New Pics (Week 9)... Just 5

...Cause I only have 5 pictures to share today. 

So can you believe that all this time, at least for months now, I had the ability to maintain the quality of my images while still being able to resize for blog posts?  When I purchased the Miracle Makeover actions from Paint the Moon awhile back, it came with two web resize actions.  One converts an image to 500 px and the other to 900 px.  There is a VERY noticeable difference between using these actions to resize and just letting Blogger do it.  It's amazing!  I wanted to share the differences with you below.  My first picture was resized using the action, the second one was resized by Blogger (yuck).  The ones that were automatically resized became a little blurry and, more annoyingly, pixelated.  It's horrible!  Thanks again Pain the Moon!  Seriously, you made my year!

New Pics (Week 8)... A Noisy Saturday

I really wanted to title this post Silent Saturday because I'm too tired to write today but then I realized silent is not the same as wordless.  Hello!  So anyway, I went with 'A Noisy Saturday' because the following pictures were all taken with my ISO as high as 1600!  Yeah you heard me right.  And I hate noise!  I had no choice though.  I wasn't resorting to the flash.  I'm too in love with the look of natural light photography.  Anyhow, I'm starting to change my mind a bit.  About noise that is.  My sister said that a noisy picture isn't always bad especially when the picture is good.  She said you wouldn't notice the noise in a good picture and that sometimes (good) noise can add to the details of your subject.  That's right, I guess there is good noise and bad noise!  Boy my sister is one smart cookie!  In fact, I wouldn't have believed her as much until I saw it myself.  These pictures didn't bother me so much.  If this were about a month ago I would have labeled these 'ruined' and put them aside to collect cyber dust.  In fact, I was very happy with them!  I used PSE to reduce the noise a little but actually left a lot of it in!  In a way, the noise made the picture almost sharper!  So to stick to my previously written words of a prior post, 'I can tone it down', these edits were almost entirely to the color and lighting of the photograph ONLY.  No airbrushing, wrinkle removing or eye brightening actions used from Picnik!  Here is my Livvy, au naturale, in all her splendor!

Blog Hoppin' & A very random note to Livvy

Linking up to the Before & After Blog Hop over at Pixel Perfect.

I've attached my original, clean edit, and final below.

Camera Settings for SOOC:   Shutter Speed-200  ISO-400   Aperture-f/5.6   Focal Length-45 mm

Somebody stop me!

I wasn't sure what to do here but I just loved the picture that Jamie provided for the Edit Me Photo Challenge so much that I found myself still making edits to it even after I already linked up and entered my 'one' submission!  To me it's not about the photo challenge and whether this is entered in, I just wanted to be able to share my other edit with everyone because I fell in love with it.  I used Picnik as my editing software.  My goal was to focus in on those colorful striped knee socks so I converted it to black & white again but, this time, left the vibrant color on the socks and shoes.  To finish it off, I applied a vintage frame in PSE that I purchased from Paint the Moon.  The Polaroid was a frame provided by PSE.  I thought it was cute!

Woo hoo; very excited about the Edit Me Photo Challenge

I'm lovin' the picture this week for the Edit Me photo challenge over at My Reflection of Something.  I know I always say that but, seriously, this picture is so adorable!  It was taken by Jamie over at Mommy's Camera.  The original shot was so great it would have been really difficult to improve.  Instead I went for changing it completely.  I absolutely love the colors in the original shot, but I wanted to convert to sepia so that you would focus on the striped knee socks!  I just happened to find a paper bag frame in PSE that I decided to put it on.  Thought it was cute and, for some reason, fitting!  So here is my entry:

New Pics (Week 8)... Thank You Paint the Moon!

I had another photo shoot with Livvy yesterday.  Although we found some spots of shade, it was a bit more challenging for me to find the proper camera settings with the sun being out and bright!  I feel like some were blown out a little but I was able to adjust the exposure.  I don't even know if "blown out" is the correct term but let's see if I can explain.  Sometimes her face almost looked neon if that makes sense.  Because I purchased some more VERY cool actions from Paint the Moon, I wanted to attach my before and afters to mark my SOOC, clean edit, and action applications.  In some cases, I actually like my clean edit better.  I am, however, VERY excited to work more with these new actions some more!  Paint the Moon makes it so easy to download and install into whatever editing software you are using.  I love that!  Not to mention the affordable prices! 

New Pics (Week 8)... Still really excited to share!

This is a continuation of my last post titled New Pics (Week 8)... Really excited to share! While revisiting my SOOC shots from the photo shoot of Alivia in my back yard, I decided to process a few more!  While I was at it, I figured why not link up to a few photo challenges?