Apparently....

Apparently it's not enough to describe the "great shot" you just took, but necessary to post it.....

This is a picture I took early this morning following a hard storm last night. The day was clear and bright and the morning sun still low in the East. This picture could go either way...artistic or way over exposed.

I like it, so it's a keeper. Feedback is welcome.

Beauty and Joy

On a heavily overcast May day in Georgia, we went for a ride. Along the way....we saw strange bovines in a distant field. Ignorning the first drops of rain; many, many fire ant hills (ignored but not missed, unfortunately) deep wet grass, the possibility of snakes and ticks, we tresspassed just a little to get a closer look.

Not what one expects to find in GA. These beasts were in a rolling green field with a nice muddy pond at the bottom. They seemed very content, but three of them decided to let us know that they were HUGE just in case we tried to cross the fence. It NEVER entered our minds! I have now determined that they are Cape Buffalo. No idea what they are doing in Georgia, but we are going to try to find out. Google tells me that Cape Buffalo are very dangerous.....and I believe it.

After taking as many pictures as we could as the rain beat down, we drove on to find the most beautiful corner in the SE with an old, old house with a little mother cat and her 4 little kittens enjoying the sunshine on the front porch - yes, the weather can be quirky. We also met 5 more donkeys and a few more gorgeous cows.

Here is a nice portrait of the mother cat just to offset the beasts. All in all it was a great day for photography.

Color

Again, on the subject of color change: some pictures adapt well to "messing with color" and others don't. These two pictures are another example of what happens when you experiment a little.

These were taken at our latest county park, Cedar Falls. This tract of land lies along the Reedy River in the southern part of the county, west of Simpsonville. It's the site of an old mill and dam that has been overrun, abused and misused for years. It's taken many years for the county to acquire the site, but now the process of cleaning and restoring is under way. The river is quite wide at this spot and there are a few small rapids.

This shot was taken along the shore where the water was running fast. I call the second picture "Maxfield Parrish" after the painter who created the more amazing colors and blues in his work.

Enjoy!

By request

I thought I'd post a before and after view of a shot I took last week. The first is the shot as I took it and the second is inverted with photoshop then I messed with the hue. Many photos don't work well with this technique, but then I find the one that does. Once the picture is inverted, it can be changed to almost any color. Fun!

Critters

And there are little critters everywhere. This one was hanging out on a bridge over a creek. He seemed to want me to take his picture and hung around so I could. I've never seen one just like this before, but soon found out they are voracious eaters of garden plants. At the same time, they are also food for the beautiful herons and egrets. It's the circle of life!

Just for the fun of it, I tried him in a different color.

Art and Architecture 2

This picture is from Orlando last week. Lovely day, lovely view. Glass can make beautiful art. How nice to walk down a busy street and see this! I do have to wonder how many birds fly into this building???

Art and Architecture

I just missed getting this submitted for a contest...a day late reading the email, but I've had a couple of requests to post it.

I took this early on a Sunday morning in downtown Athens, GA. I took the shot looking into an antique store window in which there was a mirror and several glasses and other objects. The only adjustment I made was to deepen the color a little.

It again shows how beautiful common objects are if we just look a little closer. Reflections are a particular favorite of mine.