Images from the month of April, 2008. For each day in the month, I will take at least one photograph. Some days, I will take more photographs than others but I will only add one new image to this gallery for each day of the month. This is part of my image a day project for 2008.
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dream hat photography > As we get to the end of another month, I find myself shooting flowers again. Before this daily project started, I knew I enjoyed shooting flowers but landscapes made up a large portion of my overall shots. I had also taken a lot of sunset and sunrise photographs. I still love those shots and have plans to take more of those types of shots as time goes by but on a daily basis, at least in this part of the world, at this time of year, flowers are plentiful and offer so many options and opportunities. Black and white photography has interested me for a very long time but I am particular about which of my images translate well into that mode. I need to do more with duotone and will eventually play with that in the future. Anyway, today’s photo was taken in Hoover, AL at the Aldridge Botanical Gardens. From what I can tell, this flower is some type of Calla lily, but some of you may know a lot more about the specifics than me. I have been observing the star system a little lately. I fully understand that it is a subjective rating system that reflects the opinion of the individual viewing the image. I don’t hang my hat on the ratings and in terms of feedback, rely more on what people say or in some cases what they don’t say. Many of you are very supportive and understanding. I know I have mentioned this now in a number of captions so if it bothers you, don’t read the captions. As much as we might try, because we are putting something of ourselves in these images and posting for the world to see, the negative or less than positive comments tend to stick out above the rest. Personally I think everyone in this group is sensitive and creative. The level of expertise varies a good bit throughout the group but we all seem to share the same passion and love for photography. Remember there are people behind the images you see in the galleries so choose your comments carefully and with kindness. The vast majority of the members of the group do that anyway.
dream hat photography > Today was a little more of what I was trying yesterday, shooting from a low perspective. My tripod legs will spread out and it can be almost flat on the ground. It was late afternoon, the light was pretty low, and exposure times were long. I shot with the cable release to minimize any camera movement. This shot is looking downstream and you will see light colored lines on the rocks at the water line. This is caused by the water flowing around the rocks but the long exposure gives it a light color. I apologize to everyone about not being as active in the galleries lately. It has just been that way with various things going on. I very much appreciate everyone that takes the time to look at my images and also appreciate people that take the time to leave a comment. This is a great group of people and I benefit so much from being part of the community. We all put ourselves out there when we post an image to the galleries. Art is expressive and subjective – in my view what we do here is as much art as any other artistic expression. At the same time, we are trying to improve our skills, get better at our craft. It is a tough balancing act sometimes. We all come to the group with different levels of expertise, different interests, and different personal goals for these galleries. If over the course of the year, I can look back and feel that I have grown as a photographer, then for me, mission accomplished. I truly love taking photographs and when someone likes one of my images, it is a bonus. Thanks again for the comments and support.
dream hat photography > I have several thoughts so hang with me if you have the time and patience. Some days I just shoot, some days I actually have a concept, not often, but some days. Today my intent was to shoot primarily from a low perspective and see what I could capture. Let me say a few things about the photograph, it is another water lily but from a completely different location. I have not applied and PP to the flower beyond color correction, sharpening, brightness, and contrast but the colors on the flower don’t look real. I assure this is a very accurate photograph. I would be interested to get any input or reactions on an idea I have been thinking about. I have wondered what my photographs might be like if others in the group processed them. I think it would be interesting if we could on some basis, have a photograph or little selection of photographs that we could select from, process and upload. The compare results to see how different people interpreted the image. Maybe we could create some kind of community gallery for the uploaded images. I would be willing to get some kind of web location where we could upload and download the RAW files. Different people could take pictures; I am not suggesting we use my images. I was just using it as an example. Any thoughts, ideas, suggestions?
dream hat photography > Sometimes I pick a photograph for the day and know why I like the shot. Occasionally I pick a photograph for the day and am not sure why I like it. There was something about this shot that I liked but to be honest with you I don’t really know why. I had mentioned the other day that I was feeling stale again. That feeling motivated me to modify how I am using curves to correct the color in my shots. Hopefully there will be a subtle difference in the finished images.
dream hat photography > This shot was taken at a footbridge that crosses the Cahaba River. The back story is that I was looking for a new place to shoot. I researched some options in my area and found out about the bridge. That was the easy part. I had directions that took me to a sports park, and then the bridge was supposed to behind the park. The trick was finding the bridge. There were some little league baseball games in progress. It was getting late in the afternoon and it was cloudy, so my light was fading. I asked some of the moms on the playground by the ball park about the bridge. My assumption was that moms know everything. They had all heard about the bridge, but none of them actually knew the location. They sent me over to ask one of the coaches who gave me directions to a different part of the park and off I went. His directions got me in the right general area and I started walking down paths and into the woods looking for the bridge. At this point I am burning what little daylight I have left, am walking in wooded areas with a lot of undergrowth, and concerned about snakes. I could hear the river, but couldn’t see it. I made my way through the undergrowth and to the edge of a small steep hillside that led down to the river. So I maneuvered down the bank with my camera, backpack, and tripod. The woods were heavy in both directions and I leaned out looking down the river, then up the river and saw the bridge. Now it was just a matter of getting back up the steep bank, back through the woods to the edge of the park to search for the bridge but I knew where it was now. Eventually I found the right path and it was worth the effort. The down side was that I had used most of the good light in the search. I took a number of shots and decided to go with this one. In my photograph from yesterday, I commented about processing and workflow. I have some pretty good books on Photoshop and need to read more. I found a great section on color correction and used it on today’s images. I am happy with the results and the colors are very accurate. Hopefully this will be something that can become a regular part of my workflow.
