Pre-Christmas busyness is obviously kicking in, as we had an unusually low number of members entering this week’s Smartphone evening, and a lower than usual turnout on Wednesday evening. I am also suffering from that same pre-Christmas busyness so my Christmas gift to you will be a shorter than usual blog .. I have cards to write and wrapping to finish, and those mince pies just wont eat themselves 😊
Wednesday evening ushered in the second Smartphone evening of the season. The idea is simple: take a picture on a smartphone or tablet, edit it as you please (but edits must also be done on a smartphone or tablet) and then share with the group and discuss the result!
This week we had a total of 21 images from seven members. As this needs to be a shorter blog, I am going to exercise my “blogger’s prerogative” and highlight one image from each member that (for whatever reason) I liked the most 😊
This image rather disturbed me when it first appeared on my screen. At first glance, the worker in orange appears to be looking over the shoulder of the younger woman, which struck an unpleasant chord for me (I work for a transport organisation and we focus a lot on the safety of women and girls using our services). I was very relieved when Philip explained that the man in orange was actually painting the windowsill so was looking down at his work! I very much agree with Philip that this is an interesting bit of street photography: the fact that it triggered that initial emotional response for me and then demanded that I look more closely to see what was going on makes it very interesting indeed (bloggers prerogative remember!). All processing was done in Snapseed, the key edit being to lighten the shadows of the worker (he had the light behind him so was rather dark in the original shot).
My “image of choice” from Alfred was this charming capture of Brixham Lane. Lots to enjoy in this one, including the nice trailing lines that take your eye up the path, the punchy colours and the variety of textures. Members had some debate about whether the picture would have been improved or diminished by having a person towards the top of the staircase, however the conclusion was that we will never know .. Alfred’s priority at the time was not to keep his wife waiting too long! Again, all processing done in Snapseed which Alfred used to give his image an HDR look.
Brian gave us three great images to enjoy which made choosing my favourite very difficult. Both of his landscapes were great (I particularly liked the way in which he managed to soften the water .. who knew you can do long exposure images on a phone? 😉) but the image I enjoyed the most was this very graphic shot of patterns in the sand. My choice will probably divide the crowd (some members felt it lacked a point of interest), but I really liked it: great textures, interesting patterns, nice shades .. definitely an image that works really well in monochrome, and one that might look great printed big and hung on a white wall! I’d be curious to see whether it works even better in a letterbox format. Yep, you guessed it, all processing done in Snapseed!
In contrast to Brian’s graphic mono image, my pick of Dave S’ images is this grasshopper. It’s much more common to see pictures of insects captured side-on sitting on a stick to ensure that everything is in focus, however Dave’s image has the grasshopper sitting face-on amongst the dahlia flower petals. This gives great contrast between the almost monochrome body of the grasshopper and the pastel colour of the flower. Members also enjoyed the nice soft curves of the petals. Yes it may be a bit grainy (digital zoom) and yes it might not all be pin sharp, but I liked it!
I also really enjoyed this graphic image from David A. Everyone agreed it was very much a “photography club image”: the graphic shadows, the muted pallet which really showcased the green box, and the attention to keeping the horizontals horizontal and the verticals vertical. Simple subject but a great image 😊
David M gave us some interesting images to consider (who knew that a plastic slinky could look like a coloured glass bowl!?) but this is the one that I enjoyed the most. This image captures the creative folding that one granddaughter applied to another granddaughter’s script (I hope she appreciated the artistry!). Some interesting shapes well captured against the dark wood. Nice frame around the image too, thanks to (of course!) Snapseed.
My favourite image of the evening was of David P’s fishpond! Everyone enjoyed this simple but very effective shot of smoke bush leaves in the mirror-flat water of a fishpond. Great colours, great reflection, a great bit of reflected sky, and lovely water droplet detail on some of the floating leaves. Well seen, and proof that you really don’t need to go far to get a great image!
And as my winner, I will also share David P’s latest selfie (he can always be relied on to produce an unusual selfie!). This effect was achieved using the double exposure feature in Snapseed .. one image wearing sunglasses has been merged with another image wearing a hat .. so theres something else that you can try out in Snapseed!
Those that have made it this far (well done if you did!) may have noticed the common theme that all Photocraft members seem to be using Snapseed as their smartphone image editor of choice. If you’ve not got it, go download it now: it’s free and there are heaps of online tutorials on YouTube to help you get the most out of it (just go to YouTube and search “Snapseed tutorials”).
Now where are those mince pies hiding ..
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