Week 48 good to WOW Edit Holiday

Today I am guest posting over at Ashley's blog Ramblings and Photos...the first photo blog I started reading.  Please do visit me over there.  I have learned so much about editing photos from her weekly tutorials, and I really enjoy using what I've learned.   All of her tutorials really came in handy with this week's photo:

Original:

Edit:

Since my tutorial is kind of wordy, I'll skip all the steps I did with this photo.  Suffice to say that I used almost every tip we learned in this last year during Shoot and Edit, plus I cropped to a 5x7 aspect ratio because that is the size I'll be printing and it framed them better.  Last year at this time my family would have just gotten the original...and been pretty happy with it.

If you are someone who, say, just bought Photoshop Elements, starting with the first of Ashley's tutorial posts and working your way through them is a great way to learn your new program and how to edit photos to boot.

Tuesday's Photos

It was such a fun and busy week.  We got to spend some time with my sister-in-law as she was decorating for Christmas.

We got to spend time watching my oldest son compete in his lego robotics competition...and celebrate with him for his team's trophy in "Gracious Professionalism."

Kim Klassen's Dream Texture, Multiply mode, Masked off his hands, face, and shirt

We got to spend some time enjoying the cold, winter sun at the park while waiting for Huckleberry to be done.

Such gorgeous later afternoon sun, though it threw me off color wise, but I was still able to capture a few sweet shots (including my ducks from Sunday's Scavenger Hunt).  Any tips on white balance settings for that golden hour?

But nothing beats 45 minutes to photograph the  beauty of winter frost, sun, and some scrumptious frost bokeh...

Balancing my home life and photography can be tricky at times, but when I'm photographing nature, I spend time with God.  My heart swells with worship for my God who can create beauty out of the ugliest things.

And if sometimes I forget to honor God with this gift of photography, He gives me a photo that just screams for a verse to remind me.


 

Scavenger Hunt Sunday

There is something so satisfactory about completing a good hunt.  Even on weeks when I struggle with my photography or don't have quite the time I'd like to dedicate to the task that I would like, it feels great to hit publish and go enjoy the creativity of the other participants.  This week was busy...with lots of bad pictures taken (my photography class was a macro lab with water drops which was a lot of fun to practice as a group, but I am having no trouble deleting the pictures)...but the hunt was still oh so much fun!

Portrait:

This isn't my best portrait of Huckleberry ever, but this was taken today at the completion of his all day Lego Robotics competition.  His team did not go on to state (only 5 of 26 did) but did win the trophy for Cooperation/Core Values.  It may sound like a sympathy trophy, but it really was based on the team's demonstration that everyone played important parts, encouragement for each other, and demonstrated empathy.  We were very proud watching our boy and his teammates encourage and cheer up one discouraged teammate.

Nostalgic:

Time:

It is Christmas Time at my Sister-in-Laws house who we "dropped in" on between robotic competition rounds.  Huckleberry had to stay at the school, but thank goodness we didn't!

Full of Light:

Winter CAN be full of light when you put the low, bright sun together with some frost!

Motion:

Sunflower fell over while I was taking this shot...my husband says it was totally worth it.  She would have fallen anyway; I just might have actually witnessed it.  

I hope you had a wonderful hunt and have a most blessed of Sundays!