Lucky in Love

This weekend we had a little fun with my camera hoping to get some good pictures for my cousin to use for her Save the Date and Engagement pictures. All in all we had a blast and I think came away with some great pictures. It was really hard to pick favorites, it sure does help when you have such a good looking couple......

Did I mention that we had a little fun........

Here is a little sneak peak of the props we used for her Save the Date picture!!!

Beware of Bears

Is this not the cutest little bear you have ever seen?? My very talented aunt has been crocheting up a storm with my little bear hat pattern. I gave crocheting the good ole college try but ultimately failed with a big fat F - yes I got in over my head. I can't wait to see all the other designs and colors she is knitting up!!! I love my family!

We went visit our friends the deClouets last night to finally meet the new addition to their family. Weighing in at a whooping 6 lbs meet Mr. Dylan Michael deClouet and his first modeling gig for bear hats!!! That's my dear old husband holding the tiny little feller, makes my heart pitter patter!!!

Call Of The Wild

We took a little trip to the zoo this weekend. Animals are my favorite subjects to photograph, they have tons of personality that shine through the lens and they don't seem to mind the camera. Here are a few of my favorite pictures from our day at Audubon Zoo......

Scenes From The Underbelly

I love baby bumps!!! Last week I shot some pictures for my dear friend about to have her second little girl. Their is just something so magical and beautiful about pregnancy. These are some of my favorite pictures from our day together.....

I am tickled pink to have another little girl in our group!!!!

Update: Little Miss Ella Claire was born July 22nd. Mom and baby are both happy and healthy!!!!

Itsy Bitsy

What is it about newborns hands and feet that just melt your heart? My friend sent me these pictures of her beautiful new baby girl. They are straight out of her camera (not mine), no editing, no fixing, just sweet innocent perfection!!!

Look at those little bitty finger nails!! Her name is Elizabeth Grace and she is the lucky lady who gets to grow up in this cute little room!!

A perfect 10

A Womb With A View

I am in the process of learning Lightroom. It's an editing program from Adobe and I find it to be a lot more user friendly than Photoshop. Lightroom geared more towards photography and photoshop is geared more towards the graphic designer. I am neither of these professions but I like to play like I am sometimes.

Learning Lightroom has been a lot less frustrating than Photoshop, the only complaint I have is having to export and import files rather than just the universal "save as." I still go back and forth between the 2 programs to get the end result.

Lightroom comes with what they call "presets" it is the equalvent to "actions" in photoshop. Here are some pictures I took of a cute little baby bump with all my new favorite presets!!!!

I took the SOOC (straight out of camera) pictures, imported it into Lightroom, and literally just pressed the desired presets button. It really is that easy.

B&W Low Contrast

Direct Positive

Antique Grayscale

This little munchkin in Mommy's belly came out to enjoy the big bright world we live in yesterday. Everyone is healthy at 8lbs and 7oz and very very happy.

On A Sunday Afternoon

Britt and I spent Sunday afternoon at his family's farm out in the middle of some where near the middle of no where. I brought the nikon to capture our little slice of calmness for the day. We stayed till after sunset so my camera could play with the lovely light.

I love these pictures. I love taking pictures. Their is so much beauty to be seen through the lens of a camera. It is so fulfilling to capture that special moment, or pictures like these that bring you to a calm place just by looking at them.

Yes, underneath the peaceful water rest hundreds of bass fishies - yummy!!

Happy Hump Day!!!!

"The Farm"

Name That Photo

I had so many titles I wanted to use for this picture:

A Day In The Life Of

Dream On

Zonked

Hard Not Life

Just Hanging Around

To Much Wine Last Night

Don't Hate Me Because I Can Sleep All Day

And I Do Mean Tired

If You Tranquilizer Her She Is Nice

Sleep. It's What's For Dinner

It's 9:45 am and my furry baby is on her third nap of the day.

He Loves Me, He Loves Me Not

I am worried about my little plants, we had a few days of freeze here in South Louisiana and everyone is feeling the effects. I took this picture back in October of my beautiful Ixora plant but now she looks sick with no blooms left in site and brown spots on her leaves. All my other 'babies' are wilted and cold but I am hoping the warmer weather will bring them slowly back to life. Just dreaming of the days I will be able to enjoy these beautiful blooms again.

Have a great weekend!!!

Ixora, Maui Orange

Hey, Soul Sister

I just had to share this picture with you guys (Sorry Ray, if you get in front of my camera chances are you'll end up here!!) I took it with my Nikon D40. This photo is straight out of the camera (SOOC), no photoshop, no cropping, no enhancing, just perfection. Confession - I did play around with the picture in photoshop but nothing I did to it look as good as the original. I love when that happens......

When most people get in front of the camera they have no idea what to do. I'm by no means a professional, and when you mix and non-professional behind the camera, and a not professional in front of the camera you get tons of silly pictures. "Should I smile or be serious? What do I do with my hands?" To which I answered "I don't know." My motto on taking pictures is to take as many as possible and you are bound to get one great pic. After we got through the silliness (i.e. sticking a tennis racket in your face), she looked to the side to see a car turning down the driveway, and my camera captured the natural movement. I love this picture of her, it reflects the essence of who she is - fit, sporty, and beautiful.

This is my cousin Rachel, our mothers are sisters, she grew up with three brothers, so I have adopted her as my little sister (and best friend). She came to me a few weeks ago in need of a picture of herself doing something kinda sporty. We looked through some old photos I had taken of us playing volleyball on the beach last summer, but nothing really worked. I suggested we take new pictures, and what some may call a photo-shoot emerged. We had fun and as always laughed alot.

I also wanted to share some new "Actions" that I downloaded on the internet from some smart people who know a hell of alot more about photoshop than I do. It's been really fun playing around with different pictures and different actions.

Left picture is a boost action and on right a vintage action

Left picture is a heartland action and seventies action on the right

Just Because

Image via Lonny Magazine

Mickey Blue Eyes

My favorite niece in the whole world has the most beautiful big blue eyes. I think she sometimes gets tired of me telling her how beautiful she is but I really can not help myself. Last night we took a few pictures in front of the Christmas tree to send cards out to friends and family. I did a little editing on one of the photos to bring out her already blue eyes.

The first picture on the left is straight out of the camera (SOOC), the picture on the right is a little photoshop action I like to call "Bring on the Eyes!" I sharpened the pic up a little, cropped the bottom, and touched up her smile and voila - can everyone say with me SHAA BABY!!!

Their are many different ways to make eyes pop in photoshop. One of the easiest ways is:

1- Zoom in on just the eyes and use the lasso tool to trace around the eye.

2- Click "Select" and "Feather" and enter the number 10 (helps blend the lines).

3- Click "Filter" and "Unsharp Mask" then slide the bar to slightly sharpen.

Be very careful not to sharpen the eyes to much or you subject will start to look like they are from another planet. The 10% of photoshop that I actually understand has become highly addictive for me. The other 90% is just down right frustrating.