Final Project - My Florida Vacation

Make a Smilebox slideshow

I used Smilebox to create my final project. All of the pictures that I have used are my own. These are all pictures that I have taken throughout the course of this semester. I hope you like what I've come up with!

Action Shots

These are some various action shots that I have taken. The first is one that I captured of a duck that was diving down for something appetizing that was obviously under the water.

The second picture is one that I was able to capture at Sea World during one of their many, many amazing shows.

The third picture is one that I took of a pelican as it was flying in for a water landing.

Last, but certainly not least, is a picture that I took of Jason Varitek, Red Sox catcher, as he was warming up in the bullpen before the game.

Portraits

This is a picture that I took of Jaba Chamberlain, a pitcher for the New York Yankees (yuck), when I went to the game in Boston. I really liked the intensity on his face, as he warmed up for the game that the Red Sox eventually won in the bottom of the eleventh!!

Adding text to pictures

The two pictures I have chosen to add text to are one that I took when I was on Miami Beach and one that I took of my 'little girl' Winnie. I though the Miami Beach picture looked a little bit like a postcard after I added the text to it. Pretty neat!

Clone stamp

As you can see in the bottom picture, there was an orange fence in the background and some shadows and lines in the foreground of this picture. When I first uploaded the modified picture, I had not taken out the shadows in front of the pelican's feet, or above him near his neck, but I went back to remove them because I thought it would look a lot better. I'm really happy with the way it came out. I think the picture looks so much cleaner and sharper after having the opportunity to go in and clean it up. This is by far my favorite tool that we have used thus far. I was a little nervous about using it at first, but now I think it's something that I will use more often!

Filters

The top image is the untouched one that I took of a tower at an amusement park in Orlando. For the bottom picture, I added a few different filters to it, playing with them until I found something that I thought looked pretty neat. I tried to layer a few different ones, but I'm not sure if it actually worked or if this is the result of one single filter. I'm still learning as I go along with Photoshop...

Dodge and Burn

The top picture is the original picture untouched, while the bottom picture has been altered using dodge and burn, among other things. I tried to lighten the top of the picture, where the leaves of the trees are, and the majority of the trunk that was originally covered in shadows.

I went on to darken the clouds and sky in the frame of the tree, and adjusted the overall brightness and contrast of the picture. I also tried to make the blue of the water stand out a bit more by brightening that up as well.

Winnie Mosaic

I LOVE THIS!!! I'm pretty sure that the photo mosaic is my new favorite thing in the whole world. This was a really fun program for me; I played with it for a long time. The picture that I chose is of my dog, Winnie. This is one of my many favorite pictures of her... she was outside in my backyard in the summertime just hanging out. All of the pictures used to create this were various ones that I had of either Winnie or her sister, so that made this extra special.

Flower colors

I like this picture a little more than the one of the palms that I played with. In this picture, I tried to make the reds stand out much more than any other part of the flower. To do this, I toned down the yellows and the greens and made the reds a lot lighter and brighter.

Color Adjustments

I altered the colors of this picture significantly. In my original picture, the palms were considerably darker and the sky was a typical blue. I can't honestly say exactly what I did to change it, I just played with the different color adjustments that I found until I thought it looked different and cool.

Photoshop is very new to me, so I'm not sure how to use all of the tools that are available. I'm not in love with the changes that I have made to this picture, but I think it does look pretty neat. I'm really excited to be able to learn how to fine tune some of the great pictures that I have taken and how to really sharpen some of the not-so-hot pictures that I have.

Cut and paste

Ok, so I used two pictures that I took in Florida; one on the coast and one at Sea World. I cut the bird from the picture that I took at Sea World and pasted it on the tree that I took on the Intracoastal. I have to be honest and say that this is not a favorite of mine, as I think it looks a little weird... but if I must, I must.

Cropping

This is a picture that I took a while ago; it's my dog Winnie. She is no longer with me, but this is one of my many favorite pictures of her. I got down on the floor, to her level when I captured it. I used photoshop to crop out some of the tiles in the foreground, and a lot of the sliding door and pantry cabinet behind her. I couldn't resist using an older picture that I had taken... especially one of my "little girl".

Landscape

Landscape was really fun for me. In trying to capture nice landscape shots, I found that I was looking for areas free of excessive building and powerlines. That was actually more difficult than I anticipated.

Some of the pictures that I have incorporated in this slideshow are ones that I took while in Florida; others were taken more close to home. I really landscape pictures that incorporate water in some way. You'll notice that many of my pictures do just that, whether it be in Florida or Vermont.

I hope you enjoy them...

Thirds

Here, I have taken a shot of the American flag flying high above the Intracoastal waterway in Ft. Lauderdale, Florida. I took these pictures from a Water Taxi, while moving along the waterway. I thought they came out fairly well. I actually struggled a bit with the "thirds" assignment, because I found that many of my pictures were a little busier than they should've been and the focus of the picture may be difficult to determine... I decided on these to post as my examples.

Coming out of the Dark

There is a tunnel that connects one side of a crazy-driver laden travel way to another, and leads to the beach. I went to the bottom of the staircase and took a bunch of pictures from the bottom as I worked my way to the top. This is one of the pictures that I really liked because you can see the "paradise" that awaits when you get to the top of the stairs.

