photography – Page 8 – nancy merrill photography

Cee’s Black & White Challenge: Sepia Tones only

For more from this challenge, visit Cee’s Black & White Challenge: Sepia Tones only.

A Photo a Week Challenge: Thirds Rule

In photography, we are taught many rules and guidelines about composing our images. One of the most basic is the rule of thirds. Cut your image area into a graph of nine (three vertical lines and three horizontal lines) and place your subject on one of the lines, avoiding the very center of your plane.

I love how using this rule opens up images and really draws our attention to the main subject, even though you would think the opposite would be true. My husband is my favorite subject, so I get to experiment with this rule a lot with him. I hope you like the results.

IN A NEW POST CREATED FOR THIS CHALLENGE, SHARE A PHOTO OR TWO (OR THREE…) USING THE RULE OF THIRDS.

Everyone is welcome to participate, even if your blog isn’t about photography. Here’s how it works:

Each week, I’ll come up with a theme and post a photo that I think fits. You take photographs based on your interpretation of the theme, and post them on your blog (a new post!) anytime before the following Thursday, when the next photo theme will be announced.
To make it easy for others to check out your photos, title your blog post “A Photo a Week Challenge: (theme of the week)” and be sure to use the “postaday″ and “Photo a Week” tags.
Come back here and post a link to your image in the comments for this challenge.
Follow nancy merrill photography so that you don’t miss out on weekly challenge announcements.

One Photo Focus: February

Last month, I found a great method for adding deeper colors to my photos, and I was really excited to try it out on this month’s One Photo Focus.

Here is the original photo, by Stacey at lens addiction:

When I opened the RAW file in Photoshop, I used the following settings in the RAW converter:

These settings got me to here:

For the final touches, I used an action that I created that I call Adding Deeper Color II. It includes adding two duplicate layers of the background, one with a setting of SoftLight and the other Multiply, with the Multiply layer on top of the SoftLight layer. For both layers, I added mask layers. I also added a Gaussian Blur at 15.0% to the Multiply layer. Then I used a soft brush set to Opacity 100% and black (to remove) and brushed over the boat and buildings on the Multiply layer. This is what I got:

Thanks to Stacy for hosting this fun challenge. For more from this challenge, visit One Photo Focus: February.

Click the image above for rules on joining the fun!

A Photo a Week Challenge: Spacing

When framing a shot, you are always thinking about the story you are trying to portray. If you have more than one subject in your image, spacing becomes very important. Do you want them close together? Is spread apart better? When shooting this super fun couple the day of their wedding, we decided to take most of the couple pictures before the ceremony. The groom had already seen the dress, so they weren’t worried about the tradition of the groom not seeing the dress before the actual ceremony. We had a lot of fun using a variety of spacing ideas to tell their story on this most important of all days.

IN A NEW POST CREATED FOR THIS CHALLENGE, SHARE A PHOTO OR TWO (OR THREE…) OF WHERE SPACING OF THE SUBJECTS HELPS TELL THE PICTURE’S STORY.

Everyone is welcome to participate, even if your blog isn’t about photography. Here’s how it works:

Each week, I’ll come up with a theme and post a photo that I think fits. You take photographs based on your interpretation of the theme, and post them on your blog (a new post!) anytime before the following Thursday, when the next photo theme will be announced.
To make it easy for others to check out your photos, title your blog post “A Photo a Week Challenge: (theme of the week)” and be sure to use the “postaday″ and “Photo a Week” tags.
Come back here and post a link to your image in the comments for this challenge.
Follow nancy merrill photography so that you don’t miss out on weekly challenge announcements.

One Photo Focus January 2016

Laura Macky Photography has provided a lovely image for us to play with this month. Here’s her original:

After playing around with the contrast and brightness and enjoying a bit of cropping, I decided to use one of the black & white presets I purchased from Little Lusker. The final one I settled on is Film. Here is the end result:

Stacy, thanks, as always, for a fun challenge. For more from this challenge, visit One Photo Focus: January.

Click the image above for rules on joining the fun!

A Photo a Week: Vintage

vintage_nmp

The vintage look is very popular right now. It’s a fun look to play around with. Most photo editing software will come with canned vintage presets you can apply to your images. In Photoshop, I use Curves, contrast, and saturation to get the vintage look I want. It’s fun and challenging at the same time.

IN A NEW POST CREATED FOR THIS CHALLENGE, SHARE A PHOTO OR TWO (OR THREE…) OF THAT HAVE OR USE A VINTAGE LOOK.

Note: Older photos you can in that naturally have a vintage look are welcome, too.

Everyone is welcome to participate, even if your blog isn’t about photography. Here’s how it works:

Each week, I’ll come up with a theme and post a photo that I think fits. You take photographs based on your interpretation of the theme, and post them on your blog (a new post!) anytime before the following Thursday, when the next photo theme will be announced.
To make it easy for others to check out your photos, title your blog post “A Photo a Week Challenge: (theme of the week)” and be sure to use the “postaday″ and “Photo a Week” tags.
Come back here and post a link to your image in the comments for this challenge.
Follow nancy merrill photography so that you don’t miss out on weekly challenge announcements.

Sylvain Landry’s Challenge: Depth of Field

The look of love

The Reveal

Pink spring blossoms

Murphy

Pink rose

Peach blossoms

The hope of spring

Field of daisies

This is the first of Sylvain’s challenges that I’ve been able to join. I’m very excited for this one. I’ve included many photos I’ve posted before along with a new one. I hope you like them.

For more from this challenge, visit Sylvain Landry’s Challenge: Depth of Field.

A Photo a Week Challenge: Zoom

A couple of weeks ago, I posted the Draper City Park’s Tree of Life in the Lights challenge. This week. I’m posting the same tree, only with a closer zoom. It’s amazing the details you can see in the zoomed picture: the individual lights, some of the expressions on the people’s faces looking at the tree, the leaves still desperately clinging to the branches. This week’s challenge is to find or take two shots of the same subject, with one zoomed in to show greater detail and a different perspective.

IN A NEW POST CREATED FOR THIS CHALLENGE, SHARE TWO (OR MORE…) PHOTOS OF THE SAME SUBJECT AT DIFFERENT DISTANCES.

Everyone is welcome to participate, even if your blog isn’t about photography. Here’s how it works:

Each week, I’ll come up with a theme and post a photo that I think fits. You take photographs based on your interpretation of the theme, and post them on your blog (a new post!) anytime before the following Thursday, when the next photo theme will be announced.
To make it easy for others to check out your photos, title your blog post “A Photo a Week Challenge: (theme of the week)” and be sure to use the “postaday″ and “Photo a Week” tags.
Come back here and post a link to your image in the comments for this challenge.
Follow nancy merrill photography so that you don’t miss out on weekly challenge announcements.