Race against the clock!

Okay, I'm sort of racing against the clock!  My husband and daughter are doing the food shopping and I've just finished editing some pictures I took today.  I went crazy, took about 300 or something.  Let's see if I can post them all before they come home. 

I've been experimenting with my camera settings and trying to use natural light (so no flash).  In certain instances, I had to up the ISO to 1600 so quite a few of these, to me anyway, are a bit noisy which I point out.  Since they are pictures of my baby, I decided to edit and post them anyway.  For an entry level D-SLR I am, however, pleasantly surprised to see that it handles high ISOs without noise quite well!  With a moving child I had to keep my shutter speed at 160 - 200 at times, also high.  It was quite a challenge trying to get the correct exposure not really being able to compensate anywhere.  Some of my Straight Out Of Camera (SOOC) shots were hurting, but I was able to salvage them.  Then again some of my SOOC shots were gorgeous so I guess I'm learning!  There are too many to post before & afters so I've attached mostly retouched versions with a couple of SOOC shots so that you could see the exposure differences.  By the way, I spelled out SOOC for those that aren't yet hip to the photography lingo.  Let's just say only less than a month ago, I was not HIP to it myself!  I actually had to google the acronym.

I don't know if anyone else is having problems attaching images to posts?  I usually upload from my computer which apparently is not happening since it's down for maintenance.  Who knows when I'll have another moment of free time.  Last time, as an alternative, I uploaded my images to Picasa and attached them from there, but this takes longer.  Now that I think of it, it's kind of weird that I was able to upload to Picasa since Blogger and Picasa are all powered by Google.  I guess it was a fluke, because I just tried it and am getting the same pop up message that Blogger gave me.  Very frustrating for a busy mama who doesn't have the luxury to pick and choose when to post. 

Here are a couple SOOC shots followed by their retouched version. 

I was going for a 1960's feel here.

WARNING: approaching the Noisy, noisy, noisy.

I don't think as noticable retouched.

The remaining pictures are all retouched.

I feel like this is a little over exposed, but I love the softness of her hair and the detail of her curls.

The one below I feel is especially noisy.

This one too!

Noisy yet again.

I don't think it's as obvious in black and white.

Now, to mix it up a bit!  My mom bought these for herself and they were just so cute I had to take some pictures.  I couldn't resist with all the sparkle!  Gorgeous colors!  No toe polish required.

How 'bout some stars and stripes?  These ones are barely retouched.  These came out the best!

BELOW: This bathing suit is actually hanging from my kitchen chandelier where the light is BEST!  It just pours in through my 8 foot slider.