Welcome to the 18th issue of the Digital Darkroom

Hi

Such an awesome month at BetterPhoto! First, we give a big welcome to Ben Willmore, an award-winning Photoshop expert and author who joins our outstanding staff of online instructors. In his new eight-week course, "Photoshop Mastery: The Essentials," Ben will share his knowledge - specifically, the Photoshop tools that are most critical to the digital photographer. Read about Ben's new course at:
http://www.betterphoto.com/photocourses/BEN01.asp

Also, I'm thrilled about the upcoming release of my new DVD, "Digital Photography Unleashed: Capturing Wildly Great Photos." It's due out in late October, but you can pre-order it at a special discounted price. For details, see:
http://www.betterphoto.com/product/ourProductDetail.asp?productID=1256

In this issue of Digital Darkroom, don't miss my article below on cropping, rotating photos, and leveling horizons, and the terrific batch of photo discussions!

Lastly, the August contest winners have been announced! Congratulations go to David April for his Grand Prize winning photo, "Two Zebras." Kudos also go to Robert Vreeland, Anupam Pal, Yuri Bonder, Nicole McGrade, Amanda Price, Ehsan Shahin Sefat, Rob Friedman, Jonathan Nissanov, Kartik Venkataraman, and Alessandro Azzolin for their terrific First Place prize winning images. See the contest shots at:
http://www.betterphoto.com/contest/winners/0408.asp

To read the online version of the Digital Darkroom at our Web site, visit http://www.betterphoto.com/digitalpics/

Have a great month!
Jim Miotke
http://www.betterphoto.com/MG.asp?ID=124

In This Issue: Wednesday, September 15, 2004

• Featured Photo: Relic
• Featured Article: Cropping, Rotating Photos, and Leveling Horizons
• Digital Before and After
• New Photo Discussion 1: Stained Glass Boat Reflection
• New Photo Discussion 2: Making Waves
• New Photo Discussion 3: A Little Blue
• New Photo Discussion 4: Lamp on a Tilt
• New Photo Discussion 5: Collect All 50
• New Photo Discussion 6: Sun's Out
• New Photo Discussion 7: F/15 Fighter Pilot
• New Photo Discussion 8: Liquid Chocolate
• New Photo Discussion 9: Dreaming . . .
• New Photo Discussion 10: Forecast: Sunny But Windy
• New Photo Discussion 11: Can I Go Now, Dad?
• New Photo Discussion 12: Morning Star
• The Next Step: Where to Go From Here

Featured Photo: Relic

Relic kind of spooky. image was desaturated, hand tinted, with moon inserted © Roger D. Meador Canon EOS Digital ...

Featured Article: Cropping, Rotating Photos, and Leveling Horizons
The Crop Tool may be the one Photoshop tool you turn to the most, says BetterPhoto founder Jim Miotke - once you learn how to use it, of course! Countless photographs that you might otherwise throw away, he adds, can be fixed with a simple application of the Crop Tool. In his new article, Jim also offers his thoughts and tips on rotating photos and leveling horizons. Learn more about these imaging software techniques:
Read more...
 

Digital Before and After

~~ Groovy~~ This started out as a shot of my neighbor's red horse barn that is used mainly for storage. I thought it needed a little sprucing up. So I played with the new filters I've added and came up with this. I used the flood filter, dreamy photo effect, and a few Flaming Pear filters. Lots of fun!! I'll attempt to post the original as well so you can see what it started as!!

Groovy Before The before image!!

Learn to Capture Great Digital Pictures with Jim Miotke's DVD

Explore the basics of digital photography in Jim Miotke's exciting new DVD, "Digital Photography Unleashed: Capturing Wildly Great Photos." This dramatic and helpful DVD is divided into four shows and is packed with creative details and technical advice. This DVD is due out in late October. As a special offer to BetterPhoto members, we are taking pre-orders at a discounted price of $19.95. That's a savings of $5. This excellent DVD will help anyone interested in exploring digital picture-taking. Get on the list for a special, signed copy today at:  Learn more...

