Bonnie - Week 4 Light and Shadow

Week 4: Light and Shadow

 

This week for me should probably be labeled less light and more shadow. I was attempting to find some amazing sunrises or sunsets -- or stormy skies that would demonstrate light better, but my attempts were either thwarted by lack of sleep in getting up early to catch a sunrise, uncooperative weather -- or simply not being able to find what I wanted to take a photo of.

 

So, here's what I have for you...

 

Light:

 

A Bright Idea

For these I took a photo of two overhead lights from a row of many at a restaurant in Fairfield CT. I liked the filament that was visible in the bulbs. I cropped the photo to center the bulbs, and attempted to straighten them. However, because they weren't hung straight to begin with, I tried to find a happy medium. I lassoed the entire middle section to adjust the brightness levels after feathering, so the socket would be better visible against the dark background, but it made the filaments blur a bit -- so I did it in two steps. First I brightened the whole area of bulb and socket, and then I went back in and brought the sockets alone up a bit more. While they still blend a bit into the dark background, they are a LOT better than they were. I played around with black and white for this photo, but I liked the amber tones under the bulbs, from the blurred bulbs behind these two, and I also liked the red color that came out on the top left socket when I increased the brightness. There are also some nice shades of blue that are intermittently picked up from shadows on both the bulb and the sockets, as well as a slight reflection of filament in the bottom of the glass bulbs.  (Favorite #1)

 

 

Lace Curtain Irish

For this I loved capturing both the shadows and light in the window panes from the filtered sun coming through the lace in the early morning. I cropped the photo to remove the window frame and I switched it to black and white. Then I lassoed and feathered the middle portion where the sun was shining in and adjusted the levels to be even brighter to make it the focal point, and then I inversed the lasso section and created a darker contrast in the outer edges.

 

Shadows

 

 

The Cowboy

This is the shadow of my husband, who always wears a cowboy hat, in the midafternoon sun. For this I cropped the photo to just capture his head, and I lassoed and feathered the interior of the shadow to increase the darkness contrast. I contemplated changing it to black and white, but I loved the blue tones that emerged from the darker contrast so I left it in color. Then I used the inverted selection to lighten outside the shadow. Not my favorite picture at all, but I did think the idea was cute, in spite of the execution being a little less than stellar. If it was a sharper shadow it might have been a bit better, as this looks a bit cartoonish. But I did like the beautiful variety of colors that I was able to intensify within the shadow that were not really apparent to the naked eye before editing.

Window Pane Chair

This was the shadow from a chair in a courtyard and I liked the way the chair back curved and gave a soft effect against the hard patio bricks.  I did little more than crop this, and I'm not sure if should have straightened it or not. But straightening it cropped more of the picture out and left less of the patio brick. (see below). For these two photos, other than cropping, I did little to edit it except to use the shadow and highlighting tool, which gave me some nice white reflections in some of the window pane from the chair reflection, and brought out some of the brick texture.

Same as above - Straightened

Tried to straighten the grout lines, which cropped the picture down a bit more. I'm not sure which one I like better...so here are both!

Fencing

This photo I cropped and straightened to align the end post with the photo frame. I lassoed the center portion and feathered and adjusted the middle to a brighter shade to create a focal point. I considered using the erase tool to rid the sidewalk of gum, but thought that it might get a little too perfect looking, and for some reason my photographs seem to accent the grittier side of life.

Cast Iron Pan

This was my brunch dish Sunday afternoon that was served in a cast iron skillet with a porcelain white dish as a liner.  I loved the way the shadow reflected the handle slot in the side of the skillet. For this photo, I changed it to black and white, cropped it and increased the contrast on the pan, then I went in the outer edge of the pan and increased the highlight and contrast to show the hard and uneven texture of the interior of the pan.  (Favorite #2)

 

Where I failed this week:

• Still not shooting in RAW. (Why do I keep forgetting to make this adjustment??)
• Went out to shoot with ideas of what I wanted to capture (sunsets, sunrises, amazing shadows) and of course could not replicate what my imagination wanted to find.

 

What I learned this week.

• Let the picture come to you instead of looking for it. My favorite photos from this week were the ones I  just happened to see, and say, "what a neat picture that might be".
• I love black and white!

 

For this week I intend to add more over the next few days as I relax and let the photos come to me.