Day 270- Autumn Love

Texture Tuesday’s theme is LOVE this week. Since I LOVE autumn (my favorite season), I went outside, looked down and snapped this quick photo. Why did I look down? None of our autumn colored leaves seem to stay on the trees in our yard- they just immediately fall off. . .

I textured this photo with two layers of Kim’s autumn burst and 2 layers of fall in.  Follow the link on the right to Kim’s Cafe some beautiful textured photos.

Day 269- Down Under

TGIMM!

(Thank God It’s Macro Monday)!

I seem to be drawn more to the details than the big picture, so it’s a big relief to me when Macro Monday rolls around. I always forget to link to Lisa’s Chaos, where Macro Monday resides- so this week I’m not! If you have time, follow the links on that page to some beautiful macro photos.

 

Day 268- Branch Bokeh

The drooping branches of my favorite Maytens tree often provide beautiful bokeh backgrounds for photos taken in our backyard.  Today, I decided to use them as the foreground to go along with the theme for my ODC Flickr group- Starts with B.

So- now presenting Black and White Branches with Bokeh!

 

Day 267- Issues

I’m having some issues with the slideshow with this new WordPress theme.  It automatically takes the photos from the posts on this page and inserts them into a slideshow at the top.  Cool! But. . . some of them it changes.  I can’t figure out how or why it is doing that.  It seems to have something to do with whether they have been cropped or had a black and white conversion. This photo has been cropped to a square AND had a sepia treatment AND a black and white conversion on top of that (all in Aperture 3) AND then a Photoshop tweak and watermarking- so heaven help me. . .

 

Day 265- 100 More Days!

Project 365 2011 is 100 Days away from completion!  I am feeling such a sense of satisfaction from having honored my commitment to take a photo every day and post it, while improving my camera skills! I’m celebrating Day 265 by changing the look of my blog (or not. . .). I’m experimenting with WordPress themes, so not all my links are showing up. Bear with me as I play with this!

Today I am using the topic from Our Daily Challenge on Flickr- From Ground Level.  I took a beach towel and lay on our lower patio, aiming the lens one of the leaves that is starting to litter our grass. Definitely a bug’s eye view!

Day 263- Shrouded

Yes, I know I have photographed these webs before- but our yard is SHROUDED with them, and the spiders are HUGE! I feel like I am in a science fiction movie.

Today is Texture Tuesday, so I added one layer of Kim’s tattered texture using the color burn mode. This was the first time I had used color burn, which I thought did a nice job of adding some interest in the non-bokeh part of the photo (I masked off some of the texture in the rest of the image).

Day 259- Hard at Work

I found this rather large spider working hard in my garden this morning (with two more nearby!).  I didn’t really get the shot I wanted (a closeup of a spider spinning a web- all in focus).  When I increased the depth of field (closing down the aperture) on later shots, she was moving too fast for the slower shutter speed required. So, I settled for the shallow depth of field. BTW, this photo was not cropped, other than making it square (yes, I was THAT CLOSE!).

Big news in my Flickr world: yesterday’s photo of the day was “Explored”!  Not really sure what it means, but I know it’s good. . .

Day 258- Beginning

Most of the photo blogs I look at are documenting signs of the approach of autumn, so I decided to look around for some in my garden.  We have a moderate climate here, so the color display here is just beginning. I had to look closely- and, in among the greenery, here is what I found!

f/3.8, 1/2000, ISO 200, 85mm

Day 257- SF HDR

When my husband invited me to accompany him on an insurance claim in San Francisco today, I jumped at the chance to photograph something other than my backyard and family heirlooms! Unfortunately, it was a foggy day ALL day, so my plans for a gorgeous Golden Gate Bridge shot went out the window. You could see a bridge was there, but you couldn’t easily recognize as the Golden Gate.

But, with the magic of HDR, I managed to create this shot- and, I assure you, it IS the Golden Gate!

 

 

Day 256- Last One

My ODC Flickr group’s latest challenge is “with a flower on it.”  My first thought was dishes. My Blue Ridge and my china definitely are flower decorated- but I have photographed them for this blog several times.  So I wandered out on the deck this morning to see if there were any flowers left that I actually have not featured on this blog.

I think I found one. One exactly! The last geranium on the plant, alas.

Because it is Texture Tuesday (and because I like it this way), I added 2 texture layers (Kim’s bent edges and canvasback).  I played around with the image for awhile and decided to change the whole thing to a black and white.  I’m not sure if that is supposed to work well with textures, but I like the effect.

I think I will be photographing dead leaves next. . .