New Photo Discussions

New Photo Discussion 1: Stained Glass Boat Reflection Stained Glass Boat Reflection Altered with Photoshop. © Donna Pagakis Olympus Camedia C-... Great image, Donna!!!! - Donna J. Taff See Donna's Premium BetterPholio™ Response 1:I've never seen the stained glass filter used so beautifully, Donna! Love the colors and composition ... we can tell it's a reflection of a boat, very well done! - Joannie M. Bertucci Response 2:Thank you, Donna and Joannie. This is the first time I have used this filter. I was trying for something a little different. You have made me feel that I have achieved this. The feedback is so appreciated!!! - Donna Pagakis See Donna's Premium BetterPholio™ Read this discussion online Respond to this discussion

New Photo Discussion 2: Making Waves Making Waves That's exactly what I did here. The Mini Cooper was a red car. Thanks to Harry's Filters, it became a blue one. I made the waves with the Liquefy filter and a PopArt filter was also added. © Patricia Marroquin Canon EOS 10D Digi... Love it! That liquefy filter is such fun! - Carolyn Fletcher See Carolyn's Premium BetterPholio™ Visit PickYourShots.com - Carolyn's Deluxe BetterPholio™ Response 1:Magnificent work of 'art', Patricia. I love what you've done here with these effects. Very well done, my dear friend - your good friend, Allan - Allan L. Whitehead See Allan's Premium BetterPholio™ Visit ArrowheadFotos.com - Allan's Deluxe BetterPholio™ Response 2:Very cool capture, Patricia. That color is amazing!!! Wow, such terrific blue!! Cool effects! - Susan T. Evans See Susan's Premium BetterPholio™ Response 3:Nice computer work and imagination, Patricia! Super image!! These cars have gotten really popular here - reminds me of the old days when the Beatles got so popular :0) Must be a result of "The Italian Job" movie?? - Murry Grigsby See Murry's Premium BetterPholio™ Read this discussion online Respond to this discussion

New Photo Discussion 3: A Little Blue A Little Blue F/3,5 - 1/80 sec., Flash. PS: Dreamy Photo. CP: Texture file. © Evy Johansen Olympus Camedia C-... Beautiful shot, Evy! I love the effect! - Sanjay Pindiyath See Sanjay's Premium BetterPholio™ Response 1:This is BEAUTIFUL, Evy! Wonderful artistic impression! Love your use of effects and selective color! Excellent image! - Dan J. Holm See Dan's Premium BetterPholio™ Read this discussion online Respond to this discussion

New Photo Discussion 4: Lamp on a Tilt Lamp on a Tilt An abandoned restaurant offers up many interesting subjects. This overhead lamp and awning are viewed from a tilted angle through a Nikon 70-300 G lens at f/9 for 1/800th second. The D70 was set for ISO 200, aperture priority, center weighted focus and metering. A small amount of oil pastel filtering in PS Elements 2. © Rob Bishop robgbob.com Nikon D70 Digital ... Rob, Really neat photo, and I like the angle in which you presented this photograph. I REALLY love that filtering and have seen it in few other photos here. Nice job! - Phillip L. Sauvey See Phillip's Premium BetterPholio™ Response 1:Thank you, Phillip! I have been back to this location 3 times, and until now have never gotten these lamp and awning images to work for me. This time, armed with my new Nikon D70 and Nikkor 70-300G lens, I found the right time of day and the right angle to shoot from. The fantastic colors that the D70 produces really helped too. I shot 32 pictures that day, and 10 were keepers. That's the best percentage I have ever had in one shooting. Yes, I love the D70.:) - Rob Bishop See Rob's Premium BetterPholio™ Visit robgbob.com - Rob's Deluxe BetterPholio™ Read this discussion online Respond to this discussion

New Photo Discussion 5: Collect All 50 Collect all 50 Began with one macro photo of the Ohio coin, removed the background, created several layers cloning the coin and rotating a few to give the photo some diversity. I then made some minor adjustments with saturation, etc. © Phillip L. Sauvey Olympus Camedia C-... Excellent shot, Phillip! Nice use of effects! - Sanjay Pindiyath See Sanjay's Premium BetterPholio™ Response 1:Thanks, Sanjay! I've been having lots of fun with Photoshop. I had taken this photograph months ago and just decided to do something with it. Thanks again for taking the time to comment as it is very much appreciated! - Phillip L. Sauvey See Phillip's Premium BetterPholio™ Response 2:Your layering effects and technique are excellent, Phillip ... very well done and nice color saturation, too. Much Aloha from your "southern" neighbor!!! - Stan Contrades See Stan's Premium BetterPholio™ Read this discussion online Respond to this discussion

