52 of 2013 - Week 13

52 of 2013 - Week 13. Picaboo's theme for the week is 'What to Think About Before You Click'. My Focus 52 - Pixel Project theme is 'Including Clouds in Your Landscapes'.  The first shot is of a beta that we were fish-sitting. The color in this fish is spectacular! I'm bummed that I didn't notice the smudge on the glass until I was editing the shot after he'd gone home.  The second shot isn't much of a landscape, but Weeb thought the cloud looked like a bunny with its ears back, so I snapped a photo (we didn't have clouds on any other day this week).

Taken with my Canon PowerShot G12 (the fancy point and shoot), edited with Photoshop and PicMonkey.

366 of 2012 - Day 324

366 of 2012 - Day 324. Weeb instructed me to take this photo of a plane as it went over her school. We don't get as many planes flying over as we did in our old city - we're not as close to the airport anymore. I got the zoom effect in PicMonkey.

Taken with my Canon PowerShot G12 (the fancy point and shoot), edited with Photoshop.

Picaboo's Weekly Challenge is posted here: The Zoom Effect.

366 of 2012 - Day 246

366 of 2012 - Day 246. Another shot of the August 31, 2012 Blue Moon. It was a good thing I was out walking with Weeb when I was. She spotted the moon when I was ready to give up. It was moving across the sky very quickly - if we had come outside an hour later, we would have missed it behind the other townhouses.

Taken with my Canon PowerShot G12 - f/4.5, 1/15 sec., ISO-100, camera hand held, no flash, shot outdoors. Cropped (and resized), added text, applied Unsharp Mask and High Pass Filter with Photoshop.

Picaboo's Weekly Challenge is posted here: 7 Tips for Taking Better Photos of Food.

366 of 2012 - Day 245

366 of 2012 - Day 245. August 31, 2012 displayed a beautiful blue moon. I understand we won't have another until some time in 2015.

Taken with my Canon PowerShot G12 - f/4.5, 1/15 sec., ISO-100, camera hand held, no flash, shot outdoors. Cropped (and resized), added text, applied Unsharp Mask, High Pass Filter, adjusted Vibrance and Brightness / Contrast with Photoshop.

Picaboo's Weekly Challenge is posted here: 7 Tips for Taking Better Photos of Food.

366 of 2012 - Day 213

366 of 2012 - Day 213. I get awesome views of the moon from the backyard of the The Bodacious Brown House.

Taken with my Canon PowerShot G12 - f/5.6, 1/60 sec., ISO-100, camera hand held. Cropped, added text and adjusted Exposure and applied Unsharp Mask and High Pass Filter with Photoshop.

Picaboo's Weekly Challenge is posted here: How To Take Better Landscape Photographs. Clearly, I still need some practice.

366 of 2012 - Day 178

366 of 2012 - Day 178. Planes fly pretty close, around here, sometimes.

Taken with my Canon PowerShot G12, f/4.5, 1/1000 sec., ISO-80, no flash, camera hand held, shot outdoors. Edited with PicMonkey and Photoshop.

Picaboo's Weekly Challenge is posted here: The Formula for the Perfect Picture.

366 of 2012 - Day 136

366 of 2012 - Day 136. I thought this cloud looked like a rose with a stem and leaf.

Taken with my Canon PowerShot G12 (with my new 58mm tele-converter lens!), f/5, 1/320 sec., ISO-80, no flash, shot outside, camera hand held. Photoshop edits: Exposure adjustment, Brightness / Contrast adjustment, Cropping, Text.

Picaboo's Weekly Challenge is posted here: Taking Pictures on a Cloudy Day.

366 of 2012 - Day 135

366 of 2012 - Day 135. Looks rather like a UFO, doesn't it? This plane was making an awesome jet trail, so I dashed to get my camera. I almost missed it; this thing was FAST! When I opened the file and zoomed in, I had a laugh at how UFOy this looked with the sun reflected off of it; you can hardly see the shape of the plane at all.

Taken with my Canon PowerShot G12 (with my new 58mm lens!), f/6.3, 1/1250 sec., ISO-160, no flash, shot outside, camera hand held. Photoshop edits: Exposure adjustment, Cropping, Text.

Picaboo's Weekly Challenge is posted here: Taking Pictures on a Cloudy Day.

366 of 2012 - Day 132

366 of 2012 - Day 132. Morning Moon.

Taken with my Canon PowerShot G12, f/4.5, 1/1250 sec., ISO-160, no flash, shot outside, camera hand held. Photoshop edits: Unsharp Mask and High Pass Filter (slight, on moon), Brightness adjustment, Exposure adjustment, Cropping, Text.

