Bannack Best
This Town Ain’t Big Enough for the Both of Us | Feb. 14, 2013 | 2:46pm | Bannack Ghost Town, Montana | f/5.6 | 1/160 | Canon EOS Rebel T3
I loved the dramatic shadows on this shot. I bumped up the saturation and lowered the exposure in camera raw, and then I experimented with the “cappuccino” setting in a sepia toning action made by ~paranoidstock on deviantart.com. It turned out far too dark, so I manipulated the hue and saturation levels and turned off one of the adjustment layers to get the effect you see here.
Song of Healing | Feb. 14, 2013 | 1:59pm | f/5.6 | 1/50 | Canon EOS Rebel T3
This is an organ in the doctor’s house. When I think of organs I think of the massive one in the Salt Lake City Conference Center, so this was particularly interesting to me. The doctor that once owned this old house must have been a music lover, because his home hosted not only an organ but a piano as well.
Up to Something | Feb. 14, 2013 | 3:14pm | Bannack Ghost Town, Montana | f/5.6 | 1/250 | Canon EOS Rebel T3
This might be my favorite shot of the whole trip. I used camera raw to lower the saturation and add a shadowy vignette.
Law and Order | Feb. 14, 2013 | 1:32pm | Bannack Ghost Town, Montana | f/8.0 | 1/25 | Canon EOS Rebel T3
This gavel and top hat were laying on a table near a window in the Masonic Temple. The park ranger told us that the identification numbers used for this sect of the Free Masons was used to denote vigilantes. Law and Order, wild west style.
Nostalgic Smile | Feb. 14, 2013 | 2:42pm | Bannack Ghost Town, Montana | f/5.6 | 1/125 | Canon EOS Rebel T3
I snapped this shot while the model was posing for another photographer. I liked her wistful gaze. I used Camera Raw to reduce the saturation.
The Test of Time | Feb. 14, 2013 | 4:14pm | Bannack Ghost Town, Montana | f/5.6 | 1/160 | Canon EOS Rebel T3
The detail on the window of this church was the first thing that really caught my eye when I entered Bannack. I got this photo of it as we were leaving for the day. I used camera raw to deepen the shadows, blacks, and whites, and added a vignette to get more contrast.
Bannack HDR
Preserved in Amber HDR collage | Feb. 14, 2013 | 12:02pm | Bannack Ghost Town | f/5.6 | 1/3200, 1/800, 1/200 | Canon EOS Rebel T3
I shot this image using my camera’s bracketing settings, which captured the image at three different exposures. I used Photomatix to compress them all together. The result:
Preserved in Amber
I decided to go for a more realistic approach when choosing the settings for my HDR, rather than the surrealistic style that seems to be pretty popular. I just wish I’d thought to use a gold reflector to get just a little rim lighting on the right edge of the bottle.
Hotel | Feb. 14, 2013 | 11:38am | Bannack Ghost Town | f/5.6 | 1/400 | Canon EOS Rebel T3
I took this picture near the very beginning of the visit, when I was still trying to figure out which camera settings to use. I originally saw this as a throw-away image because it was so bright, but I thought I’d try to salvage it using a one-shot HDR process. I used Camera Raw to create two other versions of this image (one far too dark, and one evenly exposed but flat) and then put them all into Photomatix at let it work its magic:
Hotel Meade One-Shot HDR
The colors are much better! The image is still a little lifeless (get it? Because it’s a Ghost T…nevermind) but it’s a vast improvement over the original! I added a dark vignette to help frame the scene.
Bannack: Macro Abstract
Skeletal | Feb. 14, 2013 | 4:27pm | Bannack Ghost Town, Montana | f/5.6 | 1/80 | Canon EOS Rebel T3
This was the spookiest thing I encountered at Bannack Ghost Town by far. It appears to be a cross-section of a bone. It was about five inches across, so it was far too large to be human, but what made it spooky to me was the partial exoskeleton of the bee clinging to the left edge. It reminded me of the opening sequence of the television show Ghost Whisperer. Suiting, no? I should also add I found this in the windowsill of the yellow-door house where several children supposedly died while in quarantine for illness.
Locked Away | Feb. 14, 2013 | 4:20pm | Bannack Ghost Town, Montana | f/5.6 | 1/125 | Canon EOS Rebel T3
I wonder how secure these old door handles were. I didn’t think to look at the time, but I wonder if you can actually see through the locks, because I read that frequently in books. That never made sense to me as a child since modern locks certainly cannot be seen through.
