My first Photoshoot with my nephew

 

 

 

 

                                                                             

 

                         

 

                         

 

                         

 

                           

 

 

I just love the lines in the dirt!

I love St. George, UT.  We were taking a family trip over to the petroglyphs.  Along the dirt road side I noticed these beautiful lines.  I made my husband stop so I could get out and take pictures of the ground.  I didn't think  looked too crazy taking picture of the ground until I got back in the car and saw the look on my husbands face (He doesn't get it, lol)

What is your main focus?

 

This is a pic of my nephew.  My sister is going to give him his first hair cut so she wanted me to take some pictures and edit them for her.  Well of course I used Picmonkey.com to edit them.

 

 

 

First I started by cropping  the picture in Basic Edits.  I didn't want the whole back ground to show.  When you crop, you have to find the main focus and make sure that it is centered in the picture.  In this picture, I wanted the eyes to be the main focus.

 

 

I then went into the Touch up section.  I used the blemish tab to lighten out any little red spot on his beautiful face, and then used airbrush to smooth his cheeks and chin out.  I then used mascara to bring out eyes mouth and hair.  After that I used eye brighten to make his eyes stand out.

 

 

 

 

 

I used Orton but only a little of it.  When you click on a tab it always changes the picture half way.  You can choose to intensify it by choosing more or de-intensify it by choosing less. for this picture I used less.  I went into boost and used a tinny, tinny bit.  I wanted this picture to look intense to I darkened the edges a bit.  I normally don't do that but I think I looks great on this picture. 

 

Editing is an art.  It does take a while to make the picture come out the way you intend it to.  If it doesn't just back up to the beginning and start again.  The wait is worth it :)

 

 

 

 

 

Effects on picmonkey

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

I took this picture looking down from the third story building where I work.  I have lived here in good 'old St. George for 20+ years and have never seen a snow storm like this before.  I had to take a picture of it.

So first, when I look at one of my pictures, I think of what steps I want to take to have the out come I want.  With this picture I chose Orton on effects tab.  The best way to make it look the way you want, is to play with it. When you click  on the tab it will give you a chance to increase the effect or decrease it.  You can always click undo if you make a mistake.

 

 

After that I went to Cross process, its just under the Orton tab. It makes things have a little tint of blue, green or red.  On pictures of people I usually chose green just because it brings out the colors of our skin better.

 

 

Cross process green

Cross process blue



Fixing your dull pictures

                         

 

I pass mountains after mountains on my commute to work and then back home.  I do live in a very beautiful part of the world. 

 

 

These mountains are very far away, I wasn't sure how they would turn out so I did a lot of playing around in the different effects on Picmonkey online editing.  First I went into exposure and brought out the highlights and the shadows.  It was looking kinda plain.

 

 

After that I then went into sharpness in the Basic Edits and incressed the sharpness.  I don't always use clarity, it makes my pictures look a little too dark.  Then I went into Touch up and used a little mascara to bring out the darker lines.  After that I started looking for something, in Effects, to bring out the color without over doing it.  I found film stock and went with reala, it brought out the darkness of the shadows

 

 

Fixing spots and bringing out colors

Sometimes when I look at a photo that I hate or that I look crappy in, I think of how I can make it look better even if I have to change it all together.

 

With this photo, I hated, my shinny face and my sons bright faded face.  I darkend it up a bit then cropped it and then started to play with eyebrighten and mascara.  Don't look at the photo on the left too long, I look crappy. ; 

Red Rock

One of this things I find most beautiful about St George UT.