Picaboo's Weekly Challenge is posted here: How To Use Back Lighting In Your Photographs.

366 of 2012 - Day 126

366 of 2012 - Day 126. SuperMoon! I had to go out again and take a second try.

Taken with my Canon PowerShot G12, f/8, 1/500 sec., ISO-500, Exposure bias -2 step, no flash, shot outside, camera hand held. Photoshop edits: Unsharp Mask, High Pass Filter, Cropping, Text. Ooh, and I took this one on Manual! Completely on Manual!

Picaboo's Weekly Challenge is posted here: How To Use Back Lighting In Your Photographs.

Taken with my Canon PowerShot G12, f/4.5, 1/2000 sec., ISO-1600, no flash, shot outside, camera hand held. Photoshop edits: Unsharp Mask, High Pass Filter, Clone Tool on street light in upper right corner, Cropping, Text.

Picaboo's Weekly Challenge is posted here: How To Use Back Lighting In Your Photographs.

366 of 2012 - Day 91

366 of 2012 - Day 91. Hello Moon. Not a bad shot for a fancy point and shoot, eh?

Taken with my Canon PowerShot G12, f/4.5, 1/50 sec., ISO-80, Exposure bias +1 step, 30 mm focal length, max aperture 4.34375, no flash, camera on tripod (though I probably didn't need one). Applied Unsharp Mask and High Pass Filter when I cropped and added text in Photoshop. I also adjusted Exposure slightly as the bright moon gave me a wicked bright halo around itself. And here's the kicker - I didn't use the Automatic setting! On the advise of my husband, I used TV (Shutter Priority) and fiddled with the settings and snapped away.

Picaboo's Weekly Challenge is posted here: Photography Basics: Reading Histograms (which I haven't, yet).

JUPITER AND VENUS MARCH 2012

Jupiter and Venus are putting on a show, right now. I hadn't paid much attention since it's been pretty cloudy and gloomy here, lately. We went out to run an errand last night and there they were, beaming brightly at us as we walked out the front door so Weeb and I ran to grab our cameras. Here are a couple of shots that I took. It's stunning how bright they both are and how HUGE Jupiter is! My photos don't do them justice.

Here is an article by National Geographic about the cosmic pairing.

366 of 2012 - Day 58

366 of 2012 - Day 58. Moon with Jupiter (I thought it was Venus, but nope) in lower left corner. Shot last night.

Taken with my Canon PowerShot G12, f/4.5, 1/50 sec., ISO-80, 30 mm focal length, max aperture 4.34375, no flash, camera hand held (impressive, eh?!). Adjusted Brightness slightly in Photoshop when I cropped an added text.

Picaboo's new Weekly Challenge is up. Photography Basics - Understanding Exposure.

366 of 2012 - Day 42

366 of 2012 - Day 42. I love the sky, especially when the clouds are putting on such an awesome show!

Taken with my Canon G12, f/4, 1/80 sec., ISO-80, 6mm focal length, max aperture 2.96875, pattern metering, white balance auto. I monkeyed with Brightness / Contrast and Levels in Photoshop, when I cropped and added text. Like the previous 2 days, cropped to 180 ppi, rather than 72 ppi.

366 of 2012 - Day 33

366 of 2012 - Day 33. Not a lot of sunrise opportunity today, but I did manage to catch this shot. I had to take a video of the trees behind me as well, as the birds were all singing to each other. It was a beautiful sound and so reminded me that spring is coming!

Shot with my Canon G12. I was playing with settings and I think this was taken on the P (program) setting, adjusting to Sunny. Details: f/4, 1/1000 sec., ISO-80, 12 mm focal length, max aperture 3.625, pattern metering, no flash, white balance on auto. Hm. Maybe this was an Auto shot, after all! I did tweak the Vibrancy slightly in Photoshop when I cropped and added text.

LIVING NEAR THE AIRPORT

When you live and work near the airport, you get used to seeing and hearing airplanes overhead.

In fact, there is only one time I recall NOT seeing or hearing a plane in the sky (the afternoon of 9/11) and that was completely eerie and weird.

At this time of year, when the clouds roll in and cover us for what feels like months, the sounds of planes seem 100 times louder than on a sunny day. I'm sure there's a brilliant scientific reason for that, but I don't know what it is.

I took this when I was at work, a couple of years ago. I should have taken it with a street light in the shot, so you could see some perspective.

We're not that far from the airport, so this isn't an unusual sight. And though I occasionally worry that one (or bits of one) may come crashing down on top of me, I think I'd much rather see them up there, flying around, than not.