Skeleton Key
This is an experimental Abstract macro. I blended “Skeletal” with “Locked Away” using the Linear Light blending mode. The texture of the bone lends an interesting surreal look to the lock.
Bannack: Near and Far
Ghost in the Glass | Feb. 14, 2013 | 12:30pm | Bannack Ghost Town | f/5.6 | 1/100 | Canon EOS Rebel T3
At the end of town I found a little green house with a fascinating assortment of objects inside. The door was locked so I couldn’t go inside, so I aimed my camera at the window and tried to take a shot through. I noticed as I adjusted my focus that the room inside was completely obscured by the dust on the window pane when I used shallow focus. I liked the texture of the dust on the glass. No edits.
Window to the Past | Feb. 14, 2013 | 12:30pm | Bannack Ghost Town, Montana | f/5.6 | 1/100 | Canon EOS Rebel T3
This is what the room looked like inside, with a deep focus through the haze of dust on the glass. There was so many things inside it looked more like a storage shed than a living room. I like the old typewriter on the shelf on the left, and the set of crutches that can just barely be seen on the right.
Bannack: Action Freeze and Ghost Blur
Peanut Butter Pinecone | Feb. 14, 2013 | 4:37pm | Bannack Ghost Town | f/5.6 | 1/250 | Canon EOS Rebel T3
This is one of the last photos I took on the trip. I saw this peanut butter coated pinecone swinging lightly in the breeze and remembered I needed a photo showing frozen action. I swung the string higher to get a more dynamic shot. The birds were irritated that I denied them their treat for a few minutes. Once I moved away they happily flocked around again.
Mourning | Feb. 14, 2013 | 3:54pm | Bannack Ghost Town, Montana | f/5.6 | 6.0 | Canon EOS Rebel T3
This was a fun and tricky technique to try. I had to set my shutter speed extremely low and ask Meg to hold her pose for half the time, then quickly scramble from the shot while the other model helped perfectly still the entire time. The result was this ghost shot.” Because the slow shutter speed made the image extremely bright, I lowered the exposure, darkened the shadows, lowered the clarity, added dark vignette, and then used the adjustment brush in camera raw to raise exposure on the “ghost,” giving her a soft, eerie glow.
Bannack Portraits
For our “Bannack Shoot-Out,” all of the Digital Imaging students rotated through different stations setup at the Bannack Ghost Town barbershop and the Hotel Meade. Each station featured a different model in period clothing and different types of lighting. I worked in manual mode for the whole shoot-out, so I learned a lot about my different camera settings.
Cool Light | Feb. 14, 2013 | 2:27pm | Bannack Ghost Town, Montana | f/5.6 | 1/100 | Canon EOS Rebel T3
For this shot my primary light source was a window. There was supposed to be a speedlite and umbrella, but they weren’t going off when I shot this photo. I thought about warming this photo up by increasing the saturation, but I decided I liked the look of the cool wintery light.
Purple Satin | Feb. 14, 2013 | 2:25pm | Bannack Ghost Town, Montana | f/5.6 | 1/250 | Canon EOS Rebel T3
Meg was a great model. I loved the way her satin dress fit her. In contrasted beautifully with her somber surroundings in the Bannack barbershop. My lighting was a large window.
Waiting at the Window | Feb. 14, 2013 | 2:41pm | Bannack Ghost Town, Montana | f/5.6 | 1/125 | Canon EOS Rebel T3
I struggled to get good shots of this model; I think my camera settings were ill-suited. My main source of light was the window, but this station also had a gold reflector to the model’s left. I cropped this photo to frame it better, reduced the highlights and whites, and boosted the saturation and vibrancy.
Straw into Gold | Feb. 14, 2013 | 3:08pm | Bannack Ghost Town, Montana | f/5.6 | 1/250 | Canon EOS Rebel T3
This model had two huge lights to illuminate her. In fact my image turned out way too bright, so in Camera raw I darkened the shadows and blacks, lowered the exposure and contrast, and added a shadow vignette. I love the way the light on her hair looks so much like sunlight filtering through a window.
