Through A Photographer's Eyes: October 2011

Day 304 - Fallen

This Week's Featured Linkup - ''Photo Tip Tuesday"

It's time for my 20th Linkup Feature...

Jaymi over at Live. Love. Travel. host the weekly linkup called 'Photo Tip Tuesday'. Included below are the details of this linkup:

The idea behind Photo Tip Tuesday is simple. I have learned so much about photography and editing from reading blogs and I know others love to learn tips and tricks as well. On Photo Tip Tuesday, you can link up as many photos as you like and simply share something about how you took the photo or how you edited it. Your tip can be anything from a full fledged tutorial, to simply sharing what lens you used, what your camera settings were, or perhaps what action you used to edit your photo. And please never think that you don't know enough to share a tip or that you aren't advanced enough to teach others. People read blogs from all levels of photography knowledge, and the simplest of tips can help one another.

My goal with this link up is for people to visit others, learn, share, and make new friends. The link-up will be up from Tuesday to Thursday and I will post my favorites sometime over the weekend. It might be my favorite photo, or my favorite tip. I hope you'll stop by and link up!

'Photo Tip Tuesday' will now be included on my list of linkups under the tab 'Other Linkups' found at the top of my page.

If you would like your linkup featured on my blog, please click on the tab at the top of the page entitled 'Get Your Link Up Featured' for details. The next linkup will be featured next Monday.

I ONLY HAVE TWO LINKUPS LEFT TO FEATURE SO IF YOU HAVEN'T GIVEN ME THE INFORMATION FOR YOUR LINKUP YET, YOU MAY WANT TO DO SO SOON. ONCE I RUN OUT OF LINKUPS TO FEATURE I WILL BE CLOSING DOWN THIS WEEKLY POST.

Day 303 - Scavenger Hunt Sunday / Fall Trees

With 2 hrs. and 10 mins. to spare I am posting my Scavenger Hunt Sunday post. Hey, two weeks in a row, baby! I'm doing pretty good. :)

{Macro}

I guess this picture doesn't need much explanation.

{Tree - Picture of the Day}

Have I mentioned how much I love fall?!

{Home}

Home is where the heart is and these two are my heart so with them I am home.

{Found Texture}

I would say this walkway needs a serious paint job. Made for cool textures though.

{Cover}

The cover of the one of the children's books at my mom's house.

Sunday: Focus on the Savior (with Kathryn Adams)

My name is Kathryn Adams. I blog. I have a love affair with my vacuum cleaner, and I think coffee is one of God’s greatest gifts. I am the mother of two — Banana and Moose {a.k.a. Anna and Madison}. They are everything I want to be when I grow up: funny, creative, smart, kind, compassionate and forgiving. The forgiving part is crucial, ‘cause sometimes I’m the mom who forgets to pack their lunch or turn in field trip permission slips or sign their homework.
I’m so happy I married a forgiving husband, too, ‘cause sometimes I’m the wife who is too busy posting on her blog to cook dinner or who decided to spend the day playing in Lightroom instead of doing laundry. If you get me started on my Nikon, I’ll go on ALL day.
To be honest, I’m sort of proud of that . . . I’ll explain a little later.
I can’t imagine a life without faith, without grace {I need so much!}, without unconditional love. I’m amazed and awed every day by Jesus — His heart, His Word, His presence. I see Him in my children’s eyes. I feel Him in the Fall breeze. I hear Him whisper to my heart: “You’re mine.” And I’ll tell you this one truth: He’s mine, too, and that changes EVERYTHING. Stop by Our tiny big Life sometime, and let’s be friends!

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If you were to meet me in real life, you’d pretty quickly discover that I have a passion for a select few things: Jesus, photography and writing. Of course, I’m passionate about my husband and children and friends and so many other undeserved blessings, but I’m talking about the things that really get me up in the morning: something to write, a photo to edit and a Someone to share it all with and do it all for.
I feel most alive when I’m with Him, behind the lens or sipping on a cup of coffee in front of the keyboard.
That wasn’t always the case, though.
I’ve always loved Jesus — well, as long as I can remember. But, I spent most of my life running through a checklist, maintaining a constant and exhausting effort to keep everything neat and tidy, to do right and be right and please . . . everybody.
I envied folks who seemed to actually enjoy life. They were the creative types. The “others,” like my daughter Madison, who can’t walk by a box of crayons without drawing, who have designated rooms for sewing and scrapbooking, who earn a living designing interiors or spilling emotion onto canvas.

