Slightly Obsessed

Today was BEAUTIFUL.  It is so much easier to get up and out of bed when the walk to class actually looks like it is going to be enjoyable.  Today was really great picture taking weather.  I saw about 15 other people with cameras out today, so I didn't feel as crazy carrying mine around.  In a blog post a few weeks ago I mentioned a picture that I had planned out in my head, but that I had to wait until the weather got better to take it.  Well the weather I've been waiting for has finally arrived!  I have been waiting for a certain group of daffodils to bloom for what seems like 5 years.  This week when I was walking down college I noticed that they finally bloomed.  All I had to wait for was fantastic weather.  I definitely got it today.

My roommate came with me to take pictures today.  It was nice to have her with me today because I was doing some pretty crazy things, and I needed someone to laugh with.  Here is the picture before I go into too much detail:

Like I said, I've been planning this picture for weeks.  I was so excited when I finally got to take it.  To tell the truth, I was in a horrible mood today, but this cheered me up instantly.  Now, taking this picture was not an easy task.  First of all, the Old Main lawn was really crowded today.  People kept walking right in front of me and my camera, obstructing the view of Old Main.  It's not that I have anything against people, but I wanted Old Main in the background, not the backside of a kid in cargo shorts and an obnoxious red shirt.  While people were walking all over the lawn, I was laying down on my stomach right in front of this grouping of flowers.  It has been raining all week, so rather than laying down in some dry dirt, I was laying down in the mud.  Everyone that walked by looked at me like I was absolutely insane.  Maybe I am, I was laying down in mud taking a picture, after all.  My roommate just stood there and laughed at me.  The whole thing was pretty ridiculous. 

If you haven't realized this by now, I have a really odd obsession with taking pictures of Old Main.  My roommate was kind enough today to point out that it isn't the only building on campus that is pretty.  She is right, so next week expect a picture of something other than Old Main.  I also realized that I haven't taken any pictures of people.  It sounds weird, but I usually don't take pictures of people.  I took my sister and brother-in-law's engagement photos, and that was probably that I took well thought out pictures of people.  I'll try and work on that before the end of the semester!

This Weather Is Awful.

This week was crazy.  From unexpected Crim exams to group projects, there was never a dull moment.  I would love to tell you guys that I have some beautiful picture for you this week, but I would be lying.  I was going to take some pictures this afternoon, but then the SHRA meeting took forever, and I had to run to another meeting.  I didn't take my camera to the SHRA meeting (whoops) and then I didn't have enough time to grab it before I had to run to Five Guys for a dinner/meeting.  I would just like point out that nothing actually got accomplished at the dinner/meeting.  Perhaps I will blog about that experience in my rcl bolg. hmmm...there has to be something rhetorical in that right? right?!


Anyway.  I stumbled upon an old memory card hidden in the depths of my camera case.  I found two gems:

  The only reason I call these two pictures "gems" is because they are of flowers, and although the flowers are starting to bloom, I still miss spring.  The first picture plays around with depth of field, just like the one picture from last week.  I really like the picture because one would expect the picture to be focused on the flowers, but instead I focused on the rocks.  I edited the photo slightly, but I honestly forget what I did already.  The second picture is just pretty.  I bumped up the brightness and the contrast of this photo.  Both of the pictures were taken on the same partly cloudy day all the way back in 2009.  I can't wait for this weather to stop sucking.  Also, I want all of the flowers to bloom and I want the leaves to come back on the trees.

Oldies but Goodies

I really did plan on taking a picture this week, but somehow it never happened.  I was sitting in the Atherton Lobby at 8:00pm, and I thought to myself, "Crap. I didn't take any pictures this week..."  I could have very easily done something about it, there are enough photographic opportunities waiting inside.  Now it's midnight, and I still haven't taken a picture.  Rather than taking some joke picture that I'm not ever proud of, I'm going to share some of my old favorites with you.  These pictures were taken back in the day.  I bought my camera junior year of high school.  I would come home practically everyday and just take pictures of anything.  I would get up early on the weekends just to take pictures.  College has pretty much sucked the creativity out of my soul. Well, that's a little over dramatic.  I just hate this weather.  It isn't pretty and it makes me cranky.

Here is one picture that I love, but I don't know why

I still remember the day I took this picture.  I was a junior, and I was sitting at the computer in my basement.  I had actually just finished uploading some pictures, and I'm sure I was wasting time on facebook.  I looked out onto the patio and I saw the leaves laying there all dried up.  I guess I really liked the colors, so I grabbed my camera and took the picture.  It was definitely taken out of boredom, but I ended up really liking it.  I think that happens a lot with the pictures I take.

