Pimping PSE8

So I took this picture at the Santa Cruz Beach Boardwalk last monday:

sooc - but I don't have the stats for it. I ran it through photoshop elements 8 and did exactly two things.

1st: I hit the "auto smart fix" in the drop down "enhance menu."

2nd: I cloned out the debris.

and voila:

Rockstar.

If only every edit were so easily made so awesome. I'm not going to watermark this. Because I trust you not to steal it. :-)

Evil Cat take two

Before:

And then a little bit of sharpening, a little blurring, some spot healing, some dodging and burning and a bit of desaturation...and then a crop and some rounded edges later and voila!

I'm not in love with it, but I don't hate it either and it's a nice example of dodge (the wings) and burn (the cat) can do.

But remember folks - if your pictures look like such crap that you have to spend more than a few minutes of post-processing to get them to a state of being presentable (and you're not either learning a new program or playing around to see what happens) LEARN TO TAKE BETTER PHOTOS.

The End.

Respect the Alone Hat

When I have on my Alone Hat I can't hear or see you. 

Make your own hat. Shut out the world for a bit and rediscover who you really are. (Or fold laundry in peace.)

Yet another reason to love Denise Roy.

ps - love my photoshop job? lasso, plus background layer paint plus - of course - vignette and rounded edges.)

Photoshop Thursday!

So here's the SOOC original: (all I can tell you is that it was shot on 400 speed film.)

And here's the after:

 

All I did was bump up the contrast and the saturation. Easy peasy.

Then I played and removed the color to black and white with a green tint (standard in my PSE8), added a vignette, and rounded the edges:

Movement Mat pt. II

So if you recall, we turned our "dining room" into the "playroom" way back in August.

And yesterday's before image is of what I did to the corner.

Here is the after image:

 

It's on film, and shot at full automatic. Sigh. But let me tell you something: it's a total PITA to keep track of which image is what settings (aperture, shutter speed...the ISO is the film speed, so that was easy: 400) AND catch an expression on your infant's face where his eyes are open and he's not about to scream with boredom. 

In PSE8 I simply boosted the exposure, contrast, and saturation. Then I used my favorite "rounded corners" action and added my watermark.

I'm not thrilled with the font, but I do like the clean bar - sans little floofy icon on the right. And since making a watermark is so very easy...I can make many, many, many incarnations until I get one I like.

Tutorial at my favorite new "how-to" site: coffeeshop.

Oh, and font by dafont.

And here's a shot of the whole corner:

 

 (shutter: 1/30, f3.5, ISO 200 - this is straight out of my phd*)

That's the madrock crash pad under there.  Good for many things including (but not limited to) tummy time, on-the-back flailing about, watching the light reflect on the ceiling, admiring ourselves in the mirror, running and falling onto while giggling like a maniac (my 2 year old nephew last week), falling onto off of a wall, couching up and reading together, couching up and spraying climbing stories that may or may not be bogus while enjoying a couple of cheap cold ones between climbs. When he gets a little older I'm going to hook up a bar for him to pull up on so he'll have somewhere sturdy and safe to practice standing. 

*phd = Push Here, Dummy. Also known as a point-and-shoot, but much more fun to say :) I do love my little Olympus for the quick and dirty shots.

So there you have it. A movement mat and some

Jump...edited

Ok - so I chose the worst quality scan for the first picture, but since I'm before coffee anyway I took advantage and didn't do a whole lot to it.

I just used the rounded corners action from Rita's coffeeshop (an amazing resource for PS, PSE, and Lightroom actions and tutorials) and then I applied a little sponging to desaturate the background and saturate the people (that's me on the far left...I was 10.)

I'm not sure I love it, but like I said, I'm pre-coffee....also, I'm no Pioneer Woman.

Interesting aside - this creek is in the town where the Olympic Bomber hung out. When I heard that I felt it was an appropriate place.

Take some time to play today.


PS - I have no idea how to get rid of those white corners up there. Any tips?