I was the organizer, the cleaner, the straight-A student, the by-the-book girl. I would tell you I was gifted — organization and obsessive compulsion are gifts, right? — but not creative. Besides, creating is messy and sometimes involves mistakes, and I was never a big fan of messes or mistakes.
Well, about three years ago, I discovered blogging. And shortly thereafter, I got serious about photography. It was like an entire world opened up that I had never known before. I have something to say. I have art to share. The world is art and words and wonder and He’s woven all through it.
I started a journey to let go of perfection and found that when I’m not white-knuckling my way through life in an effort to control, there is beauty hidden everywhere.

Just the other Sunday, the hubby and I led Sunday school for the elementary age kids at our church and the theme of the lesson was this: You were created, so you can be creative.
Simple. Revolutionary. I’ve thought about it a million times since.
This is what God has to say about us, about ALL of us:

For we are his workmanship, created in Christ Jesus for good works, which God prepared beforehand, that we should walk in them. ~ Ephesians 2:10

We are made in His image. We can’t help but be creative. It’s who He is, so it’s who we are!
I’m learning that behind the lens and sitting at the keyboard, I’m creating a masterful reflection of His heart. It gets a little messy sometimes, but that’s the nature of art.

In the end, it’s worth the laundry piling up a little, the trials and the occasional errors.
I once heard that there are so many different people in the world because each of us showcases a single dynamic of His infinitely faceted character. What a privilege to display a part of His image in what I create.

Day 302 - Buck Moth

After much research on the internet the hubs figured out this was called a Buck Moth. Pretty cool, huh!

Favorite Photo of the Month People's Choice

Time to vote for your Favorite Photo of the Month. These listed below were chosen as the #1 Favorite Photo of the Week the last 5 weeks (instead of the last 4) and now it is time to choose a winner. The winner's photo will get a free month long feature on the right side bar of my blog which gives them more exposure thus driving more traffic to their blog. We all love lots of traffic, right? Well, blog traffic that is. :) If you are in the running to win then be sure to let your friends and followers know to come vote for you! Voting closes at midnight on Monday.

Day 301 - Cooper's Hawk

Favorite Photo of the Week Contest Winners / Contest Changes

I told you at last week's Favorite Photo of the Week contest that I had a surprise for you this week. Well, I decided I wanted to re-vamp the whole Favorite Photo of the Week Contest. I was bored with the name, with the button and with flying solo so this week we have a whole new look, a whole new name and a brand new co-host. But first let's find out last week's winners! Winners feel free to grab your button.

Serendipity is Sweet

I love the lighting, the vintage look and the post-processing! Makes me wonder what is beyond that gate.

Seeing Each Day

Beautiful muted tons, selective focus and lighting.

The View from Right Here

Don't you just wish you knew the story behind this photo?! Stunning image.

Walk With Me

Beautiful lighting and selective focus. I love how there are other flowers in the photo but yet your eye is still drawn to the main subject.

And the winner is:

Moments In Time

Incredible details and gorgeous colors! Amazing macro!

Congratulations, Nadege on being this week's contest winner! Your photo will be featured on the side bar of my blog this week and you will be in the running for a month long feature at the end of the month. Feel free to grab your winner's button below:

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INTRODUCING...

- First of all we are so stoked to tell you that Misty from Through A Photographer's Eyes is now partnering up with Ashley of After Nine to Five in hosting this contest. Ashley has jumped in with both feet and is just as excited as Misty is with the direction this contest is taking.

- The previous Favorite Photo of the Week Contest is now called SHOOT. EDIT. SUBMIT. The purpose of this contest is to challenge yourself artistically through your photography. Each week you will choose your best photo from that week and submit it to the contest.

- Contest will open Friday at 12:01AM and close Tuesday at 11:59PM. Winners will be announced the following Friday when the next contest is posted.

- Ashley will be choosing her top 2 favorites and Misty will be choosing her top 2. Each week we will alternate choosing the overall winner. That winner's photo will be featured on the side bar of both of our blogs for the entire week. Double the exposure than before! That's why it is so important to only post your best photo from each week.

- At the end of the month an overall monthly winner will be chosen by you out of that month's four weekly winners. Because Ashley is so incredibly awesome, she has volunteered to help line up a prize for each monthly winner (beginning next month). So, not only will the monthly winner's photo be featured on our blogs for a whole month but the winner will also receive a great prize from one of our incredible sponsors.

