A Woman Loves Orchids

Orchids are such a treat to lavish on ones self, and so hard to resist the happy little faces.  These white faced lovely's are a type of phalaenopsis showing up at the stores for Valentines.  I used my little 18-50 Canon lens to shoot these and worked them in a couple texture layers.  One in Pretty In Pink with a linear Dodge, and two layers of Canvas Grunge by Kim Klassen at lineral burn, some adjustment layer here and there and finally the nice little quote.  A Woman Loves Orchids Because They Make Her Feel Like She Is Floating On  A Cloud Of Possibilty!

Life is a Bowl Full of Cherries

Isn't this different coming from me!  Its an exercise from Kim Klassen's Test Kitchen and I found the exercise fascinating but it was even more fun trying to find things to take a still life composition.  Now I can gobble up these delightful cherries!  Enjoy, I know I will.

Life in Six Words

In our Beyond Layers group, Kim ran across a fun and interesting challenge.  Your life in 6 words.   The idea originated from The Smith Magazine http://www.smithmag.net/
and so here we are taking some of our photos and putting some life words to go with our images.  Its a whole big world out there, the Smith Magazine site is very entertaining, so check it out.   My image was taken a couple weeks ago at Hagerman Wildlife Refuge in Sherman TX, and these are snow geese who were flying in by the thousands.  This photo was unusual as they were flying right over me so close that while in formation they look like someone stacked them up like a kabob.    Enjoy ~
Oh, my texture is just the cloud overlay at soft light.

Goldfinches are here!

 What a fun surprise to look out at my feeders and so a flock of Lesser Goldfinches.  My camera was ready too, amazing.  This first shot is of a single little guy waiting patiently for his turn at one of the feeders.   They did not seem very shy of me and the camera, maybe because they were so excited about a free meal!
Enjoy ~

Whats old is New

This week in Beyond Layers Class, Kim is trying to get us to take our new photos or old photos and make them more simple.   The idea being that Less Is More!   I truly struggled with this because I like dramatic deep colors full of depth.   Both these photos I have re worked in the less is more idea.  the Texture Kim has us all using is called Awaken.

On the feather I used this texture only one time.  Its a found feather that I have kept for years.

This is one of my favorite subjects.  Old dead flower heads and pods.   This is called Spring Flower Becomes Winters Cloak.  I worked and worked on this to get it soft and delicate, added finally two textures of Awaken.  

Sometimes I use a dry brush filter on my images after I process them but not on these two.

You can view more of my work on my Flicker Photo Stream here:
http://www.flickr.com/photos/11605172@N05/

Herons and Mockingbirds

Here I have included a couple more birds for you to enjoy.  The great big Mocking Birds are so stately and commanding.  In the other photo I see the Great Heron carries the same attitude in his marsh area.  Now that we have sold our old ranch and the bird bath stayed there too, I can not imagine a summer without one.  I wonder if two bird baths will find their way to my yard!
Enjoy~

Fractilius Garden

I love the way sunflowers on long stems reach out toward the sun, like little satellite dishes,  I got to playing around with one of the Redfield filters and applied it to this composition.  I was really happy with the over all effect and have not used this in a couple years, so now it is all fresh and exciting for me again.  I left the link to the plugins below if you have an urge to play.
http://www.redfieldplugins.com/galleryFractalius.htm