Author |
Message |
Eeyoreslament
Member
07-20-2003
| Tuesday, December 23, 2008 - 11:20 am
Brenda! I totally forgot! I use my new messages, and because it doesn't come up....I forget about it! I'll do it probably over the next week...
|
Biloxibelle
Member
12-21-2001
| Saturday, December 27, 2008 - 7:49 am
I like to buy local art for my house. I have festival posters and some painting of different landmarks. I would like to mat and frame some of my own pictures. The problem is I am just a point and shoot kind of person. I have no idea about lighting, depth or any of that. So I have no idea if these pictures will hold up to being blown up large enough to have framed. I don't want them to just look like blown up pictures, if you know what I mean. I don't know if I should run them through photochop first and if I do what I need to do to them. Here are the pictures. All suggestions and criticisms are welcome.
I kind of wish I had taken this one from the other angle, where the word Ocean was first. Also it was taken during the festival and I wish that display in the lower left hand corner wasn't there.
|
Biloxibelle
Member
12-21-2001
| Saturday, December 27, 2008 - 7:55 am
A few more.
I can't decide which one of these I like best. I am only going to use one.
not a landmark or anything I just really like this picture. My son took it.
this is the only picture I plan to use with a person in it.
|
Jimmer
Moderator
08-30-2000
| Saturday, December 27, 2008 - 9:11 am
Maybe you could tell us a little more about your pictures. What camera did you use to take them? How big is the original image file? How are you planning to print them and what size are you thinking of printing them? Generally speaking, the larger that you print, the better the image needs to be. Creating and printing large images is great fun. The matting and framing takes considerable skill as well and if you produce something nice it is certainly something to be proud about.
|
Eeyoreslament
Member
07-20-2003
| Saturday, December 27, 2008 - 10:44 am
I think the 2 flower pictures would be cool as a triptych. I'd cut the two-flower shot in half, then have three frames placed together.
|
Supergranny
Member
02-03-2005
| Saturday, December 27, 2008 - 12:45 pm
I like the house...you can take out that blue patch next to the house and I love the picture of the person looking out the window. That strikes a chord with me, like yearning to get out in the city etc.
|
Biloxibelle
Member
12-21-2001
| Sunday, December 28, 2008 - 6:58 am
Jimmer, they are just snapshots taken around the house and our town. The first two are from a cottage I have always loved. It has sat empty for years. It was that one place that would draw me to it. As you can see the foliage is out of control, but if you were to see it in person you can tell years ago somebody really loved that place and lovingly planted some beautiful things. The backyard was amazing with full grown fruit trees and vines of all kinds. Sadly about 6 months ago the great grand-daughter of the property didn't get her way at a zoning meeting and house "fell" down in the night. So now it is completely gone. The elephant sat on the corner of the property and about a week after the the "falling down" someone stole it. The third picture is of the old train depot with the name of our town on it. This is the only one I am not completely happy with. Like I said earlier I wish I was standing on the other side and had avoided the display items in the corner. Of course unlike the "fallen" (yes I am still bitter) I can retake this picture at anytime. The nest two are just hibiscus from my front garden. Eeyores, that is an interesting idea. However, you are dealing with a complete photo dummy, so can you explain it more. I would like to create a triptych with that picture. Do I separate the 2 flower picture right down the middle? Does it matter that all 3 flowers are facing to the left or should I flip one to face the other direction? The 4th picture is 2 Sandhill Cranes that took up residence in our yard for about a month or so. While it was interesting to have them here, something that doesn't happen to many people, as they are birds most people never even see in their lifetime, I am relieved they moved on. We had people here one and off from the refuse monitoring them (one of the birds leg signal was not working, so they were happy I called and reported them) and they do tend to leave a big mess, especially in driveway (the birds not the people) I was terrified they would lay an egg here. The 5th picture is just a shot through a peephole in our hotel in New Orleans. My son took it and it is one of those pictures I find interesting. He is the one I mentioned in this thread a long time ago that is interested in photography. He tends to take pictures of things I would never think to take and they all turn out so interesting. Granny isn't that last picture great! That too was taken in New Orleans. It was taken on the morning we were leaving, my son was saying "Goodbye". I have another angle of that picture I actually like better, it shows more out the window, but again I have too much other stuff in the picture and I don't know how to delete it. I'll post it after this post, maybe someone here can tell me what to do to it. Jimmer so far the pictures are small. I will have to blow them up in Photoshop somehow. I don't want to make the huge, no bigger then 8x10, maybe even 5x7 because I want to mat them and most of the time I like to use more then one mat. They were just taken with my Monolta digital camera, nothing fancy.
|
Biloxibelle
Member
12-21-2001
| Sunday, December 28, 2008 - 7:00 am
Here is the other view of the window shot. As you can see the table and contents, chairs and my hubby are in this one.