This picture is probably one of my all time favorites:

I took this picture three days after I got my camera.  It was a Saturday morning, and there was a lot of dew. The thing I like best about this picture is the depth of field.  Depth of field is just a fancy way of saying that not everything is in focus, which adds depth to the picture.  Only some of the dew drops are in focus, and the nail is just slightly out of focus.  Playing with the focus always makes a picture more interesting.  I took roughly ten pictures of this railing, and each time I focused on a different section.  This happened to be my favorite.

Next week I'm going to make time and take pictures like I used to.  It may be out of boredom, or perhaps I'll experiment with some more concepts of photography.  I just know that I need to find the time to take pictures again.

Uhhh What Is This?

Like I've been saying all semester, this week has sucked.  My Intro to Africa class is murdering me.  I want to drop it, but I'm not allowed.  I am just so sick of it sucking up all of my time and creativity. 

This week's photography adventures should have started when the weather was nice earlier in the week, but I was too busy procrastinating a paper and doing Spanish homework.  I wish I would've had my camera with me this morning during our group meeting.  One of the ducks from the pond was right outside of the Hub, but sadly I don't carry my camera with me all the time.

Once I finished my last Spanish assignment for the week I grabbed my camera and ran outside.  The sun was beginning to set, and I knew I didn't have much time.  This week I wanted to take a picture of something that had some texture, but I couldn't find anything that caught my eye.  In my frustration to find something that I actually liked to take a picture of, I took a few pictures of random things.  This one was my favorite:

What is this a picture of?  I wish it was something amazing, but this is actually just a picture of marble with cracks in it.  I raised the contrast of the picture to make it look more interesting.  The original was nowhere near as interesting.  I showed this picture to my friends and asked them what they thought it was.  At first they said "uhhh what is this?" I told them to guess.  They thought it was a picture of tree shadows, and then they thought it was a picture of a leaf.  I like that is is really weird and obscure.  When you look at it you have to think about what it could be.  I almost feel bad that I told you guys what it is, but I know that I'm the type of person that would want to know eventually. 

I really hope that the weather gets warmer and the flowers bloom soon.  I have a really great idea for a picture, but the flowers need to bloom first.  Until then, I will continue taking pictures of whatever I stumble across.

The Rule of Thirds

My photo this week is pretty boring.  Although this weather has been beautiful, I've had no idea what I want to take pictures of right now.  I am just waiting for the leaves to come back on the trees.  Hopefully, the leaves will restore my creativity.  The truth is, I don't care how sunny it is, if the trees don't have leaves I still feel like everything is dull and boring.  The picture I took this week isn't spectacular in anyway.  I just really like the colors.

It is just a simple shot of the "Pennsylvania State University" sign out on Atherton Street by the Nittany Lion Inn.  The sun was starting to set, and I really liked the light that it cast on the sign.

Since this has been dull for the most part, I figured I'd take the time to talk about one of my favorite photography concepts.

The Rule of Thirds

Following the rule of thirds is essential to taking great photos.  The concept is that people find pictures that are separated into three different sections of color or texture to be the most pleasing to the eye.  Essentially, if you draw a tic-tac-toe grid on the picture, you should see that each vertical section is different from the others, and that each horizontal section is different from the others. 

I took this picture at the Alhombra Palace in Spain.  It is a great example of the rule of thirds.  Here is the same picture, but with a grid on it.

You can see that the top horizontal section is all sky, the middle is part of the palace, and the bottom section is all water and reflection.  Two of the vertical sections are the same, but because they aren't next to each other this picture still follows the rule.

While it is good to follow the rule of thirds, it is fun to break it too!  Here is a picture I took during snowpocalypse last year:

This picture was taken inside of my car, after I spent an hour shoveling it out of the snow.  The snow was on my windshield still, and I thought it looked really cool.  This picture doesn't follow the rule of thirds, but I still like it.  I think the triangulate pattern is what makes it pleasing to the eye.

I really hope next week isn't so dull!

The Longest Week of my Life

I know last week I was complaining about how crazy it was, but this week has been ten times worse.  It sounds terrible, but I really didn't have a lot of time to put into taking pictures this week. I spent all week working on the three papers that I have to turn in today, studying for my Spanish exam (also today), and completing Spanish homework (due at 11:59 Thursday night).  If you haven't noticed by now, I am a pretty big procrastinator.  I love procrastinating, and this week I wasn't able to do it.  For the first time in my life I had papers written, revised, and ready to go before 2:30am the morning they are due.  Although I didn't procrastinate my papers, I still had quite a lot of Spanish I needed to work on last night.  Between working on homework, completing a study guide, and trying to memorize over 300 vocabulary words I found time to take a few pictures.

