Colour Photo 1st at end-of-year competition

I was very pleased to get a text a couple of weeks ago informing me that I’d won the colour section of the 2010 end-of-year competition in Limerick Camera club….

I was very pleased to get a text a couple of weeks ago informing me that I’d won the colour section of the 2010 end-of-year competition in Limerick Camera club. This is a competition where all the images that place 1st, 2nd or 3rd in the monthly competitions can be entered in the end-of year. There’s a colour and a monochrome section, and each person who qualifies can enter one other image of their own chosing. I chose the following image.

_MG_7514-Edit

 

This image was entered previously in another club competitoin , but did not place in the top 3. I chose it as my “other image” along with two images that did place during the year. Imagine my surprise when I got a text (I was in India at the time) saying that I’d won the colour print section. An external “guest” judge had picked it as the winner. The judge was Paul Dorrell, a respected local professional photgrapher who used to be a club member, but his workload has kept him busy recently, so no time for regular visits to the club.

Another image of mine got a commendation…

_MG_6648-Edit

I was disappointed that I couldn’t be there, but it really cheered up an otherwise dull day in India. 🙂

Cheers,
Dave.

Photo Retouching

I just subscribed to www.GuyGowan.com. He’s a photo retoucher and Adobe Photoshop Trainer, and I happened to see a couple of his seminars at Photofest in Dublin in April 2010. The stuff he does with channels in photoshop is nothing short of amazing.

I just subscribed to www.GuyGowan.com. He’s a photo retoucher and Adobe Photoshop Trainer, and I happened to see a couple of his seminars at Photofest in Dublin in April 2010. The stuff he does with channels in photoshop is nothing short of amazing. It really does speed up workflow. Also the emphasis is on non-destructive methods, and natural-looking retouches, so using a combination of curves and channel masks, all the retouches work with the image, making the changes as natural looking as possible. There’s also a method of doing HDR withouth any 3rd party program or the HDR action in photoshop. The result is  a very dramatic, natural looking image with all the dynamic range of a HDR, but without the halo’s and other negative effects you usually associate with HDR. If you get a change to catch Guy in a seminar near you, he’s defintely worth a look.