Photography Tips and Techniques - #1

Since I have recently joined a great photography club and have been busily taking pictures, I decided to start a new series about photography that I shall affectionately shorten to "Photography T & T" :)  First off, thanks to the president of the photography club that I am in.  Though she shall remain unnamed, I shall be sharing her words with you throughout this series.  Each # in the series will have 2 main parts:

1) What I learned

2) How I accomplished it (my own picture examples)

Here goes!

Photography T & T #1

Part 1 - lesson

The first lesson on photography was about 

Texture, Detail, Symbolism, Colors, and Uniqueness 

(I was late to class so this is really just my interpretation of these terms :)

First, lets start with texture.  Lets say I want to take a picture that really brought out the texture in an object.  I might choose something like yarn or fabric to photograph.  In order for your picture to look like the yarn feels, you will need to zoom pretty close into the yarn.  You might even take a close up of one strand of yarn alone.  In the end, however, the soft and fuzzy feel of the yarn should speak clearly from your picture.

Here is an example picture of something with texture (from the internet):

Though this picture is not a perfect example of texture (it is a little bleary), it is sufficient to show what I mean by texture.  

Next is DETAIL.  Generally, all pictures should include some amount of detail so this one is quite easy.  Detail really is just the crispness and quality of the picture.  The dictionary meaning for "detail" is:  "an individual separable part of something..."  Basically, you want to define each detail, separating them.

This picture really focuses on the detail of the water droplets and the vibrant color of the leaf.  It is good example of using detail.

Third, we have SYMBOLISM.  This attribute of a picture is hard.  Essentially, you are symbolizing something greater than what is presented (much like in literature).  Here is an example of using symbolism in photography:

 Again, this is not a great picture, but you can see the symbolism:  cross, Jesus, Salvation, Bible, etc.

Now we have COLORS.  If you use a editing software or even just your own computer, one way to easily make your picture more vibrant is to increase the saturation.  This, however, does not necessarily better your photography skills.  For starters, pick something simple, like flowers, and focus on the most colorful part.  Though your picture may not turn out quite like this, it is a good example of using color (along with editing):

Colors that agree with each other on the color wheel are aesthetically pleasing to the eye.

Finally, we have UNIQUENESS.  Have fun with this!  I have not included an example because it is just a huge category.  Your personal style plays a key role in your photography.  Try taking pictures at weird angles and step out of your comfort zone...you never know, they may turn out to be really cool!  :)

Part 2 - what I did

Part of our assignment was to:

"Make the Mundane Beautiful"

use "Personal Touch"

and I added a picture that I took that represents texture.

 I made the "mundane beautiful" by taking a picture of a gorgeous weed :)

Texture: bark

Personal: my horse 

Your challenge: incorporate texture, detail, symbolism, color, and uniqueness into your photos....and try to add all of them into one photo!  :-)

What do you think of my photos?  What was good about them?  What aspects could I change or have done differently?

Remember:  we are created in the image of God and each one of us has been given a unique sense of creativity: push your limits!  See what you can do to God's glory, even through something as small as photography.

Have a wonderful week!

~Lillian Kate

Photography

Hi all!
Sorry for not posting in a while, I've been really busy with school starting and all, but I decided I would share some recent photos with you.  I just became a member of a photography club, so I should be posting pictures more often/photography techniques.  I am currently using a Nicon D40x (relatively basic camera) to take all of my pictures and I do not own any editing software...pretty raw! 










The pictures of the large CATS are pond building equipment...a swimming hole for the hot summers!  YES!!!

Oh, and I thought I'd share the Audience of pageviewers...I enjoy seeing people around the world reading my little blog...

AUDIENCE:

United States

1349

Russia

82

China

64

Germany

59

France

27

Israel

20

Switzerland

19

Romania

18

Malaysia

16

United Kingdom

14

Have a wonderful rest of the week!

Have you been taking any good pictures lately?  
Do you love photography?  
Have you started school yet?

~Lillian

The Great and the Small

I'm not sure how to begin this post, so I will start by categorizing recent events in 2 ways: the "Awkward" and the "Awesome"'s of the recents.  :)

Over the past month or so:

AWESOME:

*Having your cousins over...my 6 year old cousin loves the horses and always remembers his cool cowboy boots when he comes to visit.  Consequently, I give in to his cuteness and lead our old Tennesse Walker, Midnight, around with my cousin sitting triumphantly on his back.  He has become quite good at riding, and has picked it up very easily.  He know knows how to halt and turn all by himself.  We have not gotten into gaiting yet, but we will sometime soon, I'm sure :)  Sometimes leading a horse around for a while is exhausting (I walk beside him), but it is well worth it to see the genuine love of horses in my little cousin.  In fact, he loves them so much that he looks forward to the barn chores!  He even offers to help me clean out the stalls and proudly pushes the manure wheelbarrow all by himself.  So, all in all, I love it when my cousins come over for a visit.

