So, I have not had a whole lot of time to play with the Nik plug-ins, but I have had enough chance to decide to get them. I am more than happy with what they are able to do. You can actually pick a point in a photo, attach and anchor to it and adjust the size of the anchor and edit only that area! I am loving it!

I also broke down and got the Tiffen DFX suite. All I can say is.... O.M.G. I will never buy another filter besides the basic 3. For a break down on what Tiffen has to offer check out their site.

So, so far I have gotten the Nik Silver Efex Pro,definite thumbs up if you like to do black and white, and well even if you don't. It will make you want to do it! Viveza is awesome and you don't have to mess around with layers. Color Efex Pro 3.0 is gorgeous, it has tons of effects, and then finally there is Dfine which I have only done the trial on. This one is still up in the air as yet if I am going to get it. It is for noise control and meh, I can do that in a wink with CS 3.

Reddish sunrise

So now for a few gratuitous pictures that I edited before I got the above goodies since I am still learning them and have not done anything worthwhile of posting yet :).

These are from our trip to Mexica and Florida. These were the only sunrise pics I got the entire trip heh. Vacations suck for waking up early!!

These are in Miami at the hotel we stayed at on the coast.

Where is Bogart when you need him?

*edited*
Forgot one toy I found on the Tiffen plug in. They have a color infared filter! I have tried hand editing pics to resemble this effect and let me tell ya, it ain't worth it! So here is one pic I got done, more to come soon I am sure!

Infared Fun

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I just read about Nik's Silver Efex Pro in my latest Outdoor Photographer magazine. So I had to give it a try. They have a 15 day free trial and let me just say.... I am sold! Hook line and sinker!

So with that said, first an old pic I edited with the nik filter

Old fashioned bouquet

Second, I have been playing around with placing all my pics into a frame of some sort. I have been building the frames by hand in Photoshop instead of using pre-made ones. They are absolutely amazing to say the least, have I said how much I love, adore, worship my CS2??? Well I do!!

So this pic is a fun one, I messed with saturation and layers :).

Daisy

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Just something for a bit of fun, gotta love what you can do with food products!

Heart shaped heirloom tomato

Heart

And then a bit of boredom while baking...

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So, I think I took a bit of a break from photography! I knew it had been a few weeks since I posted, but I had no idea it was this long!

So anyways, last weekend the hubby and I left Mass. and the daily rainstorms we have had (this isn't spring is it?) and we headed up to Maine. We were really hoping for some good weather and took Scenic Rt. 2 but sadly it rained cats and dogs til we got to the Vermont, Mass, NH state line! But once we crossed over... yay sun!

We ended up going up to Alton Bay, NH for a night then headed out to Biddeford and driving down through Kennebunkport Maine,  yes there are pics of the Bush Compound there, sadly though the fog moved in just as we got there and I only was able to snap a few pics that actually turned out enough  to use! Then  we headed down the coast to New Hampshire and headed over to the Hamptons where we have some family. From there it was homeward bound and we actually did all of this in one weekend! Granted we did not get home til around 2 in the morning, but it was well worth it to get away from the rain!

And.... I got to take some pics finally. So enjoy!

Psychadelic

Antiqued

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Eric Draven: Can't rain all the time...

So it seems that spring came a bit late to The Berkshires. We have had rain, lots and lots of rain. And with the rain I have gotten like 0 pics. We have had a day or two here and there with intermittant rain, and at least 1 day where the skies were clear. But meh this many days of rain makes it is hard for me to get going at the drop of a hat like when I was younger.

lineup

So the hubby took me out a couple days ago and I grabbed my camera, even though it was downpouring I prayed that we would have at least a break in the clouds at some point. Well it didn't quite stop raining, but we found enough old back roads where the trees provided enough coverage to roll down the windows and snap now and then. The first pic here is of some girls we found munching the day away. I decided to try to make it look really old since it turned out a bit under exposed.

tractor

I am not sure what type of farm equiptment this is, but it was interesting enough to where I braved biting flies and threatening clouds to run into the field and snap a couple off.

Xavier

The last image is of Xavier my english springer spaniel, for the life of me I can't remember if I have posted any pics of his growth on here, so now is as good a time as ever to put a photo up of him while he is still in the puppy phase.

I hope everyone else is having some dry days at least! :)

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Big Skies

They pulled me out of the house by the hand and led me on a merry chase. Finally I found *just* the right spot on a road that had a sign that said "Road Closed" ;) as if that has ever stopped the hubby and I from finding beautiful spots to enjoy Mother Nature!

