Back to Life - back to reality

Vacation is officially over in approximately 5 hours...I shot about 1400 shots this week at the fantastic Walt Disney World in Orlando, FL. A great time was had by all I think...I spent much of this afternoon just checking out the pictures I uploaded to my computer. I did get a few great shots...
Taken at the pool - I had the toughest time with shooting at the pool. Light from the water reflects and the sunlight is bright and everyone comes out underexposed...I must have shot 100 shots at the pool and this was the very last one. Thanks, Adam!
Melody's so funny - we were waiting in line to see something (I can't remember now what it was) but here she is telling me to take her picture.
I just want to thank my loving husband for taking this picture of us waiting for the bus...I edited this one in CS4 with an action called CoffeeShop Perfect Portrait and then applied CoffeeShop vignette to it. That is probably the best picture of me and the kids in 8 years...I love this photo!
This is a picture of Angelica walking with her Grammie at Disney's Hollywood Studios. We had to take the monorail the day before and she wasn't able to ride in the cockpit with the other kids so Grammie bought her a special prize and this was right after she gave it to Angelica (the bag in her hand). I vignetted this picture too.
This is Grammie and Melody waiting for the bus.
While this picture looks like sunset, I actually took this picture at 6:30am. Our room was on the 5th floor facing the East - beyond the twig there is a shadow of a mountain - that's Everest - Disney's latest Roller Coaster experience (I think it's like 3 years old)...did not go on that - I do roller coasters but not the ones that give me 3 hour headaches afterwards.
I set my camera on spot metering instead of the usual evaluative metering I keep my camera on.

OK, so none of these pictures look like Disneyworld, I assure you they were taken there this week. I'll post more Disney pictures as they get filtered through CS4...editing for me these days is very slow going as I am still learning about the power of CS4.

I'm off to watch the American Idol season finale...I'm rooting for Kris - and no, I don't vote...I just like to watch the singing...he happens to be cute too. =)

The Official End of the Semester

Are you ready for this? I got an A- in Anatomy & Physiology I...I can't believe it!!! I mean, I can because I did all that work but I really did not think that I was that close!!! If you're as excited as me, post a comment at the bottom...

If you go to Massasoit Community College and need to take Biological Principles, A&P I or Human Genetics, I highly recommend taking those with Dr. William Hanna. I didn't have him for Bio Prin (I had another great teacher, Ms. Diane Salvetti). As fate would have it, I ended up in Dr. Hanna's hybrid A&P I class because I got locked out of the Wednesday night traditional lecture/lab class that I was supposed to take with one of my lab partners from Bio Prin; sorry Jim!). This material isn't easy made even more difficult by taking the class as a hybrid (1/2 online, 1/2 onsite). I liked taking this class with Dr. Hanna because he expects you to be an adult and really motivate yourself to do the work. He was available for questions and help but not to the extent where he was doing the work for you...I think that makes the best kind of teacher. I've had other professors who would only help you if you showed up at office hours with a 5" mini skirt on and two cups of coffee...my legs are not bad (or were better before kids) but they aren't part of my grades. Anyway, thank you Dr. Hanna for the challenge...bring on A&P II!!!

But before any of that - the real order of business this week is vacation. Unless my niece Caitlyn brings her laptop, I will not be blogging for a week...but I will be shooting down at Disney...it's Cait's 2nd trip and her brother, Connor's 1st trip down to FL...can't wait to capture those moments...

Hopefully I will have time to post photos later - if not...see you in a week!

I'm ready

I've studied all day and cannot absorb another thing. I'm gonna go to a crop with a bunch of girlfriends and do something completely unnecessary for a change. I think I'm ready for tomorrow's final. I'm sure that I will be up early tomorrow am to re-review...

We were just outside blowing bubbles in the wind in the backyard....this is what I got...

I climbed up the playground to take this picture of Dylan on the trapeze. I also did this to the picture:I did the CoffeeShop vignette to this picture 2x. Nice...

I also got them together on the slide - this was their idea - not mine...they're better at composing a shot than I am.

Both shots were taken with my Tamron 28-75mm f/2.8 on my new Canon 50D.

And now I'm packing for this crop - I'm so ready for this vacation!!!! YAHOO!!!!

A Little Bit of a Breather

Next test isn't until Monday - it's the final...and then I am SO on vacation!!!!

Unfortunately, all the studying I've had to do has taken up all my time to do the fun stuff - like play with my camera. The good news is that the semester is over on Monday....I'm hoping for a B as an A is a little bit beyond my reach at this point...keep your fingers crossed for me...

I did though manage to decompress by fiddling with Photoshop CS4:
This is a shot of Melody falling onto Angelica. What I figured out was that if you don't rename your original photo and save it as something else, you will save over the original. In PSE6.0, you can save original and the newly edited version of the picture. (I'm sure when I have more time, I will learn CS4 well enough to be comfortable).
An unedited shot from that same set:

I can't remember what action I applied to the original shot but I love the color after the edit.






