A Day in my Life: Sunday Tennis with Daddy

Some action shots ..

Look, how I can swing the racket and hit the ball..


Attentive!

Daddy and I over the net.. Daddy wants a kiss.


My big helper.. Look how fast he can run!

I am tired!

Girl and a Horse

Some pictures at an open space preserve..

Before and After: Mystical Lighting AutoFX

I have been testing out Mystical Lighting from Auto FX, and here is a before and after. This is a small change but I think makes a big impact.



I started out with this original picture. The exposure is correct to start with, no major problems like highlights blow out, or incorrect WB etc.

The second image is the enhanced version, subtle change, but I think it improved
to get the angelic look I was going after.

First, I slighly bumped up reds 8% since I like skin tones little on the redder side, I think that looks more natural. I used Mystical Lighting for the sparkle effect on the ball. I chose a preset, played with the placement and size, and viola. However, I have to admit that the processing of the plug in was quite slow, so go get yourself a cup of coffee. I am surprised that the plugin did not respond and had to restart occassionally.

Next I added light brush in Mystical ligting so her face is well lit. Applied a little soft effect in Photoshop. I noticed that the background was a little short on the original picture on the left side bottom corner. A quick clone tool fixed that problem. Dodged the edges so the subject grabs the attention. And unmask filter (sharpening) done in the end. A very subtle effect, and but I think it was worth it.

Would I want to be playing with all the lighting effects in Mystical Lighting again?
I do like some of the effects, although I think much can be done in Adobe PS itself and actions or filters in PS seem to be damn fast and reliable than using a plugin, and the plugin even from Auto FX crashed. So if it can be done without Plugin I do like to go that route..

There are some lighting effects, that it is worth a try in Mystical lighting if you don't mind the $199 price tag.

The pictures in a digital creation:

a quick photo shoot..

I picked up my daughter from school and when she came home in the family/ kitchen room, I had stobe lights and other equipment left out. She looked puzzled, but then she ran into her room to put on a nice outfit.. She wanted to me to take her picture.. So I moved the kitchen table, and the background is actually a window curtain. Did not want to bother to put a backdrop with stands and all that. These photos are taken with just one main light (with a 7" reflector dish). I quickly put everything away, time to make dinner and help my daughter on her homework. Oh, she sat on the piano bench.


Next day, I put together a collage layout on my computer.

My Valentine ..

busy scrapbooking ..

I am so inconsistent when it comes to blogging! I started to use this primarily to put photos there, but lately I have been caught up on scrapbooking. I took this picture outside our house on a day my daughter stayed home sick.. Oh, it was late in the afternoon, and love how the sun kissed her face.


I love those yummy MME papers. There are so versatile, and you can combine different lines of paper, and still pull them together. The layout is inspired by a sketch from Basic Grey Newsletter.