Such Grace, Such Form!

Two more images that show the graceful approach Maggie often has when retrieving her torpedo. These beg for an interesting shell or fish or something to use to replace the torpedo, but unfortunately when I took my scuba diving images 3 years ago I did not have that in mind and so most of those shots won't work....Sounds like another diving vacation is needed! If only we could take her with us --- I have seen scuba gear for dogs and she would ace any training to use it.

Again, very little post processing done to these shots, just levels and a wavy texture layer was added to the second image after cloning out the pool tile.

Laughing Underwater Is Not Good For The Lungs

The first image shows the water reflections that happened when the sun was shining. After I decided to combine the shots of her diving with the ones from Cozumel I could not use any with all those highlights so was glad I had continued to shoot when the sun went behind the clouds. In the second image, after Maggie had such trouble getting all the way to the bottom for her toy I decided to hold it out in front of me at a more shallow depth and then I was totally surprised what she looked like from the toy's point of view! Her eyes are opened very wide and she has such a concerned, worried look on her face...I promise she loves the retrieving and begs to have her toy thrown in the pool! I thought about entering the second image Tuesday night but did not think the judges would have any idea what was going on. Without the backstory would you have?

Not much processing was done to these images, mainly a levels adjustment to brighten them and no sharpening other than what was applied in the camera to the jpgs.

Maggie Swims With Fishes

I really liked the way Maggie looked in this shot --- floating along underwater, or even almost prancing like a horse. It seems very ethereal and dreamlike, but I wish she had been turned a little more toward me....too bad it is so difficult to communicate with her underwater! At first I waited until the sun was shining directly in the pool but then I liked the murky, darker way the shots were when it went behind the clouds.

Sony Cybershot in underwater housing at f 5.6 and 1/250th, Program mode, ISO 100

Post processing: cloned out the tile and distractions, replaced a rear leg and her mouth without the torpedo from other images, ran TechyColor action by Kubota to brighten, combined reef image, added wavy texture layer, ran Blue Dawn Leonidas by Kubota at 20% opacity which made it even brighter and "icier", sharpened with the highpass filter in softlight mode.

The Incredible Diving Dog

Years ago our son taught our Labrador Retriever to dive in our swimming pool to retrieve a torpedo toy and when we had a photo club assignment of Unusual Perspective I thought that photographing her from the bottom of the pool would fit. I have a Sony Cybershot point and shoot that fits in an underwater housing that I used on a scuba diving trip to Cozumel 3 years ago so that is what I used to capture these images. Unfortunately it only takes jpgs, and you cannot use the viewfinder with the housing on so I often had the camera pointed a little off and would only catch part or nothing of Maggie so it took several sessions. And sadly, she has severe hip dysplasia and now has so much trouble kicking her rear legs hard enough to propel her to the bottom to pick up her toy that she had to give up a number of times, but she loves to dive. The view from under the water is so much different from what you can see from ground level as she splashes and dives, sometimes I almost breathed in the water from laughing so hard. After post processing some of the images I decided they were a little boring showing the plain bottom of the pool so I combined images from my dive trip to make it appear like she was diving in the ocean. I got so many that I loved that the next few posts will show those various images.

Sony Cybershot in underwater housing, Program mode, f2.8, 1.200th, ISO 100

Post processing: after increasing the exposure and blacks in ACR, in PS I cloned out distractions and the tile at the water level, did a Match Color adjustment to get the blues of the reef image closer to the blues of the pool, merged visible all the layers and changed the blending mode to Soft Light at 50% opacity, added a texture layer for the waves, sharpened with the highpass filter in softlight mode.

A Few Hours Later

Same mushroom a little later in the day, almost noon. This is just one image, the smaller aperture let me get more in focus and possibly the brighter light helped also.


Post processing: Popsickle by Kubota for details, Black and White Full Moon by Kubota, Touch of Light on the stem and levels to bring up a little of the grass.

Moonscape Mushroom

I don't remember seeing this type of mushroom in our grass before our recent rains, and it was interesting to watch how they changed over a couple of days and then died. They opened like an umbrella and then turned inside out before turning brown. This image is an early stage and is a composite of 3 separate images to try to get as much detail in focus as I could.

Nikon D200, 60mm macro lens with +4 closeup filter at f5 and 1/1250th, +.85 exposure compensation, cloudy whitebalance
Post processing: combined 3 exposures and used a mask to hide the blurry areas, Touch of Light on the stem, Popsickle by Kubota in Softlight mode to emphasize the details, Black and white Full Moon and Black and White Warm and Deep by Kubota

One more seashell

This shell image is not part of the series on the driftwood but was shot several months before. I think a color version was chosen by Craig Tanner for one of his daily critiques back in the Radiant Vista days.

Nikon D200, 60mm macro lens at f3.2 and 1/1000th, ISO 800 (I forgot I had changed the ISO a few days before) cloudy whitebalance
Post processing: removed some spots, levels for brightness, levels for whitebalance, colorbalance layer to reduce orange in the background, Curves for contrast, Fade to black and white by Kubota, Photofilter in sepia, Touch of Dark on the background, Touch of Light on the shell, sharpened with Popsickle by Kubota, final levels to darken background more.