|
Jimmer
Moderator
08-30-2000
| Sunday, December 28, 2008 - 9:57 am
Smaller sizes like 5 x 7 and 8 x 10 will look great with nice matting. You shouldn't have much trouble getting that size with most digital cameras. ------------------------------------------- I can recommend a simply fantastic program for anyone who likes to print their own pictures and is using Windows (unfortunately they don't have it for the Mac, though I guess there are ways to run Windows programs under the Mac system). It is called Qimage. It lets you print all different sizes (and on the same piece of paper if they fit) and it resizes, interpolates and sharpens the images based on the size you are printing, without affecting the original image. It also lets you make changes to the print without affecting the original. Many more features. It is a brilliant program. So let's say you have an image or a couple of images and you want to print 5 x 7's. You just select the images, it adds them to the page (2 5 x 7's fit on a standard page or 3 4 x 6's). You can then crop them whichever way you want and it then does all the other stuff in the background (interpolation (resizing) and sharpening) all without affecting the original. The interpolation and sharpening result in outstanding print quality (especially with larger prints). It saves those settings so you can print them again if you want to print them again later. It comes in three versions – Lite, Professional and Studio. It's shareware so you can try it before you buy it. Qimage - Professional Photographic Printing Software
|
Spitfire
Member
07-18-2002
| Monday, December 29, 2008 - 7:25 am
My christmas present from DH was a Canon Rebel. I'm super excited about it because I love to take pictures and my old smaller canon wasn't keeping up to some pics that I was wanting to take. Totally unexpected gift so now I have some researching to do on how to even use the thing properly.
|
Julieboo
Member
02-05-2002
| Monday, December 29, 2008 - 7:54 am
OH MAN you are so lucky!!! And I am soooo JEALOUS!! (I got pajamas )
|
Julieboo
Member
02-05-2002
| Monday, December 29, 2008 - 7:55 am
At our local camera store there was a very cool book dedicated to the use of different cameras and there was one for the rebel. Looked very easy to read too.
|
Biloxibelle
Member
12-21-2001
| Monday, December 29, 2008 - 8:01 am
Thanks for the website Jimmer. I have looked at and it looks great. My daughter is gone this week so this is the perfect time to play around with it. How cool Spitfire!
|
Nyheat
Member
08-09-2006
| Monday, December 29, 2008 - 8:12 am
I would take the flower photos into photochop and adjust the levels. See how there is sort of a grey haze over them? Level adjustment will take out the grey for crisper, more vivid images. You can do it manually in the Adjustments menu. Good luck!
|
Nyheat
Member
08-09-2006
| Monday, December 29, 2008 - 8:16 am
To show what I mean, I took one of your pics and adjusted the midtones in Levels. Just drag the sliders around til it looks right.

|
Mocha
Member
08-12-2001
| Monday, December 29, 2008 - 8:18 am
Biloxi great pics! I love the elephant one if you could remove the car somehow lol. Also love the flower pics and the one that looks like its thru a peephole.
|
Spitfire
Member
07-18-2002
| Monday, December 29, 2008 - 8:25 am
Thanks, I'm so excited. Julieboo, like I said, totally unexpected. I usually get PJ's to. Jimmer, it came with a DVD that I haven't had time for yet and also a 1 hour lesson with a staff member from the store.
|
Julieboo
Member
02-05-2002
| Monday, December 29, 2008 - 8:31 am
Way cool about the 1 hour lesson!!
|
Spitfire
Member
07-18-2002
| Monday, December 29, 2008 - 8:36 am
What is the difference between the XS and the XSi?