dream hat photography > Feast or famine, why are there so many days like that for the dailies? Yesterday it was all I could do to come up with one photograph for the daily gallery. Today was a struggle to choose. Opinions vary and personal tastes vary so feel free to disagree with my choice. I put the other contenders in the Birmingham Zoo gallery, partly because it was small and these shots are all from the zoo. This shot is a Monarch butterfly but I assume most of you already know that. One thing I wonder about with the group is the work flow that each of you go through. I wonder if you have any special plug-ins for Photoshop that you think really offer some great assistance and leave more time for shooting and less time working with the images. I started this journey with Photoshop Elements 6.0 to process my images. It seems like such a long time ago now. I was originally shooting in JPG format because I didn’t know any better. It wasn’t long before I discovered the benefit of working with layers and also the benefit of shooting in RAW format. It was around that time that I had processed enough images to begin to establish a workflow. I was reading a lot about workflow in articles but so many of the articles applied to photographers that shot a large number of images on a subject, like maybe a portrait of someone. The articles talked about workflows to create contact sheets, to make the process of adjusting the groups of images more efficient. In that sense, it didn’t apply to the way I was shooting. Eventually, I started to notice a familiar routine as I would import my images into Adobe Bridge, open selected images in Adobe Camera RAW, then move to Photoshop CS3. Once in Photoshop CS3, I had my basic routine of renaming my background layer to protect the original layer, creating a blank layer to overlay the background and use the Custom Shape Tool to decide how I wanted to crop the image. Then I moved on to adjusting sharpness, color, contrast, and balance. I realized that I had a workflow, not in the sense that the articles had described for groups of images, but a definite workflow for the way I handle the processing for individual images. With so many people in this group and so much activity, each day as I am working on my images, I wonder what little things I could learn from each of you if I had the chance to observe your workflow, what new techniques I would discover.
dream hat photography > After a few days of shooting flowers in well maintained gardens, today was back in the woods. Periodically with the daily shots, I start feeling stale. I need to regroup and give some thought to locations and subjects. It isn’t a case of not enjoying the photography. Today, in the woods was nice and relaxing. The fresh air was great and it is good for me to walk around, forgetting about everything but taking pictures. It is the gallery that taunts me, questions my creativity, whispers that I am not expanding my range. It is becoming a familiar cycle. Today’s shot is just a small spray of wildflowers. It is nothing dramatic. Simple scenes can contain details that go unnoticed. These small flowers are scattered throughout the woods. They are sparse and very easy to miss if you aren’t looking closely.
dream hat photography > After a long afternoon at work that ended after a three hour long meeting, I went to the botanical gardens to take some photographs and relax. The light was great and the flowers were beautiful. I shot so many pictures and I didn’t have enough time to work through all of them tonight. I struggled with which one to select and have posted a few alternates in the Bonus Tracks gallery. I expected to have a rose shot for the day but as I was getting ready to leave, another photographer told me that the water lily was blooming. I decided to go with that instead of the roses.
dream hat photography > At lunch, I went by the Birmingham Botanical Gardens. The rose garden is just beginning to start blooming. There will be a lot of different colors and varieties and I have never photographed roses. Today was a bit of a test run. It was the wrong time of the day for good lighting, way too harsh. The flowers were beautiful and I learned a few things from this initial run. The shots will get better but I had to start somewhere.
At lunch, I went by the Birmingham Botanical Gardens. The rose garden is just beginning to start blooming. There will be a lot of different colors and varieties and I have never photographed roses. Today was a bit of a test run. It was the wrong time of the day for good lighting, way too harsh. The flowers were beautiful and I learned a few things from this initial run. The shots will get better but I had to start somewhere.
> At lunch, I went by the Birmingham Botanical Gardens. The rose garden is just beginning to start blooming. There will be a lot of different colors and varieties and I have never photographed roses. Today was a bit of a test run. It was the wrong time of the day for good lighting, way too harsh. The flowers were beautiful and I learned a few things from this initial run. The shots will get better but I had to start somewhere.
At lunch, I went by the Birmingham Botanical Gardens. The rose garden is just beginning to start blooming. There will be a lot of different colors and varieties and I have never photographed roses. Today was a bit of a test run. It was the wrong time of the day for good lighting, way too harsh. The flowers were beautiful and I learned a few things from this initial run. The shots will get better but I had to start somewhere.
Gallery pages:  1  2  3  4  >  
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