Color Focus!

Part One:


This part of my project has little or nothing to do with color. Twitchell asked to to take someone's senior picture and I did.

While I was taking this picture, despite the fact that portrait photography is something I loath, I tried to listen to what Myron wanted most.

I snapped a few shots and then showed him the pictures, it was a little frustrating at first because he didn't like anything I was doing.

Finally, I got a shot that he enjoyed, despite Stephan's complaining of "cut off limbs."


Before Edit:





After Edit:



As you can see, the picture, before I edited it, looked over exposed and had a rather soft look to it. I edited the picture using Adobe Photoshop CS3, and added some texture to the picture with a high pass filter and soft light. I also used a burning technique that Stephan taught me. After a few different layers and edits, I decided that the picture seemed well enough to send to Mr. Louis; which I did. I am looking forward to seeing my photo in the year book, it seems sort of exciting.



Part two:

This part of my project was the focus on color part. With these images I was trying to convey a sense of color shown at my place of employment- Silverwood Theme Park. I got my inspiration for these images here:
http://themeparkphotography.com/TPP_Dorney_Template.html


Although, at this website they photographed more the rides than the other things within the park, and I decided to do the exact opposite. I photographed the people, the food items, the employees. It all seemed a lot more "colorful" than the simple rides themselves. (Which aren't very colorful at Silverwood, except Aftershock!)

Picture One:


This is a picture of a cotton candy vendor that happened to be closed when I took a picture of it. In Photoshop I changed the colors and a little bit to get them to pop a little more, and put a high pass filter-soft light-layer mask on the cotton candy place. I always find in ironic that it's mostly for cotton candy and it looks a lot like an old school popcorn maker.


Picture Two:



This image was taken to show color in a soft of dark setting. Haleigh and I were sitting on a bench in the shade, and I decided that this would be a cool shot of a ride stick. People hate those things... a lot of ride operators get yelled at over the height restrictions being off.


Picture Three:



This image, Haleigh and I were riding scrambler. I was going to take a picture of her, but she got upset with me, so I moved the camera to something more interesting. I love the red and blue contrast on this picture, with the faint out of focus corkscrew and middle of the ride in the background.


Picture Four:





These are both picture of employees at silverwood, the top one is Shaun, and the bottom one is Sam. Shaun is a ride operator and Sam is the rides supervisor. Both very cool people. I decided that these pictures went hand in hand because I took them with the mindset that the shirts would be the emphasis on color.


Out of all the projects I've done, I think I'm most proud of this one... the more I take pictures and the more I experiment on my own the happier I am with the photos I've been taking. These projects have become more than just a weekly grade in my life, they're sort of a fine line of organization, which I have missed a lot during the summer.

I'm looking forward to the portrait section.

-Mursadii Link

I found a website!

http://www.sweetsauer.com/daily_photos/2009/03/photo-scavenger-hunt-daily-photo-ideas.html



So I've been sick for the last two days at home, and I decided that I would take pictures of a few things from this website. I had to brainstorm ideas, and I decided that a scavenger hunt would be a very good idea. Something I could do around my house, and wouldn't die because of.



Right now I am sifting through ideas of what I want to do for the scavenger hunt. I am thinking as of right now.

- Something Silver.

- Flames.

- Coffee.

- Something in black and white.

- A cat.

- A flower.



Something Silver


I took this picture as a staged photograph. Most of the pictures I took for this project were staged. Actually, all the pictures we took were staged, I do believe. Anyways, the door knob of this picture was a golden color and I desaturated it in order to fit more with the "silver" theme.(http://i151.photobucket.com/albums/s121/stumpy01/skeletonkey.jpg)






Flames


I enjoyed the high contrasts of this picture and the three different colored candles. I originally wanted to take a picture of a piece of paper burning outside, but the light was too bright to catch a good picture of the flame. I enjoy this picture though, I love the reflection of light on the wood. It's amazing. (http://i85.photobucket.com/albums/k61/zozo113124/photography/candle_Candle_light_2004.jpg)


Coffee.


Okay, so I did tea, because I decided that tea would be good for my sickness. I hate being sick, and tea always seems to make me feel better. I love the sugar with the spoon on the side of the picture. Before I put that there I figured it was missing something, and I decided something sweet would go quite nicely into the picture. (http://i229.photobucket.com/albums/ee182/lieshlovesyou/photography/coffee.jpg)


Black and White.