New Photo Discussion 6: Sun's Out Suns Out © Bernard B. Travers Canon PowerShot G2... Love the effects. Great photo. Karma - Karma Wilson See Karma's Premium BetterPholio™ Response 1:Beautifully done! I love the effects!!! How did you do this? - Sharon S. Day See Sharon's Premium BetterPholio™ Response 2:Nice and SUNNY for sure, BT! Super design, light, colors and effects!! - Murry Grigsby See Murry's Premium BetterPholio™ Response 3:Beautifully done, Bernard - great effect! - Karen Engelbreth See Karen's Premium BetterPholio™ Response 4:Wow - thanks Karma, Sharon, Murry, Laura, Colette, Donna T, Deborah and Karen. What wonderful comments. Well, I did this by taking the picture, of course, in a nursery here in Marysville. I created a separate layer. Added texturing to the first (leather look), cloned the stamen from the second and added it to the first. Tweaked the color to give brilliance glow and - VOILA! Thanks so much, again. - Bernard B. Travers See Bernard 's Premium BetterPholio™ Read this discussion online Respond to this discussion

New Photo Discussion 7: F/15 Fighter Pilot F/15 Fighter Pilot Nikon 300mm lens f/11 @ 1/500 © Charlie Borland Stock Photography Nikon F3 SLR Camer... Charlie: How did you meter this splendid backlit silhouette photo? Does the fact that you used a telephoto lens, which makes the sun more prominent, affect your technique? Thanks. - Frank P. Luongo See Frank's Premium BetterPholio™ Response 1:Hi Frank- Actually, this is a composite image done in Photoshop. The original fighter pilot image was from an assignment I photographed for Intel back in the "Top Gun" movie days. Later, I composited it with a sunset out of my files. However, your question about how to make a big sun like this is correct had I done it that way. A 500mm lens would have given you a similar effect. - Charlie Borland See Charlie Borland's Premium BetterPholio™ Take an Online PhotoCourse™ with Charlie Borland: Stock Photography Read this discussion online Respond to this discussion

New Photo Discussion 8: Liquid Chocolate Liquid Chocolate Late afternoon, natural light, portrait mode. Altered in Photoshoppe; black and white, erased background, lightened, added chocolate color. © Kimberly O. McCarty Olympus Camedia C-... Very Nice Shot, Kimberly! - Michael S. Swaffar Response 1:I love that color! So warm and rich! Just like hot chocolate! Looks like they are swimming in it. Very cool, and what a tender, loving moment captured! - Dale Ann Cubbage See Dale Ann's Premium BetterPholio™ Response 2:Nice shot! I love the coloring. I also wanted to know how you added chocolate. - Christine Perez See Christine's Premium BetterPholio™ Response 3:To make the chocolate color with Adobe Photoshop: Made my photo black and white. Then went into Enhance and adjusted lighting and contrast a bit. Go back into Enhance and adjust color, go to color variations, decrease blue and increase your red. Go back into Enhance and adjust the brightness a little more and then tweaked my contrast until it was a rich chocolate color:) - Kimberly O. McCarty See Kimberly's Premium BetterPholio™ Read this discussion online Respond to this discussion

New Photo Discussion 9: Dreaming . . . Dreaming . . . I took this early afternoon. Applied effects and borders and text in PSP. This was an 8 hour project, but I'm really pleased at the outcome! © Karen Bonin Sony Mavica CD400 ... Karen, I'm really surprised I'm the first to comment on this beautiful photo! You did a wonderful job and I think your 8 hours paid off! - Julie Turner See Julie's Premium BetterPholio™ Response 1:Thanks, Julie!!! I thought the softened background and the pearls added in gave it that romantic look. At least that's how it made me feel. Glad that you liked the picture too. - Karen Bonin Read this discussion online Respond to this discussion

