Photo Assignment 7, Nature/Landscape

For my seventh and final Photo Assignment, I chose to take, edit, and turn in photos of Nature/Landscapes.  I took these photos in different times over the period of a week, in places such as my neighborhood, school, and places around Saline. I didn't edit, or only slightly edited all but three of these photos. I didn't edit some of them because I didn't want to mess up the light and colors the photo already had. The hardest thing about this Photo Assignment was narrowing all the photos down to turn in. The best photo I took is below.

The ISO of this picture is 64, the Fstop is f/10.6, and the Exposure/Shutter Speed is 1/218 seconds. The rest of the photos I took are below.

What I liked most about this assignment is that it shows that Michigan doesn't always have to be droopy or gloomy or gray. Some of the photos in the slideshow show lots of the color Michigan's nature has. The editing I did the the photos was mostly Levels, Cropping, and Exposure touch-ups. I really enjoyed this assignment.

Visual Dictionary

For this assignment we had to take a creative word from the dictionary and put photos together to describe those words. The words I used were undulation, melancholy, and theater. The techniques I used on Photoshop were Crop, Paint, Clone, and Blending Tools, along with Quick Selection Tools. The three Visual Dictionaries I made are below.

I liked this assignment because it allowed us to show our creativity in our Photoshop skills along with our creativity in finding and interpreting words with images. 

Photo Assignment 6, Event

For my sixth Photo Assignment, I chose to take and edit pictures of an Event. The event i chose is a Christian camp I go to every year with my youth group, SpringHill. I chose to turn in pictures of this camp because it's something I always look forward to, and there's tons of exciting things there to take pictures of, such as car rides, the Tubing Hill, and, one of my favorites, the bands! Since it's always snowy when i"m there, I tried to take pictures that didn't have a lot of glare from the snow. The best photo I have is below, taken during one of the concerts.

The ISO of this is picture was around 600, the Fstop was 1/1.8, and the Exposure was 1/200 seconds.

The rest of the photos I took at SpringHill are below.

My favorite thing about this assignment was that I could take something I really love, and edit the photos to make them look better, then get a grade from it. The photos not only describe the event but you can tell how exciting and fun the experience was. On all the photos, all I had to do was crop them and change the Levels a little, along with some Brightness and Contrast problems from sun and snow glares. Overall, this assignment was really fun.

Photoshop Tutorial

The tutorial I chose to replicate in my photo describes how to fade one or more images into another. The link below shows step by step instructions, using detailed instructions along with images you'll find in Photoshop to help you transform your photo. This tutorial was created by CreativePro.com, which has tons of other tutorials you can use in Photoshop. They tell/show you how to fade images together using a Gradient Tool. I really liked this tutorial because the descriptions they used along with the pictures made editing this photo a lot easier. This tutorial is a lot easier to follow if you already know how to use the Photoshop basics, such as editing Levels, Exposure, using a Clone and Paint Tool, etc. If not, this tutorial might be more difficult. This tutorial works really well for collages, photo albums, panoramic photos, scrapbooks, or almost any kind of photo. The link to this tutorial, along with the photo I edited using this URl, are below.

Photoshop Fading Tutorial

Photo Assignment 5, Portrait

For my fifth Photo Assignment, I chose to make Portraits. I took pictures of my sister, Kaitlyn, and her boyfriend, Andrew. I used my own camera for this. The trickiest thing, besides making Kaitlyn and Andrew cooperate, was making sure the photo didn't have a huge glare in it when it turned out. My camera also doesn't have the best Portrait settings on it, but the pictures still came out pretty good. They looked even better after I edited them in Photoshop, even with some minor changes. The best photo I took is below.

The ISO of this picture was 64, the Fstop was f/5.5, and the Shutter Speed was 1/209 seconds.
The other ten best photos I took are below.

I liked this assignment because it let me have fun taking different pictures of people in different areas of Saline, such as railroad tracks and Millpond Park, using different poses as we went along. The best thing is that the photos didn't need a ton of editing once I uploaded them in Photoshop. Most just needed some Levels or Exposure adjustments.