Portraits
Felicia Approved | Feb. 10, 2013 | 5:54pm | Rexburg, ID | f/1.8 | 1/125 | Nikon D40
My home teacher came over to help with the shoot and brought along his Nikon D40. I was so impressed by the aperture capabilities but intimidated by the manual focus. I’m still dependent on my automatic! Felicia let me practice with it by taking shots of her pulling faces. Just look at that bokeh! I can’t wait to get a 1.8 aperture lens of my own.
Suave | Feb. 10, 2013 | 2:09pm | Rexburg, ID | f/5.6 | 1/32 | Canon EOS Rebel T3 | Speedlite Flash, LED continuous light (orange gel) and two gold reflectors used for lighting
Brit and LC were called as Ward Directory Coordinator and Ward Directory Assistant, respectively, and so were tasked with tracking down the info of every member of the ward along with photos. Since my assignment for this week for Digital Imaging was portraiture, I thought it would be an awesome opportunity to practice. I borrowed a small light kit from the school and a tripod and a large reflector from my home teacher. We used a bed sheet as a backdrop. We still needed more light, so we opened all of the windows and doors, turned on all the lights, and brought down two desk lamps. The shoot itself was a riot! We had over fifty people come over throughout their day to get their photos taken and some of them really let their personalities show. This will certainly be a ward directory like no other!
She’s a Lady | Feb. 10, 2012 | 4:07pm | Rexburg, ID | f/5.6 | 1/800 | Canon EOS Rebel T3
You might not expect it, but Kayli’s husband Joseph is very savvy in women’s fashion. He picked out this beautiful wine red gown for his military ball this past weekend. I thought she looked absolutely stunning, so I asked if she would model for me. She was such a trooper! It was freezing outside, but we really wanted to show the dress against a backdrop of snow. Kayli wants to give this photo to Joseph for Valentine’s Day since it will be their first together as a married couple. Here’s to the both of them!
Slumber Party | Feb. 11, 2013 | 12:00am | Rexburg, ID | f/5.6 | 1/30 | Canon EOS Rebel T3 | Speedlite flash, LED continuous light (orange gel), and one gold reflector used for lighting
It was quite difficult to get the right lighting for this photo! I resorted to two lamps and the full light kit, and even still, I had to use the adjustment brush in camera raw to increase the exposure on their faces and other spots. Getting a good angle on this shot was also difficult, because the room is pretty small. My roommates have such cute robes and pajamas!
The Crew | Feb. 10, 2013 | 11:54am | Rexburg, ID | f/5.6 | 1/32 | Canon EOS Rebel T3 | Speedlite flash, LED continuous light (orange gel), and two gold reflectors used for lighting
Since we only had a black bed sheet for a backdrop for the ward directory photoshoot, we had to work really hard on the lighting to keep our subjects (many of whom were wearing black suit coats) from disappearing into the background. It became quite the team effort! Felicia served as a point of reference since she has such dark hair, and the other girls helped by holding the lights and reflector as close to her as possible. I thought it was so funny that the framing of the images for the photo shoot hid the three girls from view even though they had to get so close.
All Dolled Up | Jan. 25, 2013 | 7:15pm | Rexburg, ID | f/4.0 | 1/200 | Canon EOS Rebel T3
Felicia is one of the few girls I know of who can keep a pretty, neutral expression while putting on makeup. I shot several photos of her primping before she left to go ballroom dancing with friends. I turned up the shutter speed a lot because it was so bright, and I wanted to be sure that I wouldn’t blur her exacting motions.
Enhancements
Portrait Touch-Up
Benthani | Feb. 19, 2013 | 4:06pm | Reburg, ID | f/5.6 | 1/64 | Canon EOS Rebel T3
Bethani’s smile is absolutely adorable in this shot, but her mother was mortified that I caught her on camera with a dirty face. She’s been sick lately so her eyes are watery and her poor little face is crusty. :( Still, I think her smile is priceless so the shot is worth saving.
All smiles!
To clean her up I went to town with the lasso tool, content aware fill, and the clone stamp. I had to zoom in really close and make small selections to maximize the power of content aware fill, and the spots that I couldn’t fix automatically I cloned over with the stamp. I focus mostly on cleaning up right around her mouth, but I also tidied her onesie and removed the tears from her eyes. To finish I took the image into Camera Raw and lowered the clarity to smooth out her skin. I also bumped up the highlights just a touch. I decided against completely cleaning up her face because I didn’t want to strip away the reality of this moment in her life.
