This being my last semester, I am less occupied with academics. Already having a job offer, I had very little motivation to get through the days. So I decided to get a new project. I’m going to call it the Aggie Project.
The project will last for 30 days, where I’ll attempt a new technique everyday with a new picture (hopefully taken on that day). At the end of 30 days, I will summarize the key points I’ve learnt and provide a list of references I’ve used for learning these techniques.
Today being Day 1, I would like to start off the project by presenting the Spring blooms at Texas A&M University. I clicked these pictures as I wandered through the campus with the sole aim of finding the Blue Bonnets that I’d seen in a picture posted by the official TAMU account on Twitter[1]. I wandered off a little further than I expected to, so my shots provide a slightly different view. I started from the Administration Building and ended up on South Texas Ave, opposite to the T-Mobile store.
The technique I am focusing on today is Layers. I got my initial inspiration from a blogpost by Jacob Matthew Dix[2]. In his blogpost, he recommends using phone-based editing apps (Snapseed and PS Touch). Over the past year, I have become very familiar with Snapseed. In an attempt to learn PC based editing software, I will be using GIMP for this project.
This is a photo I clicked in front of the Admin building on the east side of the campus.
Original Image
The white periwinkle flowers in this image looked too washed/over-exposed. I intended to give it some highlights and shadows.
Although I like the green of the stems in Layer 1, I intend to keep the attention on the flowers. So, I decided to add another layer with cooler temperature and vignette.
By multiplying we can essentially obtain brighter/darker images with more flexibility. I have used the original image as the base with 100% opacity. I have used Layer 1 and Layer 2 in multiply mode with 50% opacity. Doing so helped me obtain a warmer picture with darker backgrounds. Hence I could achieve my goal of eliminating the washed-out look and provide a summer feel to the picture.
That’s all for today. Tomorrow I will work on the Bluebonnets that I chased and try a new technique. I welcome your thoughts/critiques.
References:
[1] https://www.pscp.tv/w/1OyKAyjNLkeKb
[2] http://www.mobilography.net/layer-stacking-snapseed-pstouch/ : PS Touch has been since discontinued. So, I use an alternate app call Image Editor by Byte Mobile.