School Context

For this assignment, we had to take a photo of part of Saline High School and paste other pictures into it to make an unrealistic photo look realistic. The before and after picture I took and then edited are below.

I liked this assignment because it let everyone show their creativity in how and what they put into the photo. I liked this assignment because it also helped teach me a lot of new techniques in Photoshop, and I really like the photo that turned out.

Photo Assignment 4, Architecture

For my fourth Photo Assignment, I walked around Saline and took pictures of architecture. It was really sunny outside so I had to adjust the settings on my camera so there wasn't a ton of sunlight covering my pictures. I took all of these pictures on my own camera, not one from school. All of the pictures I have are buildings from around Saline, such as bakeries, churches, and restaurants. The best picture of Architecture I have is below.

The ISO of this photo is 64, the Fstop is f/5.5, and the Exposure is 1/272 seconds. 

The rest of my Architecture pictures are below. 

The hardest thing about this assignment was getting the right settings to take the pictures, and finding the right angle to take the picture. But this assignment was fun and interesting because with just a little bit of editing the photos of places I see all the time are a lot better. 

Portrait Demo

For this assignment, we had to take two Portrait photos, one with an official 3-Point Light setup, the other just using light from a window and poster board. The light reflecting off the poster board puts light on the other half of the persons face, so the other half of the face isn't shadows. The 3-Point Light setup has real, expensive lights that provide all the light needed for a good portrait photo. After setting the Shutter Speed on my camera higher (around 1/160) all I had to do was turn on the Portrait Setting, center the picture, and take it. The best pictures I took are below. The right was taken with the window and poster board, and the left with the 3-Point Setup.

Photo Assignment 3, Black and White

For my third photo assignment, I chose to take pictures in black and white. I took pictures of mostly trees, bushes, and a few different landscapes. Some of these photos were taken on a school camera, but most I took on my camera from home. After walking around and getting a lot of pictures, I uploaded them to Photoshop and changed them to black and white photos. The best Black and White picture I have is below.

The ISO of this picture is 64, the Fstop is f/9.4 and the Shutter Speed is 1/296. It was sunny the day I took this so I didn't use a flash. The other ten of my best Black and White photos are below.

The hardest thing about this assignment was finding things to take a picture of, and getting certain objects or backgrounds to be blurry. My camera also works a lot differently from the ones we use at school so I had to change a lot of the settings to make the photo look right.

Panoramic Photos

For this assignment, we learned how to make a Panoramic photo. This basically means you take a picture of something, but you're able to show more of the landscape. You do this by taking a picture of a landscape, then moving the photo to a different part of the landscape, while also overlapping about 30-40% of the previous photo. You can end up with 3-7 photos for each Panoramic. Then all you have to do is upload the pictures to Photoshop, and it'll blend them all together for you. The Panoramic photos I took are below.




What I learned from this assignment wasn't just how to make Panoramic photos, but also how to find things that are good for making a panoramic, like the side of a building or large landscapes. My favorite thing about this assignment was putting the 4 or 5 pictures I took and turning them into a much better photo then if I had just one.

Motion Demo

For this assignment our class went outside and took an picture of someone riding a bike. Our goal was to blur out the background and keep the person on the bike in focus. What made this assignment difficult was the bright lights outside. The shutter speed also had to be lower (1/100), and the aperture higher (8.0) to get  a better looking photo. The ISO was also set very low (only 80). What I learned from this assignment was that the lighting of where you are really changes how the settings o your camera need to be set. If they're not correct, the photo won't be good. The best photo I took is below.

Photo Assignment 2, Macro

For my second Photo Assignment, I used my own camera to take pictures of various items around my house. I used a Macro/Close-Up Setting on my camera to get more detail into the pictures. It was kind of hard to find things to take pictures of, but after I had enough I uploaded them to Photoshop and edited a few to make them look better. I mostly just cropped them and used the Clone Tool to get rid of dust or other objects I didn't want in the picture. The best picture I took is pictured below.