Framing

As I am currently in Florida, I am going around taking lots of pictures of everything I see. I took this picture when my Uncle was driving me all over the city of Ft. Lauderdale. He was kind enough to pull over to the side of the road (regularly) to let me take some shots of the canals, among other things.

I really like this picture because the tree frames the canal very well. I've taken over 300 pictures since I've been here, so I'm hoping to use some of them for class because they've come out so well.

Viewpoint and Direction of Movement

When I was researching various methods of photo composition, I stumbled upon a site which contained information relating to the viewpoint of a picture and the direction of movement.

Thinking about your viewpoint when taking a shot is important because the outcome of the photo can vary dramatically based upon the different viewpoints that it may have. For example, when taking a picture of a palm tree, (I use this example because I'm in Florida right now and am taking many many pictures of them), you could take a picture of the entire tree in its natural stance, perpendicular to the ground and have a great shot. If you go and stand underneath the tree, and look up at its palms and upper levels, you can capture another great perspective. I think that the key to obtaining unique viewpoints is thinking outside the box when it comes to taking your pictures.

Direction of movement is another interesting little tip that I found when looking around for information. The basic concept is this, if the subject of your photo is capable of some sort of movement while being photographed, it is best to position yourself (the photographer) in a manner which allows for the object to look like it's coming into, not going out of the shot. Combining this method with the tips on different viewpoints can make for a really great picture.

Information obtained from: http://www.azuswebworks.com/photography/ph_comp.html

Varied Light Sources

This last picture was taken around the same time as the second one, but had the flash on. I like this much more than the second one for obvious reasons. I like the way the leaves stand out, and the bananas can be clearly seen.

Varied Light Sources

This was taken at 6:30pm (dusk) with no flash. It's the same banana tree, same angle. I'm not so crazy about this one because you really can't make out what you are looking at.

Varied Light Sources

I apologize for posting so late. I've been travelling these last few days and haven't really been in one place for long enough to take pictures of the same subject in three light sources. Now that I'm finally settled, here's what I've come up with... the picture above was taken at 3pm today. It's a banana tree that my uncle has in his front yard, in Ft. Lauderdale!

Complementary Color Scheme

I took my complementary color shot of a basket that I keep in my office; it's usually pretty full of bubble gum, which the kids come and help themselves to regularly. This was of only a few objects that I could find containing complementary colors. I really liked all of the examples that were posted for us this week, but found that my options were rather limited when it came to bright colors. This simply isn't the best time of year for that... luckily I'm headed to Florida on Saturday the 21st, so I anticipate many more options for great shots...

Monochrome Color Shot

My shot for the monochrome example is of my cat, Sam. As you can see, he is an orange cat with quite a few different shades of lighter color. This was taken in macro, and was very difficult as he was looking to play with the dangling lens cap as opposed to sitting still for me.

Analogous Color Scheme Shot

I took this picture of some cups that I have on my desk at work. I actually brought them into the office next to mine, because the lighting was much better and the background was cleaner. As you can see in the picture, the green cup with the orange inside contains some little clips that I use for some of my files. The other two cups have paper clips and binder clips, which cannot be seen at this angle. I like the way this picture came out because it's so sharp and the colors are very bright.

I took this picture of a little rottweiler stuffed animal that I have because my favorite subject is no longer with me. This reminds me of my dog, who was undoubtedly the greatest thing that had ever happened to me and my best friend. Her colors (leash & collar/harness) were blue, so this was a little more special to me when I found it. I placed this on a long roll pillow on the back of my bed when I took the shot.

This is a picture of a rather old copper tea kettle. It is special to me because it reminds me of my grandmother who passed away almost eleven years ago. She and I were very close, and I have a number of things around my house that are representative of her. This is one of those things that struck me as an appropriate object to shoot in macro.

Here is my macro photo collage. I had a bit of a hard time taking macro shots. I always felt like macro was best utilized when taking shots of flowers and butterflies, not random things around my house. I walked around for quite a while looking for things that were small enough that I could capture a decent shot, but could still use the macro setting. I'm not sure that they came out as well as many of my other shots, but hopefully with some more practice I will be able to take some good ones soon.

Brush off a spot

I apologize, I forgot that we were supposed to write about our pictures...

I like this picture because it's very natural looking and inviting. I actually took all of my pictures on the automatic setting, because I wasn't quite ready to mess with the aperture just yet. I thought about brushing the seat of the bench off, but decided that it would be best represented in its natural winter form, pine needles and all.

A cozy spot for me and you...

I like this view as well because it shows the natural winter landscape in the background, with a more limited view of the pine needles on the seat itself.

Two feeders

I like this picture for some of the same reasons that I like the bench seat between the trees. I like the natural look of it. I had a hard time trying to decide what I was going to take pictures of and spent a great deal of the week thinking about it. I finally decided, on the weekend, that I was going to a friend's house to take some pictures on her land. I took a bunch of shots of the birdhouse from various angles and liked some of the ones that had the branches in the shot.

Smooth Landing

This shot is one that stood out to me because of the bird, in flight, being captured landing. I won't pretend that I knew that was going to happen and timed it perfectly, but I was pleasantly surprised that I caught it.