I went to the Grandfather Clock Lounge in Atheron and quickly snapped a few pictures of the piano with my camera.  The lighting was pretty atrocious in there so my pictures didn't turn out exactly they way I wanted.  I hate using the flash on my camera.  It is so bright and just annoying, but I had no choice but to use it last night.

I can't say that I am especially proud of this picture, but I do enjoy the reflection of the keys.  I need to figure out something with the glare coming from my flash though.  I think taking the picture during the day when there is actually sunlight coming through the windows will solve all of my problems.  I also think I am going to edit this picture and see what happens.  I just need the time to get it all done.  I am so excited for Spring Break.  It will give me the time to mess around with this picture, and sleep too!

Photo Editing Fun

I think we can all agree that this week has been an absolute fiasco.  I didn't have enough time to take any pictures this week.  I was extremely bummed.  The only free time I had was when my Crim 100 class was canceled on Tuesday.  I love that class, so I was somewhat upset.  I know, a college student upset that a class was canceled, crazy, right?  Well I spent an hour sitting in the Hub waiting for my friend to join me for lunch.  During that time I edited some photos, and because I didn't have time to take any new pictures I was forced to select things that were already on my computer.

I took this picture last summer:

My friends and I spent almost all summer jamming out to The Beatles, so it only seemed fitting that we included "Hey Jude" in our road art.  This picture was taken more for the sake of memory than for art.  While I was sitting in the Hub I decided to play around with the contrast of the photo to make it more interesting:

 

In this image, the psychedelic colors within the letters and the peace sign are more vibrant.  I love increasing the contrast in photos to make the colors stronger, but I have been changing the contrast in my pictures since the 8th grade.  It isn't exactly creative for me anymore.  I searched around on my photo editing software and found a "threshold" tool under the "colors" tab.  I honestly have no idea what it does, but I know that messing around with its settings makes your pictures look really awesome: 

I really love the way it made the peace sign look! 

Last week I mentioned that I couldn't wait to take pictures at THON.  Unfortunately, that didn't happen.  As I was boarding the Blue Loop at 4:00 am Sunday, I realized that my camera was still sitting on my desk.  Turning around and running back to my dorm was outrageously tempting, but I was already running late.  I had to rely on my roommate to take pictures for me. I took her photos and then added some of my own editing to jazz things up:

 

 

Changing the threshold setting is probably my new favorite way to edit photos.  It makes the pictures unique and interesting to look out.  It definitely gives a wacky feel to the pictures that wouldn't be appropriate for all images, but I think it worked out well this time!

The Apple of My Eye

The weather this week was beautiful, yet my picture this week was taken inside.  Unfortunately, I spent much of the week indoors studying and writing papers.  I obviously lead the most exciting life ever.  I have been so busy this week so I've only been able to tackle one project at a time.  When the weather was nice on Tuesday, I wasn't even thinking about snapping a photo for Thursday night.  The next thing I know, it's cloudy.

On Wednesday it was cloudy by the time I could take pictures, but I went on a walk with my camera anyway.  I was looking for anything that had texture.  I absolutely love pictures with a lot of texture, but I haven't taken any thus far.  I wandered between buildings looking for interesting brick patterns, and after a half hour of searching I stumbled upon what I was looking for.  I adjusted my ISO and my shutter speed, picked the perfect zoom, and hit the button.  Nothing happened.  I started to freak out, thinking that my camera was broken.  It wasn't.  My battery was dead, and I didn't have a memory card in my camera.  Whoops.

I went out Thursday after lunch and tried to get a picture of the ducks swimming in the pond outside of The Hintz Alumni Center.  I got one picture of the ducks swimming in the half frozen pond, when an old woman came up from behind me with a bag of cheerios.  The ducks took one look at the bag and headed for the grass.  Apparently the, "Don't Feed The Ducks," sign doesn't apply to everyone.  I went back to the pond after my Intro to Africa class, but the ducks were nowhere to be found. 


Around 6:00 pm I was starting to get anxious about finding the right subject for an indoor photo.  I went to my SHRA meeting, and found the perfect thing to photograph.  Today we had our secret valentine exchange and I was given this little guy:

I can not wait for THON this weekend!  I hope to get some amazing pictures!

A Change in the Challenge

Generally, I love taking pictures, but this is beginning to feel like a job.  It is hard forcing myself into being creative.  It sounds weird, but I have to be in the right mood to go out on a picture taking adventure.  Last weekend I was too tired and stressed out to be creative, and even though the light was perfect Sunday morning I could not get out of bed.

I must confess, I pushed photography out of my mind completely for most of this week.  I only started thinking about it today while I was sitting in my Intro to Contemporary Africa class.  I was staring out the window, like I usually do in that class because, well, it's boring, when suddenly I knew what I wanted to take a picture of.  Sure, I had a picture of Old Main already, but not a picture taken up close. 

