A New Day, A Different Way The creative and photographic endeavours of a woman trying to add color and beauty to her world.

I love taking photographs, but I have come to realize I dislike editing photographs.  Cropping and adjusting levels trying to make them perfect.  I just don't find that part fun.  If the straight out of the camera shot isn't good enough (and they seldom are even for very seasoned photographers) I just don't play with it. 

So in an effort to change this I set myself a one week challenge.  Just one week nothing too ambitious, of picking a photo out of my archives, editing it and posting the before and after shots here on my blog.  My thinking is perhaps if I could see a weeks worth of posts with the edited photos it will inspire me to keep editing my photos. 

So here are today's before and after shots.

I love taking photos of flowers with my macro lens.  I never know what I will end up with as the lens doesn't always want to focus on what I want to focus on.  This one turned out okay in that respect but to me the original is a little dark and dull.  I wanted to soften the effect and lighten the overall effect. 

I started by cropping the photo a little, I did a slight levels adjustment and then added three layers of texture using different blending modes in Photoshop Elements.  I am a lot happier with the after shot however looking at it now I see that I would like to go back in and bring out a bit more of the green from the middle of the flowers, and really that's the goal of this little challenge.  To allow myself to see what I am missing by not editing. 

There seem to be a lot of beautiful poppies growing in our neighbourhood.  I came home at lunch yesterday when I knew most people would be at work and creeped into a couple of neighbour's yards to catch some photos of their poppies.

Anyone who has followed my blog knows that I love taking photos of flowers.  I used to think I had to try to photograph other objects so my posts weren't so repetitive but I have decided to embrace doing what I love and the flower post will continue with some regularity.  I hope you like these beauties.

The Irises are blooming right now and they are incredible.  There were taken from the parking lot of on office building if you can believe it.

Today I am linking up for Texture Tuesday over at Kim Klassens Cafe Blog.  The theme this week is text so your photo must include at least one layer of one of Kim's textures and some text.

I have been out taking photos of spring blossoms this week and this quote jumped to mind as I was looking at this photo.

I used Kim's golden texture first, using the soft light blending mode at 56%, then I added dusty rose also on solf light and changed the opacity to 71%.

 This spring we planted a Rhododendron in our yard.  We know it doesn't have a great chance for survival.  Our soil is all wrong for this type of plant but the blossoms were so beautiful we just couldn't resist.  I hope with a little extra care we can keep this beauty alive and thriving.  I had to share the beauty of these blossoms.

Here are the remaining shots that I want to share from last Saturday's trip to the Summerland Ornamental Gardens.  I think these shots are even better than the first set I published.

I found this little guy inside a flower I was taking a photo of.  I didn't even notice him at first because he was so white.  I have never seen anything like him before and while I am really not a fan of spiders at all I had to get in as close as possible to take a shot.  I don't technically think he is albino but I have never seen a white spider before.

Here are some more shots from the Summerland Ornamental Gardens.  I have so many beautiful shots and I want to show them all so I thought I would do half now and half in a few days so I don't give everyone flower overload.

Yesterday we hopped in the truck and went for a drive south.  I thought we had no destination in mind just a little road trip.  I was perfectly okay with that because I knew I would be able to get my husband to stop at the art supply shop on the way through Kelowna.  It kills me that we don't have a decent art shop in Vernon. 

Anyway it turns out that hubby did have a destination in mind but was keeping it as a surprise for me.  Knowing how much I love to photograph flowers he took me to the Summerland Ornamental Gardens.  The Gardens are over 15 acres of ornamental and xeriscape gardens along with a butterfly garden and an arboretum.  We barely scratched the surface of this place yesterday and I am sure we will go back.  Hubby was very patient carrying around my extra camera lenses while I stopped to take pictures of just about everything.  I will post more photos later in the week but here are a few.  All shots are unedited, straight out of the camera so they are not as good as they could be but I just wanted to share some of the beautiful scenery.

And along the way back we toured along the water in Summerland and Peachland and I snapped these.






And then to round off our day we went to a car show here in town.  We generally do this every year, we start with dinner on the sidewalk at a lovely downtown restaurant and then head out to see the cars.  Here are a few shots of dinner and the crowds of people.










And from there it was home, to a bottle of wine on the back deck...ah...what a fantastic day.