Now for the rules:
1. Photo must be taken this week.(Sat - Fri)
2. Only one entry per person.
3. "Shoot. Edit. Submit." button or a link back to this contest must be on your post in order for it to qualify.
4. Link only to your blog post not your main blog url.

(If you submit a photo you are granting us permission to copy and paste it onto our blogs if you win.)

So without further ado, meet your hosts (click on their picture to be taken to their blog):

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Well, it's time for you to submit your entries! Be sure to grab the button below to include on your post.

Day 300 - Beluga Whale

We visited the Belugas just as the trainers were coming out to interact with them so it was perfect timing to take pictures. Such magnificent creatures.

Day 299 - Shades of Autumn (Red)

Here in SoCal all these fall colors are kind of hard to find but the trees in the Walmart parking lot came through for me on this one! :)

What's Up Wednesday!

If you are like me, you stumble across inspiring photog bloggers from time to time by chance through other bloggers, linkups, comments, etc. Well, I thought I would try to make it easier for you by grouping everyone in one place. Instead of opening this linkup to all bloggers, I am only asking for blogs that are geared toward photography to link up below. Just link up your blog's url below and start sending a "What's Up" shout out to your neighbors! That's it! Linky will be open on Wednesdays only so get your blog linked up. Be sure to come back to meet new photogs!

It's not required but feel free to grab my button for others to find their way to the linkup as well.

Day 298 - Acorns

Creative name, right? :) My daughter and I had fun collecting acorns at the park today and I decided to have a little fun with the acorns and textures. I like the outcome.

Tutorial Tuesday - {Making a Button}

So you've seen all the cool buttons flying around the blogosphere (well not literally flying) and you want one yourself? Well, here is a super easy tutorial on how to create your own.

CHOOSE YOUR PHOTO
Now, you can be as creative as you want with what image you want to appear on your button. You can add text or whatever you like. Whatever picture you choose though you need to change the dimensions to whatever size button you want. The average button is usually 150x150.

RESIZING YOUR PHOTO
One of the easiest ways I have found to do it is to upload the image to Picnik and re-size it but be sure to uncheck the "Keep Proportions" box and then enter your dimensions.

HOST YOUR PICTURE
You now need to find a place to host your picture. I use Photobucket. Copy the Direct Link button from the Photobucket picture.

CREATE HTML CODE
Copy the code below and into the html portion of your blog post or your side bar depending on where you want your button. Replace yourblogurl with your blog's url and yourimagedirectlinkURL with the direct link code from Photobucket.

CREATE THE TEXT BELOW YOUR BUTTON FOR PEOPLE TO COPY
Directly below the html code you just created copy the following text

<textarea rows="4" cols="20">

then copy the entire html code you created and paste it after the text then paste the following text after the html code

</textarea>

Viola! You can now view your button and people can now copy it to their own blog.

Let me know if you have any questions. I hope this was simple enough.

Day 297 - Colorful Landscape

This Week's Featured Linkup - ''Quotography"

It's time for my 19th Linkup Feature...

Nicolasa over at My Perspective host the weekly linkup called 'Quotography'. Included below are the details of this linkup:

Each week there are different themes and you post pictures you took with a quote, song, or poem that goes with the theme.

'Quotography' will now be included on my list of linkups under the tab 'Other Linkups' found at the top of my page.

If you would like your linkup featured on my blog, please click on the tab at the top of the page entitled 'Get Your Link Up Featured' for details. The next linkup will be featured next Monday.

Day 296 - Cordon Bleu Finch / Scavenger Hunt Sunday

Like the procrastinator I am, I waited till today to accumulate all the prompts for today's Scavenger Hunt Sunday. Kind of lame-o ones, but hey, at least I participated right! :)

{WORDS}

The hubs and I always comment on how dumb this sign is because a) they don't even spell out "through" and b) it's not even a street. It's the entrance to my mom's apartment complex that very clearly dead ends as it is a small apartment complex.

{UNDER}

The view while standing under this tree.

{ORANGE}

The center divide stripes looked very orange to me but than I remember that they are technically yellow so I am going with the orange reflectors instead. *Disclaimer: No photographer was hurt in the taking of this photo. :)

{FLY - PHOTO OF THE DAY}

Thankfully this pretty guy stopped flying long enough for me to get a shot.

{ALWAYS LOOK ON THE BRIGHT SIDE}

Though your life may be the pits at times, look on the bright side...Jesus Christ promises He will never leave thee nor forsake thee!