Macie...

So, I've not done a post about our little Macie in some time so I figure one is due! She's fully grown now we think and as funny as ever! She'd rather spend the day outside than inside even if it is to just lay in the grass and gather ticks (ick!).

She's turned out to be one amazing dog and we can't image our life without here.

Random bits...

I was going back though some older images to find ones to play with and found these. When I took them I had every intention of seeing what I could do with them in Lightroom. Some took more work than others.

The one above is a grate at the World War II memorial in DC. I just thought it was cool the star in the star in the metal. This didn't take much work as it was already pretty aged and interesting. I just adjusted the contrast and color to make it pop a little more.

The flags above didn't get much either. Just a little darkening around the edge to pull your eye to the center and a bit of sharpening. These are around the Washington Monument.

Now this guy I had all kinds of fun with. My nephew K loves (LOVES!!!) trains. Any kind of train, it doesn't matter so when we took him on the Metro he was in heaven. Now, the light was pretty harsh on his little face but a little toying with the exposure and a nice antique filter turned this otherwise blown out picture into something interesting.

I'm starting to get the hang of Lightroom I think. But then again, just as I get comfortable, I find a tutorial on something else that I want to try and then have to go find a picture to try it on!

Egg hunting...

The weekend before Easter we had an egg hunt for our nephews. Aunt Inzy was the Easter Bunny and planted all the eggs across our front yard. The boys had a blast I think and so did I. Taking pictures of their expressions was so much fun. They could hardly contain themselves as they opened up each egg to find out what was in it.

The two photos featured here took some retouching because of an awkward lighting situation. At that time of day our house casts a huge shadow on the front lawn, however everything beyond it is bright sun. It made for a few tricky shots that I had to fix in post processing. The above shot was totally under exposed and lacked any pop. Lightroom is great about bring back under exposed things and allowing you to tool with the saturation just a bit to make that egg stand out. It's not perfect but I like it!

This one was a little tricky too and I think I could probably use a little more work but I thought I'd throw it up here anyways. I adjusted the saturation of the grass and tried to remove some dirty stuff from B's face (he was covered in dirt and chocolate!) and did a little work to lighten up his face. Again, not perfect but I like it:)

Cherry Blossoms....

This past weekend was a fun one for us! Lots of birthdays in the family and a raging Cherry Blossom Festival down in DC meant we had house guests!

We took the kids down on the train and navigated our way through the throngs of people all trying to admire the thousands of cherry trees planted all around the tidal basin in D.C.

Well, with trying to keep track of two little ones and 5 other adults coupled with the thousands of people that just always seemed to be where I wanted to be it was hard to get a shot off but I think I managed a few that came out well.

I think next time we do this, Mark and I will head down during the week first thing in the morning or late in the evening to try for better light and less crowds. Although, we couldn't have asked for a better day! Blue bird skys and plenty of sun.