So it is the week of my little "s".

I want to do a shoot with little S this week for her bday portrait. We had some down time this evening, so I decided to go out and practice with my big telephoto lens. I convinced S to come be my model- lucky me, she said yes!

Ready, set, go!!!

What???

Discovery.

What I wanted:S sitting in the red chair- sea of green grass, nice deep red chair, polka dots and nakey piggies.
What I got: S being herself.

Thanks for looking.

This was a really bad picture that I decided to play with. It was crazy to try to get a snap of him, as he's b/w, on a black chair, with a window with bright light coming through a white sheer. My camera had no idea what to make of it :) I simply snapped when I saw it, I didn't even think about metering. Oh, well.

So here's the TON of work I did.
in ACR:
>increased exposure
> increased brightness
>Increased contrast
>increased the luniance smoothing
>increased color noise reduction
and played with the curve to make it more of an "s".
**************************
In Photoshop:
dodged the eyes (12%, midtones),
defog (I start at 60/20/0, and play from there)
sharpened,
crop
filter>noise reduction.

Like I said, the exposure was totally off, so there was alot to do to salvage this shot.

Just two....

She's just two for two more days. My heart is breaking each time I celebrate another milestone, another step on the ladder of her growth. It is so bittersweet to watch her go out in the world. I was laughing with my mother yesterday that as myolder daughter hit each milestone, it was such with such excitement and pride that we celebrated with her. For my "baby", it is so sad as we celebrate her become the little girl she now is.

And I send her off into the world of (pre)school tomorrow. >sigh<

I know, it is about as good as it gets to have two wonderful kids who are a joy and a pleasure and who are happy and healthy. It really is too much to ask to keep that all to our selves. Look out world, here she comes!

This snap was taken Saturday, just before her party started. Her grandparents were gracios enough to host a pool party at their house. We had a ball with her little playmates, and her close family- and friends who are family- they know that! We are blessed to have so much to celebrate in our lives.

Annual summer picture

This is our now annual picture of the grands with the kids in summer.
I wish I'd spent more time scoping the light.
I wish I'd been more serious about creating a pose. I wanted to really do a shoot, but somehow I wussed out knowing I'd have minimal cooperation. And knowing no one but me would really care. I still regret not being just a bit more insistant.

However, all that said and done, this is a fairly decent result of basically a planned snapshot. Too bad for S's smile, chopped limbs and my dad's blown out hair... but it is definately the best of the bunch.

I had to increase the contrast a lot, as they were in what looked like more shade than they were.
Okay, all that said, I like it. I like my dad's expression of pride and joy. I love my mom's expression of being thrilled to have this picture taken again. I like that I caught K's natural smile. I even like that S is making a bit of a face- as she is ever bit the imp.

It really does capture these four together as I see them. Definately not a perfect portrait, but a great representation of four of the closest people in the world to me. I'll keep it.