A new Photography trick I've learned.

I read a tutorial on double exposures done in camera with the 5Dmk3. 

The article can be found here

http://petapixel.com/2013/04/17/tutorial-shooting-double-exposures-with-a-canon-5d-mark-iii/

I thought it looked so cool, so I had a go at it.

The kids thought I was mad.

First I took a couple of shots that were meant to be silhouette photos.

I think it worked well leaving some detail in the photo.

Then following the steps in the tutorial I went outside and clicked at some other plants.

Missy was not impressed to be a gum tree!

The pink roses were out of focus.

The reds were a bit better. 

But the books and DVDs were the best!

Photos were great too.

When the little fella got home he had to have a go as well.

Mulberry tree.

Gum tree.

Gumnut head!

Quite an interesting, fun thing to do!

Anzac Day 2013

This is our first year without my Father In law to march in the Anzac Day March.

Our son wanted to march, wearing Pa's medals, with the servicemen and not with his school.

He did a great job, fitting in quite well with the older people, I think he chewed their ears off all the way up the main street.

Daughter marched with her school, wearing a great, great Uncle's medals

The little guy was a bit green by the time the service had finished. He was very happy to take a seat, get the hot vest off, and get a cool drink!

I like that the younger kids are keen to continue to honour this tradition and get involved.

Show weekend wrap up

This past weekend it was our local show. 

I was approached to take photos as I walked through the gate.  

Not quite sure for exactly what purpose- a magazine perhaps?

Luckily I had my camera to take photos of my own children in their Whipcracking demos.

Still, I wasn't really in the mindset on day 1 and missed heaps of opportunities to capture images as I was organising our kids and still recovering from a stomach flu the day before. I was very relieved to hear that there were a few of us put on the job!

I think I managed some artful ones on day 2!

A competition Wyandotte. with some editing and a texture added.

A Bully Boy's snout!

A Tawny frogmouth or mopoke, in the Farmyard Nursery

Hens and chickies in the Nursery.

Competition Fowl.

Wool!

Yard dog trials. 

I can't believe that I didn't get any photos of the dogs working, as I said I didn't really have my head around it. Next year I have a plan to get a group together to take photos and we pool them and make a fundraising book! I will write a list of things to be sure to capture!!

Woodchopping competitions. They travel from great distances to have a go here!

Whipcracking Demos and a competition run by my kiddos.

The farmers challenge, to see which group of 'farmers can complete a set of tasks first. My little guy had to show some of them how to start the Quad bikes ;)

A Demolition Derby, with the lovely firies at the ready to put out fires. We really appreciate them making themselves available to assist, otherwise this event couldn't go on. Unfortunately one 'contestant' didn't abide by the rules and stop when the fire truck lights came on- and put these guys in danger when they were trying to put out a fire in a car with a driver in it right at the end. He was the winner but was disqualified.

I think we have THE best fireworks around, they go on for a full 10 minutes and are absolutely sensational! I am so pleased -I managed to get these in fully manual settings!!

Ah! Now a  year to plan for the next one!

xx, j

What have I been up to?

I have been pretty quiet here in the last couple of months as I have been deep in study. 

Not for anything job associated or highly academic, but something new and a bit foreign to me.

 I consider myself a lifelong learner and am always keen to run with learning new things when I get the urge.

I have been teaching myself photography skills, plus Lightroom and using presets and Photoshop and using actions, making watermarks and brushes and adding textures to images. Whew!!

I have been doing online courses/tutorials with Udemy, Kim Klassen (who has the most calm and soothing voice I have ever heard!) - using her textures, and MCP presets, actions and textures.

I'm loving it.

There's a lot more to learn!! I don't ever think I will be an expert, I just want to be competent.

Here's some examples:

Watermarks that I have made into brushes that I can change colour when I place them on images.

The difference between Raw and Jpeg coming out of my camera.

And saving images as PNG from photoshop, before posting to Facebook to reduce compression.

Raw on the left, jpeg on the right.

Images that have had presets and textures added.

Strelitzias

Images from the Kim Klassen tutorials (which I absolutely love- her button is down on the right) where textures and Text are added.

Image courtesy of Kim Klassen

And my own images That I have manipulated and added text (in colours from the image) to.

I am really thrilled with how much I have accomplished.

xx