New Photo Discussion 10: Forecast: Sunny But Windy Forecast: Sunny But Windy Opened a sharp photo as the background and an intentionally blurred version as the top layer in Photoshop CS after adjusting levels, brightness/contrast and hue/saturation of both. I then painted at about 20% on the blurred layer diagonally to reveal some of the sharp flowers. To complete the fun I buzzed the whole mess and gave it a tad of USM. To me it looked like a field of sunny but wind swept black-eyed susans so the title was a natural. © Murry Grigsby Canon EOS D30 Digi... Very creative and great use of effects, Murry!! Excellent image! - Marcie Fowler See Marcie's Premium BetterPholio™ Response 1:This is really neat, as well as very pretty! I love the title as well! Nice job!!! - Sharon S. Day See Sharon's Premium BetterPholio™ Response 2:Wow, this is fantastic, Murry. - Donna Rae See Donna's Premium BetterPholio™ Visit DonnaraePhotography.com - Donna's Deluxe BetterPholio™ Response 3:Hi Murry!! I love this one, Very creative and very pretty! Great effects and awesome colors, well done!! - Robin L. Wehrman See Robin's Premium BetterPholio™ Response 4:Thanks all!! Sorry about the slang -- USM is the unsharp filter in Photoshop. - Murry Grigsby See Murry's Premium BetterPholio™ Read this discussion online Respond to this discussion

New Photo Discussion 11: Can I Go Now, Dad? Can I go now Dad? f/8, 250th, 28-135mm, home studio, This is poor suffering Storm, my daughter and the most photographed young lady in South Australia :-) I shot this in the studio (read double garage) as she was heading out for a night out on the town. Filtering done in Photoshop. © Graham Jones Canon EOS Digital ... Beautiful daughter you have there, Graham. Love the soft light and filters you used! - Wendy Amdahl See Wendy's Premium BetterPholio™ Response 1:Beautiful portrait! Your daughter is a very lovely young lady! - Marie C. Fields See Marie's Premium BetterPholio™ Response 2:Hi Jennifer, With the above shot the filtering was done in Photoshop. As follows: - Create a copy of the base layer by dragging the background layer onto the "new layer" icon - With the new layer selected, apply filters>distort>diffuse glow. You will need to play around with the levels but the following is a good guide. Graininess 1, Glow 3, Clear 17 - Apply filters>blur>gaussian blur. About 15 - Now drop the opacity of the copied layer to about 50 percent. - To keep the eyes, nostrils and mouth sharp, I then add a mask to the copied layer and "paint" out those areas with a brush set to black. This allows the sharp image behind to show through. - Now flatten the image and if you like you can desaturate by about 80 percent and add a warming filter to it. Simple really :-) and very flattering. By the way, had a look at your work. Terrific stuff. Do you earn much from your stock photography? kind regards, Graham - Graham Jones See Graham's Premium BetterPholio™ Read this discussion online Respond to this discussion

New Photo Discussion 12: Morning Star Morning Star Dodged the leaf to get rid of the harsh glare from the sun and the upper left above the flower because of some background distractions. Did some color saturation plus hue adjustments for the greens. Tried getting rid of the shadow on the left side of the flower with the clone tool, but wasn't successful. ~ 1/60, F-20, ISO 400, 183 mm. Critiques welcomed. © Janet L. Detota Canon EOS Digital ... Forgot to mention the oil pastel filter was applied in PSE2. :-) - Janet L. Detota See Janet's Premium BetterPholio™ Response 1:Very beautiful, Janet!! I really like what you've done with this. It has a wonderful glowing light look, and your tight, narrow frame line is great. - Duane Carter See Duane's Premium BetterPholio™ Response 2:Beautiful, Janet! Love the colors and your presentation! Excellent work! - Dan J. Holm See Dan's Premium BetterPholio™ Response 3:Hi Janet! I Like The Darkness Surrounding The Morning Glory. It Puts The Focus On The Flower!! Nice Job - Terry R. Hatfield See Terry 's Premium BetterPholio™ Response 4:Beautiful, Janet, great PS work - love the blue against the black, very dramatic!! - Deborah Sandidge See Deborah's Premium BetterPholio™ Read this discussion online Respond to this discussion

The Next Step: Where to Go From Here

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