighborhood, with the lake behind, just as dawn was starting to show behind the mountains.


This last one is not the greatest. It was a photo study I did on motion photography. You can get the idea of what I was trying to do, ( a crisp in focus subject, with the background blurred) But lack of proper equipment got me again. I need a better lens, with a better zoom, to make the background really blur properly. Also, you can tell by the look on my daughters face, that she really wasn't trying to go that fast.