This is a picture I took the last time we went to Disney of Cinderella's Castle. I applied an action called CoffeeShop Teeny Tiny World (download from here)
It's hard to see but if you look at this picture and compare it to the following photo, you can see that the second photo looks like a "model-sized" Cinderella's Castle.
Pretty cool...I'll have to find something to shoot that will make that action more useful.

All that being said, while photoshopping is neat, I, for one, want to make sure that I take that photo properly SOOC without having to edit so much - I would rather use my time taking pictures that post-producing them...maybe someday if I ever make it to the big time, photoshopping will become a bigger part of my life...for now, I'm perfectly happy just taking the pictures.

My Selfless Plug

It's up there - on the calendar at the Scrapbook Cupboard...

I'll be teaching two photography classes - one designed for DSLR owners and the other for Point-n-Shooters...

The DSLR class is on Saturday, June 13, 2009 3:30-7:30pm
The Point-n-Shoot class is on Saturday, June 27, 2009 1:00-3:30pm

Both classes, weather permitting, will give us some time to do an outdoor shoot, offsite - this part of the class comes at the end and is totally optional. We'll have a little bit of one-on-one time to talk about the shots while looking at them in your camera and if you want to, you can email me them for more technical analysis.

I highly recommend the following:
READ YOUR CAMERA MANUAL BEFORE CLASS. I am not familiar with every digital camera out there...so this is where you help yourself...It may not have as much meaning to you as it will after and yes, it is somewhat dry reading but you should have a base knowledge of what your camera can do so that learning the other stuff becomes more relevant (and fun!)
BRING A PEN. Lots of notes to take in this class. You'll get lots of notes and you will have to take more - these chock full of a lot of good information.
BRING YOUR CAMERA so that you can participate in the shoot and look at it while you are learning.


NOTE: I am not a professional photographer. I just love this stuff and finally wrapped my head around the technical stuff enough to pass on the knowledge to others. I did take a few classes with the fabulous Karen Russell but I am NOT teaching her class...she worked very hard on designing one of the best classes I've ever taken in my life...and I've worked hard on designing one for beginner photographers/scrapbookers. I certainly invite you to take her classes if you can get in (believe me...getting into that online class was near the top of my lucky list!!!!).
Thanks Karen for being one of the greatest teachers, I've ever had!

Sign up today - call the Scrapbook Cupboard - 508-378-0008.
Thanks Bev, for the opportunity to share my love of photography with your customers!

My new camera

I'm in love - with my new camera...

The weather here in New England is seasonal for early May, after we had 2 90 degree days a couple of weeks ago...so I sat with the kids in my half-circle driveway and took their pictures.
My Angel...
Since I began really studying photography, I don't often take subject centered pictures...but I still like them when they happen. A little bit of sunflare...I can dig it!
Sometimes, I think she just looks so much older when she is serious.
That's the last time she's wearing those pants...they're a little short...the good news is she's growing...good thing too because I think her little sister is almost bigger than her.

Awww...brother and sister-ly love! I knew I had them close for a reason.
Miss Melody in her favorite purple shirt.
Even though her face is not completely focused, I still like this picture of Melody. While her hair looks so dark here, she actually has some good natural reddish/brown highlights that you can't see here. Here is Melody with another dandelion in her hand...she likes to take them and feed them to Odie as a snack.
Here are my little ones, trying to make one big people tower. Here's where they started to poop out after the tower fell.
Miss Melody taking the spotlight....this happens a lot...

All the above pictures were taken SOOC (straight out of the camera) with my Tamron 28-75mm f/2.8 attached to my Canon 50D.

I'm still fiddling with my Photoshop CS4 program - just downloaded a bunch of free actions from
CoffeeShop blog. Will let you know how it goes but there are some really nice things on there for both Photoshop and Elements. Check them out...

Stay tuned for my selfless plug regarding a photography class (or 2)....

In addition to that....

My friend Kim blogged about a friend who left us suddenly a few days ago. She writes,

You never know who we touch with our lives.

You never know who will touch you.

In addition to that, time has a limit. You don't know how much time you have to affect people. And as little as the things you do can be, you don't know how much meaning those little things have to the people you touch.

I work at HarborOne. It is my job everyday to help people. I don't look at it as retail or banking or financial, in nature. At its very core, what I do is help people. It could be helping them open up accounts or solving problems or answering questions...its still helping them. I do something that touches people everyday.

A smile, an answer, a shoulder to lean on, a photograph....

The little things you do are really not as little as you think. They may be little to you because it doesn't take much effort or you think nothing about doing something for someone. But it touches them.

Our friend, Paul didn't just touch people in little ways; he and his wife, our friend, Dana, were very active in their church with young people (who can, these days, use all the guidance they can get). Even through the rough times of illness and recovery, Dana and Paul turned to their faith undoubtingly because they knew it would help them and allow them to continue to help others. Their creativity is what touched (and still does) us. And their example will continue to touch me.

We could all take a lesson from the way that Paul lived and Dana lives their lives. Keep touching others....

Paul, may you find rest and peace and watch over us all. Please continue to touch our lives as an angel.

Dana, may you find peace and solace in your friends and know that he is right here with us always.

We love you both!!!