The ISO of this picture is 800, the Fstop is f/3.1, and the Exposure is 1/3 seconds. I didn't use a flash when I took this picture either.




The hardest thing about this assignment was getting the camera to focus in enough on the object to see the detail but not make the photo very blurry. I'm also used to he school's cameras so using my camera again needed some getting used to. I had to be really patient with this assignment because there's a lot of camera settings you have to change and you have to make the photo look just right in the end.

Photo Assignment 2 Inspiration

For my second Photo Assignment, I plan on focusing on the subject of Macro. Macro is focusing really close in on an object, animal, person, anything. I hope that doing this assignment will help teach me how to use the Macro settings on my camera. I haven't used it a lot, and I'm not sure what I'm looking for exactly, but I'll keep some of these photos in mind and keep an eye out for something to take a picture of.

Ladybug

Water Droplets on Leaf

Flower

These photos are good inspiration because they really show a close up detail of these animals and objects. Also, a lot of the pictures are lighter so I think I'm going to look for areas with good lighting when I'm taking pictures for this assignment. I hope I find some really good ones. :)

Photo Retouching

For this assignment, we had to use Photoshop and change the original photo of a car, and use different Layers, Clone Tools, Crop Tools, and and Painting Tools to make the photo look better. We had to make sure the car looked better, but not totally different from before. Below is the before and after of the photo.

By completing this assignment, I learned how to use Photoshop tools much better, so now I can make other photos I take look even better. Making small adjustments to a photo, such as cropping and maybe changing the layers slightly, make a photo look a lot better then the original. The most important thing I learned about Photoshop from this assignment was making sure you're on the right layer when editing the photo, because if you're on the wrong one, the photo won't change at all. I also think the Undo tool is important because it helps you undo any mistakes or accidents you made with the photo. 

 But the photos we see today in magazines and on billboards are much different. The editors of those photos make a person look completely different. The issue is that Photoshop is being misused and overused by these people and that's what people are comparing themselves and others to. I don't mind a little change in a photo, but I don't think  completely transforming a person is necessary for an advertisement.

Photo Assignment 1, Animal

For this assignment, I had to I had to take a camera home and take pictures of my dog, Abby. I had to use different lighting and backgrounds, along with Aperture and Shutter Speed settings to make the photos look good. I also had to make my dog play, or do a trick, or be still while I took a photo. After uploading the pictures, I turned in my best and uploaded that and another 10 best to this blog.

Above is my best photo of my dog playing. The ISO of the picture is 400, the Fstop is f/3.5, the Focal Length is 12.80mm, the Exposure, or Shutter Speed, is 1/40 seconds, and there was no flash used.




What I learned from this assignment is that using backgrounds and lighting is very important, and putting those elements together with Aperture and Shutter Speed to take the best photos. The hardest thing about this assignment was getting my dog to cooperate, making her play or stay still or go somewhere. But once she started to play, I just had to be patient and wait for her to do something I could take a picture of.

Photoshop Popart Assignment

For this assignment, we took a simple photo of ourselves in Photobooth and then uploaded them in Photoshop to edit them into this. We did this by manipulating the size and color of the photo to create a collage of ourselves in different colors. This assignment taught me how to use Photoshop better so I can edit my other photo assignments and make them look better.

Assignment One Inspiration

For my first Photo Assignment I have decided to take photos of an animal. I hope this assignment will help me capture the activities of animals and focus on things that they do. I also hope this will help me get better at rearranging light and using aperture to help the photos come out better.

Some photographs I have found online that I can use for inspiration are:

http://www.flickr.com/photos/cubagallery/4598445714/

http://www.flickr.com/photos/cubagallery/3861821692/

and

http://www.flickr.com/photos/sevgi_durmaz/1484128090/

I think these are great examples of animals. Some of them focus in on the animals activity and blurs the background, while others use the background around the animal to make the photo look better overall. These pictures also mess around with the lighting behind and around the animal to highlight its details and features. For this assignment I really hope to get a lot of great pictures of my dog, granted I get her under control for once. :)