Playing Around in Photo Shop

Yesterday as a birthday treat/fun time, Jody, Alex, Matt and I headed out on a photo-taking excursion. No special reason, we (Jody and I) just think it's fun to have periodic pictures of ourselves. The last fancy ones we have are from our weddings, so it felt like a good time to snap some new ones.

We headed over to Freestone Park in Gilbert since the internet suggested that was a great place to take photos. I wasn't overly impressed with the place - a nice park, but nothing special. There was a carousel, but it was the super creepy kind like you see in horror movies so we stayed away from that :) Matt thought that an old barn-like structure there would make a good backdrop so we took some there and then some in front of a small waterfall. Then we headed over to downtown Gilbert to get some fun railroad shots. After that, we took a quick stroll around downtown finding various fun spots to pose.

Today, Matt and I picked a few of our favorite pictures to edit in Photo Shop. Matt is really great with the tool, but I had never really used it before. My first experience with it was fantastic! You can really do anything to the pictures - from enhancing colors to fixing flyaways and red eyes to making the whole thing look like a cartoon. I killed a few hours this morning playing with our shots. Below are some of my favorites:

Posterized

Lightened & Brightened

De-Saturated

Background Blur

Wind in the Hair

Grain + Color Enhance

Subtle - Fixed Flyaways, Whitened Teeth & Eyes

Fresco Filter

I think we'll have to make this an annual thing! Easy, fast and free. If anyone else is interested in joining in, just let me know!

P.S. Special thanks to my mom for the lovely birthday gift outfit I'm wearing!