This picture was my silver picture, but then I decided that there was too much attention drawn to the frog and not enough to the key, and the key was suppose to be the main asset of the picture.(http://i46.photobucket.com/albums/f147/smunyan/blackandwhite.jpg)


Cat.


I did some editing work on the eyes of my cat in this picture. I love my cat with everything in me, by the way! He's amazing. : D Best cat ever. (http://i10.photobucket.com/albums/a130/samy123/fair6.jpg)


Flower.

This is a picture of a flower, and it was a little ironic how I put the flower in a flowered flower pot. It made me laugh a little bit, I enjoy the picture. I think the pink of the flower goes well with the burgundy of the counter top. (http://i105.photobucket.com/albums/m234/_puddles_/untitled.jpg)



I know this isn't the best I could've done for this project, but I tried my hardest with the resources I had due to the fact that I am house ridden do to my sickness.

I will be in school tomorrow.

I am hoping that I can learn more about my camera in the future while using manual mode on my camera, which I also experiences more of while taking pictures this time.


-Mursadii Link

Project Number One.

"A New Style for Me"



No, it is not 12:03 on a school night, and it is defiantly not the last school night before this project is due.

I was debating everything that I was going to post into this blog, and then it became lost, and floated out of my mind.

My project was originally littering on beaches and other public socialising spots, but then I decided that littering wouldn't be a very fun subject to do a whole project on. However, trying to find a project at the last minute I thought, "hey, why not tie two things I love doing together?" So you know what I did? I went to a show. Well, a "concert."

During this concert I decided that I would do something I have never tried yet.



(I have been in photography for 2 going on 3 years now... and I have never learned how to use my f-stops and ISO, so I experimented with my camera while I took pictures of some bands.)
I decided that I was very glad that I have an SLR, and I now look forward to picture taking more than I use to... you know, now that I know what the heck I'm doing when I'm holding an expensive piece of equipment in my hand.

The first few pictures I took weren't so great...

"First Attempt"

My first picture got me down for sure. However, I wanted to keep working on my ideas and try and expand it a little further in order to gain skill and learn more how to work with my camera. I was not going to give up, and I was most certainly not going to go back to automatic mode. I had a goal to learn manual mode.

"Feel the Energy"

After a while I started getting the hang of it. When I went back through and did some photoshop work, I took some information from the videos and used the highpass filter with the soft light over lay. I decided that the highpass filter and soft light, are now my very best friends. It's like music... I go through commands in photoshop like I go through songs I put on repeat. I really enjoyed the first picture, because I always felt "orange lighting" in a band picture... was "energy" of the person singing.

(T.J. From Good Kids Bad Ideas)

"Let's Mosh!"

After fooling around with taking pictures and getting shoved into the stage more than once, I decided to take pictures of the mosh.


I loved this one because of the whole "energy concept" once again, and because the kid in the hat seems to be having such a jolly good time!

(Mosh Kids Hanging out at Goodnight Sunrise)

This was the one and only time during the whole night that I was okay with using my automatic setting. I wanted to catch a neat picture, and my settings were getting a little mixed up, so I put automatic on, and I personally think I got an awesome shot of these kids.

The kid with the mullet...

Yeah, he's pretty cool.

Pretty sure I can still smell him... wish he'd shower.

(Kids still moshing to Goodnight Sunrise)

Goodnight Sunrise was the last band that my friend stayed to listen to. (We got hungry.) Now I know that this picture is not photography at all, in fact it's completely against the rules of photography... but then again, are there rules?! I CONSIDER THIS ART! I love the colors, the energy. They happened to be singing a slow song. Awesome, right?
And they're ghosts, how cool?!

(Dan and Sam of Goodnight Sunrise)

Both of these pictures of Dan were once I managed to get my camera under control for about the hundredth time.

What happened, is I guess Goodnight Sunrise needs a darker stage than everyone else...

Yeah, that was fun to figure out.

(Dan of Goodnight Sunrise)

And as I draw my final conclusions about my project... I decide that this blog post is far too long, and there is nothing I can do about it. I'm thinking back to all the paper towel and toilet paper commericals now. "Less is more..." well that just sucks when it comes to this blog post, doesn't it?



-Mursadi Link