As I was taking pics of the sky the hubby and mom in law were behind me exploring the woods and found these beauties for me to photograph.

Lady Slippers

The hubby got all excited telling me about the beautiful flower that they had found so they walked me over and I about squealed, actually I think I did. I proceeded to climb up a pretty steep climb to get to em, which is why the pic is from the side and not the front! The flower turned out to be a Lady Slipper, which I have never once seen in the wild!

Posie

These last two are just my favs of the day though :)

Rock sculpture

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Well actually just fathers day I should say. We spent it taking pictures and getting some nice wood so that the hubby can build me that china hutch I have been wanting for so long *grins*

Everything is blooming beautifully with the abundance of rain we have had of late so I bring you a whole lot of pictures to look at!

Beauty & Destruction

We took a ride through Stockbridge and finally stopped at the Kripula center. We have driven by this building so very many times and I have never had the camera with on those rides. So this time we just had to stop. This building is right at their entrance and the inside is gutted. The front is wired shut and all sorts of keep out signs because it is dangerous, it looks to be gutted by a fire. Inside is a two story drop. So I am only showing the nicer pics. Maybe I will do some sort of grunge photos with the others.

Light

I just loved the architecture of the lights that they have at their entrance. But beautiful as they were with a color photo black and white just won out ala Ansel.

Then it was onto Great Barrington where we were meeting a homeowner who was freecycling a bunch of wood in his barn. Those pics are in a topic before this one though ;)

After picking up the wood we headed to downtown Great Barrington and enjoyed a late breakfast and some sights.

Great Barrington

I just loved this sign, it reminded me of back home in Illinois when I was little. We lived in Chicago in the '60's and this sign just has that feel.

Have you ever seen a back alley club in a small town? I haven't! We rounded a corner and I saw this door and just about squealed it is so beautiful. Just as I snapped the shot a gentleman walked out and I was lowering the camera and he joked that everyone always puts away their camera when he walks out that door! :D

Old building

The last sight of Great Barrington was this absolutely gorgeous old building heading towards the downtown area. No your eyes aren't fuzzy, I edited the pic to make it look ancient.

Rock Structures B&W

By the time we got home we were losing our light. But I was able to manage to catch a last couple images in Lenox of these art pieces in a yard. I really have to get downtown and take pics of all the new art on display though before it gets taken down!

Rock Structures

And the finale is my iris' are blooming! So I had to take a few of those also right? heh.

So all in all the hubby agree's. His Fathers day was awesome and in the end I got a little something out of it also! *happy*

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I never thought to get anything out of freecycle other than an item someone else no longer needs but that I can use, or the reverse... :D.

But this weekend we were picking up some old barn wood that was listed and when we got there I just had to take some pictures. The homeowner is in the process of moving and said it was fine by him if I took some pictures of the barn. Sadly the new owners may be tearing the building down, or if they do keep it. It will no longer resemble the beautiful old building standing there now :(.

So in tribute to such a beautiful old building and a homeowner who let me share in the beauty of his barn, I now share that beauty with you.

I hope you enjoy the photos as much as I enjoyed taking them and editing them...

Horseshoe

Barn tools

Sign

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I got to playing around with extreme saturations and came up with this. I think it is my fav of what all I did yesterday on my break time :D. I <3 shooting in RAW

Psychadelic Daisies

Old time Shed

Then I decided to have some fun with some homemade sepia images. I saw this pic of my shed, it was way under exposed and you could hardly see the shed, so I brightened it immensely and got to playing around with saturation then opened it into CS2 and really went crazy. It is not as old fashioned as I wanted it to turn out, but it's not to bad all in all :)

Narnian past

This one here I did some of the same things to, I did add a bit of filters to this one also though and vignetted the images.

Last night I decided to mess around with some of my more recent photography and try washing out the colors for a change and came up with this.

Last but not least some more pics of the wild things growing in my yard! Dandelion tea anyone? ;)

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Early yesterday morning as the hubby and I went around back to clean the dog area and do some yard work we saw a frantic fluttering on the ground outside of our computer room. Upon closer inspection we discovered the most beautiful site that either of us had seen on our property.

Moon Moth

The moon moth is an interesting creature, after reading up on it we found that they have no mouth and only live for 7 days. This made me sad as it would seem that he (it is a he) was in his death throws when we found him.

We also found out that there are several varieties of Moon Moth that come from different areas of the world. We are just happy that this guy decided to *die* on our property.

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