The first picture I took wasn't exactly creative, sure, it looked nice, but I think everyone has taken this picture of Old Main:

 I like this picture, don't get me wrong.  The words, "Old Main" are in focus, you can see the pillars, and the sky is blue.  I played around with shots of the bell tower as well.  I was just upset at the lack of color in the photo.  It needed more.  I looked around for something with some color.  Because the leaves have fallen, I had to resort to something less traditional.  I spotted the the sundial and ventured over to it. I took this picture first:

I liked it, but then I decided to frame Old Main using the sundial:

I absolutely love this photo!  Just taking this picture was enough to put a huge grin on my face for the rest of the day.  I know I'm challenging myself to take pictures in the morning on weekends, but I think I have to change that.  I am challenging myself to take pictures and enjoy doing it, regardless of the time of day. 

I woke up Saturday morning, and for once it was to the sound of my own alarm.  However, it didn't make getting out of bed any easier.  I climbed down from my loft bed, tiptoed to the window, and peeked outside.  It was disgusting.  The sun was hiding behind thick clouds, and I was certain it wasn't going to come out that morning.  I was exhausted so I climbed back into bed, hoping I would have better luck on Sunday morning.

Sunday morning I woke up at 8:00am.  Once again the sun wasn't out, and I started to get frustrated.  When the sun finally came out I was stuck in a meeting.  I don't exactly have good luck.

Monday I started to panic.  The weather forecast for this week did not look promising.  I had a free moment around 3:30pm and rather than napping I grabbed my camera and went for a walk.  Generally, I at least have an idea of where I want to go to take pictures, but on Monday I was absolutely clueless.  I spent about an hour just wandering around looking for anything that looked remotely interesting to photograph.

I found these awesome icicles on the Palmer Museum, but there was no way to get a decent shot of them.  Depressed, I continued behind the Palmer to the Stuckeman Family Center.  After a quick google search, I found that Stuckeman is made almost entirely from recycled content, and these materials can be recycled again when the building is torn down.  That's awesome!  Anyway, the building's exterior is green, but when I snapped a photo it appeared gray:

I was really mad.  I wanted a picture of the building because it was an interesting green color.  I felt the picture looked boring without the strange color.  I left to take pictures elsewhere, but the sun was going down and the clouds had started to cover the sky.  The rest of my pictures were just as boring.

When I got back to my dorm I decided to play around with the picture of Stuckeman.  All I had to do was change the contrast, and suddenly I was happy with the picture:

Changing the contrast made the color differences more intense and made the picture slightly more interesting.  Usually, I don't like messing with my pictures, but in this case it was necessary.

Hopefully, I will have better luck this weekend!

Week One

I have always been told that in order to become a good writer you have to practice everyday.  I feel that the same is true with becoming a good photographer.  While I don't have the time to put on my snow gear and brave the harsh winter weather everyday, I am challenging myself to take an hour or two out of each weekend to take pictures. 

There are two specific times during the day that are great for taking photos.  During spring, summer, and fall the general rule is that you should be taking pictures outside at either 5:00am or 5:00pm.  The sunlight at these times is the best for taking pictures in natural light. However, it is the middle of winter, so I have to modify the rule.  Rather than taking pictures at 5:00am I will try and be outside by 8:00am, and as winter slowly turns into spring I will wake up and get outside earlier and earlier. 

January 22, 2011 was the first day of my photography challenge.  The idea for this challenge came to me when I was woken up by the sound of my neighbor's alarm at 7:30am.  She went canning for Thon and forgot to turn it off.  This has happened two times now, and believe me, it is annoying.  After I got over my initial anger and frustration I climbed out of bed and looked out the window.  There was not a cloud in the sky, and the sun was shining.  I put on leggings, jeans, wool socks, a thermal shirt, a hoodie, my winter coat, and my boots, grabbed my camera, and left my dorm.  The second I locked the door the idea hit me, "I'll challenge myself to get up early once a weekend to take pictures!" 

I was on my way to Old Main to take some photos when I stumbled upon a tree in which people had carved their initials and hearts all over.  The tree was in plain sight, on a sidewalk I had traveled enough times that I should have noticed it before.  Maybe it was in the absence of people that I finally noticed it. Who knows.  I stopped to take a few photos.  Here are my two favorites:

I was so distracted by the tree artwork that I almost forgot my original purpose.  Don't worry though! I got a picture of Old Main in the awesome morning light too:

At this point my hands were frozen, so I decided to walk back to my warm dorm room.  I passed through the hub on my way back, and it was completely empty.  I realized how peaceful this campus can be, as long as you are up early enough to enjoy it.  I think I am going to like this challenge, no matter how hard it is to get out of bed in the morning.