huga

You could always just download the 30 day trial and see if you like it?

Fill light is great for dark animals or those with dark faces (hello, Lola). And for funsies, one that was taken much further than normal - it was entered into the APPAs last year.

All LR, besides the sharpen :)

Today I shot down at the refuge, which I do once a week. I always want my edits to be minimal, so I can get them back to the refuge as soon as possible and get on with my other work. The trouble is, the cattery has lots of different sections of light and if you've ever tried to photograph a cat, you'll know how much harder it is compared to a dog. I tend to wait for them to settle and just follow them around until I get the shot, except sometimes I don't change my settings in time and will get over and under exposed images. These are before and afters from today. The befores are all SOOC RAW files, all I've done is convert them to jpg for posting. This one was over and I'm pretty sure I couldn't have recovered the highlights like this if it wasn't RAW. It's had the exposure fixed, the colour corrected, cropped slightly and a sharpen. This one is obviously under exposed. If I'd corrected this on a jpg, it would have come up super noisy. It's had the exposure corrected, a bit of fill light and a sharpen.

Oops, forgot to upload! 4/52

I use Lightroom and Photoshop - like pretty much everyone else I know in the industry. LR is fantastic for culling and when I do a wedding and have to cull from 1500-2000 images, it is brilliant. Same for batch processing. Copy and paste the settings from one image to another. I use PS for sharpening (even though LR does this too, I don't like it though) and anything small - cloning, skin softening, liquifying (if needed). LR is pretty easy to use, but I've only scratched the surface of PS. Again though, it's not something you are good at right away - it takes a lot of images and evolution to get where you want to be with processing and even then, I'm still not entirely happy with my processing a lot of the time. Another thing (as mentioned earlier), if your monitor is out of whack, your images will always look badly edited on someone elses monitor (especially if theirs is out too). Thanks Pers :)

I shoot in RAW because I like working with clean, unprocessed, large files that can be manipulated to my liking. I don't want my camera to edit for me - I want to do it. It's purely a personal preference. Most professionals will shoot in RAW, but there are those that shoot in jpeg (and hats off to them for getting it so spot on! When I'm shooting a wedding, there are always times when I am changing settings on the fly and sometimes I do get it wrong). FF - they say your first 10 000 images are your worst, which I totally agree with. I would take it further and say that the first 20 000 images that you edit are your worst :p There are a lot of badly processed images around, but there are no doubt people that don't like the way I process either - like I said, it's personal.

A long term foster (probably foster failure) of one of the the staff at SCARS (I do their photos once a week) :) She is so sweet!

Today I fell in love. Help me.

I'm currently doing January Photo A Day, but not sure I want to commit to anything beyond that :laugh:

Oops. Sorry You probably wouldn't like the 8x10 print I had done of it today then :laugh: Lovely, Gila! Nice light.

I love it! First one and I pulled that sucker out lastnight. Felt good too, I can't deal with it just hanging there by a thread.

03/52

We had a coastal python come in to our house the other night at 10pm after a 42 degree day. We've had a pile of baby Eastern Browns around too (we've lost count).

I have two - one for my normal life stuff and photography and the other for sewing :) Followed you :)

Awesome bitey face, Gertrude! Beautiful, Gap - that is one that will be treasured, I know it. Love that kangaroo silhouette too, RV!

I think you'll find they'll up the prices on the dogs they can, to pick up the money they lose on others. I don't have a problem with it and highly doubt they are making money.

FF - to me it's a touch dark and looks like the camera dropped the shutter speed because of it and he's also a bit blurry. I automatically turf anything OOF, but really - there is no one correct exposure :D I tend to lean towards the darker side. But comparing Tonka to Penny - Tonka is dark and soft whereas Penny is a touch lighter, she's sharp and has that magic catch light in her eyes. You just needed Tonka looking towards the light (not directly, but side on is great) and it would have made a world of difference.

02/52

Well of course technically no. I should have said that I climbed that bloody tower once and was terrified and was not repeat not doing it again in just a few days for the same shot, if ever. I didn't think it was a huge error, it being Christmas/New Year and all that. Your list is a good memory jog, good job. Not a huge error at all, I was just checking I had my dates right.

Just listed all the dates out, just so I at least know where I'm up to because I always end up lost about midway through these things :laugh: Edited because it's all in the first post now :)

That's ok! Just thought I had it wrong. Might look at my calendar and count the weeks

I'm confused about the dates So the first week includes Christmas Day? Does that make today (1/1) the last day of the first week? Anyway, happy to have a little project going again :) 1/52

Of course you can join me! I would love the company. I shall be concentrating on dramatic light, which always looks cool in b&w.

Ok, I was thinking about this lastnight when I couldn't sleep and I've changed my mind Something I've always wanted to do is a project purely in B&W, so that's what I will do - 52 Weeks of B&W Portraits.