Birds on a Wire

I got lucky a few days ago and found some birds flying around and sitting together chummily  on a wire.  The really lucky part was that I had my camera with me and I was able to pull off the road and take these photos.  Now that's my idea of fun!

Of course, I had to play around with them in Picnik (an on-line photo-editing program which you can read me extoling the virtues of here, here, and here).  I'm curious to know which photo you like the best - both in terms of bird composition and photo-editing.

This last photo is straight from the camera so you can see the colour of the sky on the day I took the pictures.  It's a pretty nice colour without any editing.

Friday Photos - Birds on a Wire

One of the things I was looking forward to doing in September (here's the complete list) was taking photos of birds sitting together on a wire and I finally got my chance.  

Over the past few weeks, as I was driving to and from work, I often noticed large flocks of birds sitting cozily on a wire or swirling overhead.  It would drive me crazy because there I would be in the car admiring the birds while my camera was sitting at home.  I finally got smart and started taking my camera with me every day just in case.   I was rewarded this week, when I stopped at a red light, to see these birds sitting together on a wire.   I quickly snapped some photos while the light was red and was smiling all the way to work.  Of course, I played around with the photos a bit on Picnik as well.

I'm often extolling the benefits of using Picnik, an on-line photo-editing program, on your photos (see here and here), so I thought I would throw in one photo to show the before-and-after shots.

If you see a crazy woman at a stop light rubbernecking at the birds and snapping photos, please just smile and wave at me!

A Field of Prickly Beauty

I've been trying to master the art of giving a vintage look to photos using Picnik, an on-line photo-editing tool.  As I've mentioned before I really like using Picnik to clean-up my photos before they go on the blog - just to auto-adjust the colour and sharpen the image a little (you can read about it here).  This time however, I was aiming to create the retro kind of photo that I have seen around blogland.

I started off with only a little bit of a retro look.

And slowly got more and more faded looking.

Don't you just love weeds.  Wait did I just say that - okay - let me qualify.  I love a field full of wildflowers (or in other words weeds).
 

I'm loving the sun-washed, vintage look.  Do the photos look old and faded enough?

But then again I also love the original rich purples and greens - although the contrast with the vintage ones is a bit hard on the eyes.  

Which do you prefer - the vintage washed-out look or the unmanipulated photos???

*****

Just a reminder that there is still time to enter my Summer Giveaway (ends July 13th).  You can find the details here.

Linked to Mosaic Monday at Little Red House

How to Improve your Photos with Picnik

 
I think Picnik, the on-line photo editing site, is the best thing since sliced bread.  It really is amazing what it can do to improve your photos and I've only been using the free section of the website!  Before I put any photos up on the blog, I first put them through Picnik.  I'm sure some of you have discovered Picnik already, or use similar programs, but for those of you who have not found Picnik, I thought I would introduce you to it.  

Here's a basic overview of what you can do (I'll demonstrate with some of my photos as we go along).  

First go to the website http://www.picnik.com/app#/home. When you are on the "Home" tab, you can upload photos from your computer. 

You will automatically be on the "Edit" tab when a photo has been up-loaded.  The first thing I always do is click "Auto-fix" on the left side.  I would say that it improves about 90% of the photos.  Some don't need it and others it makes them worse by changing the colours from what they should be.  If it makes the photo look worse, then you can always click "undo" over on the right.

The next thing I do is decide if the photo needs to be cropped or rotated.  The rotate function is brilliant if you are a bit cock-eyed when you take photos and the horizon isn't level (tell me it happens to you too). 

  

Then I decide if I want to adjust the exposure or colour.  You can also re-size the photo and get rid of red-eye. 

Then I sharpen the photo.  Initially, I was sliding the sharpen button all the way over - I mean, who doesn't want a sharp photo - but my daughter told me that you can over-sharpen photos.  Who knew?  If you are getting white lines around things in your picture, you have over-sharpened it.  Now I usually do about 1/4 or 1/3 of the way along the slider and the effect is much better.  I also zoom in to check how sharp it looks.


Just remember that if at any point you don't like how you changed the photo you can just press "undo" on the right side.


Once you have done the basics to make the photo purty, you can do more creative things with Picnik.  When you click on the "Edit" tab along the top you can add text, put a frame around the photo, do different effects, and add stickers.  There are both free features and some that are labelled "premium" which you have to pay for.  Although I haven't paid for a subscription yet, I find there are still lots of features that are fun to use for free.  I may up-grade some day as it is still very reasonable.

My favourite things to use in the "Edit" section is putting frames around photos.  It was literally months before I discovered that you can combine frames for an even more interesting effect.  For example, I have started using a white border around my photos, followed by a drop shadow.  You have to do the frames one at a time and press "apply" after each one.  I used that effect for the mosaics at the beginning of this post.


When you are finished with editing your photo you will need to save it.  I just change the name by adding a letter after the number so I know which ones I have edited (and how many edits I have done by which letter I am on).


The other feature, I have used a little bit, is under the "Library" tab.  Here you can make small collages.  To do so, you need to click on the "start" button, that has a little ladybug beside it, on the left side.  Then select "Make a Collage".  Select the arrangement of Basic collages that suits the number of photos you want to use.  Then up-load your photos (you can only do 5 photos at a time if you are using the free version) and drag them in to the blank collage frame. The collage frame can be altered in size, dimension, and colour and size of frame.  Then all you have to do is save it when it is finished. It took me several months to discover that you can make a collage, save it, and then go back to the frames and put a frame around your whole collage.  

It really is a picnic using Picnik (you knew I had to say it).