*Going to Michigan for the first time ever.  My family and I stayed for 1 week at a tiny little lodge on the beach.  Unlike some of the other plots of beech that other lodges had down the road, our lodge had a large sandy area of beach and really clear water.  We just hung out most of the time, but we did take a day trip to Makinac (pronounced 'makinAW') Island.  We hopped on a ferry and took our bikes with us.  Since their are hardly any traffic rules on the Island (no cars are allowed on the Island), everything was buzzing with activity while we biked on the roads.  We passed countless horse-draw carriages.  The Island proudly hosts the Grand Hotel which, as its name states, is truly grand.  So grand, in fact, that you are required to pay a $10 fine to walk on its street.  No, I'm not teasing.  

Our beach

The very Grand Hotel...

...and their dress requirements 

*Jumping my horse at the county Fair this year. We cleared a 2' 6" course quite well and had a great time doing it!  I competed in dressage, too, which is a challenging thing for Hope and I to do well in since we primarily jump together.  But we got a first place trophy!  I was happily surprised; there were about 10+ other dressage riders competing.  (sorry, no pictures)

AWKWARD:

*When kayaking on Lake Michigan near your lodge's beach you almost tip over.  Flipping is fine in of itself, but when people are watching you (yes, those people would be strangers) and you are in about 5 inches of water, it is quite an embarrassing adventure.  I had gotten out of the kayak to walk it out of the rocks.  That went fine until I tried to get into it again...that is when I teetered dangerously on the edge of flipping onto rocks.  Of course, this takes time to tell, but really it happened in about 2 seconds.  Tottering on the edge, saving myself with, well, one finger.  Yes, OUCH.

*Sweating.  I sweated A LOT at Fair this year (the heat index was about 105 F because of humidity).  As I was sitting on Hope while waiting for my next jumping class, my brother says, "Oh look!  You have a sweat mustache!"  Great, just what I wanted, a sweat mustache.  With the adrenaline rush of jumping a course in front of a judge and wearing breeches, tall boots, show shirt, jacket, and a non-breathable show helmet, you can imagine how hot I got...and how much I sweated.  Yuck.  

On the drive home we stopped at Sleeping Bear Dunes.  This is my brother jumping a dune :)

                                          

Home to my horses

  

 Home, sweet home

Of summer showers and spring flowers

     When you think of celebrating Independence day properly, you might think of grilling savory hamburgers, swimming in a pool (and successfully getting sunburned), and watching colorful fireworks.  That is how I imagine the 4th of July should be.  Yet, this year, it rained.  Yes, it simply rained.  Other than being my brother’s birthday, it was beginning to be quite a disappointing way to celebrate the 4th.  What I was mostly bummed about, though, was the lack of fireworks.  we did not see any fireworks.  At least, that is, on Independence Day itself.  In the end, we heard that a theme park near our house was doing their fireworks on the 5th since it was raining on the 4th.  Yes!  One tiny victory!  The fireworks were amazing as usual and we had a good time.  All that said, hope you had a happy Independence Day!  (in light of the recent actions of our government, however, some begin to wonder what our representatives believe is True Freedom.  The light of Christ and the Scripture describe the True meaning of Freedom and Justice.)
     Anyhow, I thought I would share with you some of my more recent picture of some of the flowers around our house.

Raining while the sun is out!

“In the beginning, God created the heavens and the earth…And God saw that it was good.”

~Genesis 1:1,25

Of Rewarding Work

Last Saturday, the Lord blessed us with a bountiful harvest of hay :).  In the fall/summer of 2012, we paid a local farmer to seed our 10 acres of pasture in preparation for baling season.  Now we have around 200 bales of hay!  Even though it is usually hard for small farmers to find people with the machines needed to cut and bale the hay, we found someone who was willing to bale both our fields and take 150 bales as our payment.  So, all in all, everything worked out well!  On Saturday my brother, father, and I spent a hot day in both fields collecting the hay from the fields and transferring them to the barn.  I drove our tractor while the boys rode in the trailer.  Eventually, we got a system that worked successfully: I drove the tractor the to nearest bale of hay, my dad jumped out of the trailer and lifted the hay into it, then we drove off again.  (As I stress about how hot and hard farming is, please keep in mind that, while my dad was doing all the heavy physical work, I was getting bitten by little nasty bugs while driving the tractor.  Yes, when we had finished I was not sore or tired like my father, yet being in the sun all day really sucks the life out of you.)  Anyway, my dad let me keep 6 or 7 bales of hay out in the field for me to jump over with my horse…that was fun :)  Since it was around 93 degrees and we were in the full sun most of the day, I now sport a elegant “farmer’s tan.”  So, in conclusion, though farming is hot and hard work, it is definitely worth the time and effort.  When I look out of my bedroom window and see the hay piled high outside, I can’t help but sigh with satisfaction.  Not only did we save money by baling the hay ourselves, but we certainly had fun doing it.

Saturday morning’s sun was beautiful!

My faithful vehicle for the day :)  Oh, how I love Kubotas!

Unloading the hay

We used these $1 a piece crates to keep the hay off of the ground.

And so, we ended a day of hard work with a smile on our faces and the sticky evidence of yummy popsicles still on our lips.