|
Julieboo
Member
02-05-2002
| Monday, December 29, 2008 - 9:02 am
Not sure how accurate this is, but I came across a site that talked about the diff's: From what I’ve learned, the most important differences between the XSi and XS is that the latter has a inferior autofocus system and will not allow you (reasonable) continuous shooting in RAW. You say it will be your first DSLR and so you’ll probably yet have to experience the big advantages in shooting RAW, hence you could think you don’t need it and stick with JPEG only. As you already guess, I don’t feel that this would be a good decision. But if, on the other hand, you definitively don’t see fit for continuous shooting at 3.5 frames per second, then you can forget about that limitation of the XS. Continuous shooting is mainly useful for unpredictable action, such as some sports, children, pets and portrait sessions. On the other hand, 3 or 3.5 fps is a little slow anyway to handle most of these situations well, so this (intentional) crippling of the XS should not really be a deal breaker. It’s hard for me to comment on the AF system, because I don’t have any experience with the 7-point AF-system of the XS, hence I cannot tell how it compares to the 9-point system of the XTi and XSi. From the specs, I imagine it could be even superior in everyday use, because the centre point is cross-sensitive even for slow lenses (up to an aperture of f/5.6), while the others require a lens with f/2.8 or faster aperture to become cross-sensitive. Other than that, the XS has a slightly smaller viewfinder (which does not matter because the XSi viewfinder, albeit slightly larger, is certainly not better when it comes to manual focusing). The XS has no spot metering, but you probably wouldn’t miss it and if the need should be actually, there is still the partial metering as a reasonable substitute in most cases. The display on the back is a little smaller, but a (D)SLR isn’t made for staring at a display anyway, so this is no big deal also IMHO. The difference in pixel count is nothing to worry about, the difference between 10 or 12 MP is minor and will certainly not show except for the largest, poster sized prints – and then you will have to look very closely. On top of that, you will need really good lenses that can match such high resolutions in order to notice a difference. The kit lenses will not deliver the resolution to outperform the 10MP sensor found in the XS, the same applies to many of the more expensive lenses as well. All in all, my recommendation would be, if the price difference appears minor to you, go for the XSi. But if you feel like saving some bucks (and have no strong desire to take bust shots in RAW mode), you will not have to regret it if you take the XS instead.
|
Julieboo
Member
02-05-2002
| Monday, December 29, 2008 - 9:03 am
Also two other websites that I like to "daydream" at are: http://www.dpreview.com/ http://reviews.cnet.com/digital-cameras/
|
Julieboo
Member
02-05-2002
| Monday, December 29, 2008 - 9:05 am
Here are 2 video reviews (one on each) http://reviews.cnet.com/digital-cameras/canon-eos-rebel-xsi/4505-6501_7-32891057.html?tag=mncol;lst http://reviews.cnet.com/digital-cameras/canon-rebel-xs-black/4505-6501_7-33064505.html?tag=mncol;lst (Copy and paste each one into the browser...)
|
Julieboo
Member
02-05-2002
| Monday, December 29, 2008 - 9:09 am
And finally a side by side comparison: COMPARE (Once there, you can click on each one for the full review of each.)
|
Jimmer
Moderator
08-30-2000
| Monday, December 29, 2008 - 11:52 am
You'll have great fun with the Rebel, Spitfire! Anyone who knows what they are doing (and you will once you spend some time with it and learn about it) can create first rate results with it. Once you have a good camera, it is all about the photographer. Julie, I know you are keen on making the right decision and I agree it is important to buy the best camera for your needs and you are helping Spitfire with her question so the following comment isn't directed at you. I'm just suggesting that people not get too obsessed with the technical hardware and not lose focus of the fact that a huge part of the result is dependent on the person making the picture. Canon/Nikon or whatever you buy. Glad you're having a look at that program, Biloxibelle. I think you'll find it very useful. Try printing the same image with another program (PhotoShop, Elements or whatever) and compare the ease of use and the results. I think you'll be amazed.
|
Eeyoreslament
Member
07-20-2003
| Monday, December 29, 2008 - 12:02 pm
"The nest two are just hibiscus from my front garden. Eeyores, that is an interesting idea. However, you are dealing with a complete photo dummy, so can you explain it more. I would like to create a triptych with that picture. Do I separate the 2 flower picture right down the middle? Does it matter that all 3 flowers are facing to the left or should I flip one to face the other direction?" Biloxi, that's the beauty of it....you can split it however you want. It's clear the flowers belong to the same series, so no matter how you split them. Just keep in mind that you wouldn't want to cut a flower up, and also keep in mind that different sizes mean custom framing/matting. But if you love the result, it's worth it! I've seem some cool things like furniture (cabinet doors) where they have glass doors, or frosted glass doors, and you can place pictures behind the doors, and they aren't permanent. When you take a new batch of pictures, you can blow them up, cut them up, and replace them!
|