Replace Color
Daymon and Nini | Jan. 19, 2012 | 4:00pm | Reburg, ID | f/5.6 | 1/180 | Canon EOS Rebel T3
The bold color of Daymon’s shirt makes this a great photo to experiment on with the replace color feature in Photoshop.
How about orange?
To pull this off, I simply went to Image > Adjustments > Replace Color. With the eye dropper I selected the yellow on Daymon’s shirt, and then adjusted the scrubbers for hue and saturation in the Replace Color panel to get this vibrant shade of red-orange. I also touched up a few spots on the image with the lasso tool and content-aware fill.
Match Color
Cory Chex | Jan. 19, 2013 | 4:34pm | f/5.6 | 1/120 | Canon EOS Rebel T3
Cory was caught in the act swiping some Chex cereal. She’s trying to hide the evidence in her tummy, but there’s still a bit on her face…
Match Color experiment
Although I liked the colors and tones in the original, I wanted to try experimenting with Photoshop’s Match Color feature. I opened this image alongside Angel Light (below) and went to Image > Adjustments > Match Color and chose Angel Light as the source. I then lowered the luminance and increased the fade so that the change wouldn’t be quite so stark.
Angel Light | Jan. 19, 2013 | 4:05pm | Rexburg, ID | f/5.6 | 1/64 | Canon EOS Rebel T3
Camera Raw Editing
Before
I considered this image a throw-away until I learned how to edit it camera raw. I liked the composition of the original, and the focus on the drop of water was nice, but it was so washed out by my flash.
Surreal | Jan. 24, 2013 | 11:46am | Benson greenhouse, BYU-I Campus; Rexburg, ID | f/6.3 | 1/25 | Canon EOS Rebel T3
In camera raw I reduced the clarity and temperature and darkened the shadows to give the whole image a soft, dream-like quality.
Before
If the edit above was a throw-away, this one was even more so! Brit looked darling with her hair, makeup and outfit all ready for the ballroom dance, but you’d never know it from this photo. Fortunately, camera raw saved the day (and the shot)!
Cheeky | Jan. 25, 2013 | 7:31pm | Rexburg, ID | f/5.6 | 1/15 | Canon EOS Rebel T3
I decided to go for a soft black and white effect for this photo. I started by bumping up the exposure and draining the saturation. I also tilted the tint toward the purple side because it gave the image more life-like depth, and smoothed the image by reducing the clarity. The shadows, whites, blacks, and vibrancy had to be adjusted down to bring out the detail and I finished off the photo with a subtle vignette.
Panoramas
Garden Panorama | Jan. 28, 2013 | 4:10pm | Rexburg, Idaho | f/18 | 1/160 | Canon EOS Rebel T3
A fresh, thick blanket of snow followed by blue skies makes for some beautiful scenery. This image is composed of eight shots, taken in quick succession. I didn’t have a fancy panorama tripod so I just had to swivel my body. I used Photoshop’s automate feature to assemble the panorama, and then experimented with content-aware fill. This image was too busy for the content aware tool to work as well as I would have liked, so I chose to crop down the image instead. However, I did use the content aware fill tool to remove some dark spots from the sky, which I learned were caused by a speck of dust on the sensor of my camera. :/ I haven’t had time to take it in for cleaning yet, so content aware fill is going to be my friend for the next couple of shoots…
I also boosted the saturation and vibrancy a touch.
Here are the photos I used for the panorama – as you can see, the scene was initially much wider, but it wouldn’t look good online so I cropped it down a lot.
Panorama 1 | Panorama 2 | Panorama 3 | Panorama 4
Panorama 5 | Panorama 6 | Panorama 7 | Panorama 8
Sunset Panorama | Jan. 28, 2013 | 5:30pm | Rexburg, ID | f/18 | 1/40 | Canon EOS Rebel T3
This was quite a harrowing shot to take. I risked life and limb running up the icy, snow-buried bleachers of the BYU-I stadium to catch the last glimpse of the sun as it set behind the clouds. By the time I made it to the top the sun had almost completely disappeared. Even so, it was exhilarating. This panorama is composed of four shots and, like the pic above, had to be edited to remove the dark spots on my sensor. Since this shot isn’t as busy, I was able to use the content aware fill to flesh out the edges of the compiled panorama. I lowered the contrast and raised the brightness to capture more of the orange and pink tints diffusing in the clouds.
These are the photos I used:
