Shutter Sisters

the muse and the marlboro man

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photo by HippyHappyHay

Flickr makes my eyes cross.

In a good way, of course. Eye-crossing world-rocking is what feeds music, art, films, literature—creatives influence enthusiasts who become creatives who influence enthusiasts, each imprinting a new twist on the original until you’re not sure where the muse left off and the student begins.

I’m immensely grateful to Pioneer Woman for her most excellent Photoshop tutorials, sitting two inches from the screen breathing with my mouth open all-like OoooohhNOWIGETIT! …But then everywhere you turn we’re all morphing into replicas, following step-by-step like an army of Verne Troyers to Ree’s Dr. Evil, complete with a chorus of mini-maniacal giggling that we all finally got our hands on the recipe for the Marlboro Man style.

It’s soul food for dry spells, and we love her for it.

But this week I was bewitched by HippyHappyHay’s portrait in our fabulous pool, and went on to admire the gorgeous tones and inventive backgrounds found in her photostream. Ethereal and washed out rather than saturated, delicately evocative rather than high-contrast and grainy. So refreshing next to the unrelenting BAM! BAM! BAM! of my intermediate photofinishing routine, the unchallenged 1-2-3 that I apply like a creature of habit.

And now I’m lit up, all hippyhappy. Still grateful for the generosity of the pioneers, but ripe for something new. So don’t bust my bubble, ‘kay? Don’t say “DUH… that’s just ‘#23 Low Contrast/Vintage’ from Actions-R-Us…”

Let me bask in this apparent differentness.

(Come to think of it, maybe it’s about time I jump on the actions bandwagon. Think so? Do you use actions for instant interestingness? And is it not a contradiction in terms to push a MAKE-IT-UNIQUE! button while everyone else does the same? Isn’t adopting the latest popular pizazz like buying a Toyota—don’t you then just see Toyotas everywhere? Does originality even matter, or is it all just about prettier pictures?)

I digress. Share with us: who’s taught you a thing or two? And who’s inspired you to turn it all upside-down?

Comments

  1. I have a super old version of Photoshop Elements that I’m plugging away at. Trying to learn it so that I can then justify the cost of purchasing the big daddy. I’ve been binging on The Pioneer Woman as well but take the lessons and then run wild with them. Sort of a learn the rules to break the rules approach to photo editing.

    I usually get inspired by flipping throough Flickr pages. I do love the photo you’ve posted from HippyHappyHay. I like the pink hues.

  3. Well, firstly thanks so much for using my photo, and all your kind words!
    I have a wonderful friend who has been there to support my whole foray into the world of photography. I often emailed her (yay for the internet which makes this world so much smaller), lamenting that I couldn’t make head nor tail of Photoshop, so how could I make great photos? She would always reply, "Bah, you DO make great photo’s. Forget about Photoshop and do what YOU do best, capture the moment and connect with the viewer."
    So I did, and I do.
    Actually only today have I downloaded a trial version of Photoshop Elements…I must go and look at Pioneer Woman!
    Thanks again Kate 🙂

  4. I don’t even have photoshop anymore. When we upgraded to Leopard it killed the version of photoshop I had, so instead of getting it again I decided to see what else was out there. Right now I am trying Pixelmator (because there was a macheist that donated to charity and came with a bunch of other stuff) and finding that the actions I love out there aren’t really meant for it. Also, a lot of other people don’t use it so I’m on my own with it. I’m looking at Aperture as a possibility too, but we’ll see. I’m so green on editing my photos most of what I upload is raw, exactly as I took it.

    I’ve learned a lot just by coming here-so THANK YOU!

  5. One other (than the Pioneer Woman) I bow to is Stacy at the Land of KA. (http://thelandofka.com/)
    She’s the heat!!! And has been really helpful to me. Thank you all who lead us along the path of insane obsession with photoshop!!!
    Oh, I just Elements 4
    Julie

  6. I love Pioneer Woman and her Photoshop mad skills. It amazes me that I’ve been working in Photoshop for 13 years, as a web designer, and now discovering photography – it’s like a brand new toy to me. 🙂 I like Heather of Dooce.com. Her daily photos of Style, Chuck the dog and personal insights are just amazing.

  7. You know as much as I love it, and believe me I do love Photoshop, I feel like it makes us lazy. I often find myself thinking "oh, I’ll just fix that in photoshop", rather than taking the time to get it right in camera. I am actually waiting for a cheap film camera to arrive today, to try and force myself to get it right and make me think more about what I’m doing while I’m doing it. This was a great post.

  8. I only recently got Photoshop CS3, but have never used actions. I am a HUGE fan of Adobe Lightroom. The presets are amazing, anf then there are all of the sliders (exposure, contrast, etc.) on the right so that you can make your photo your OWN.

    I think CS3 is fitting nicely into my precessing as well, and with the two of them I feel like I can take my flat digital photo and make it look like I saw it when I snapped the photo.

    Or at least evoke the same emotion 🙂

  9. I just have a handful of actions but haven’t really used them yet much. The ones have have seem to overdo things a little for my taste. I do have one called "Baby Skin" that basically just fixes red blotchy newborn skin. I just processed my first newborn shoot yesterday and I used it a lot. The great thing about actions is that they are VERY customizable. They usually include multiple layers that you can play with to match your style. Change the opacity or levels and it will never look just like someone elses photo.

  10. Actually, my husband is who got me into photography, and who is always willing to help me out.
    As for tools, I try not to use them very often. I like when the photo is as I saw it, it helps me to remember the moments a little better 🙂

    My husband has does the same, and since he’s been my photography inspiration, perhaps that is where I get it from 🙂 he’s taught me to be really creative in setting up my shots.

    here are some of his : http://flickr.com/photos/ofeverything

  11. I love actions. I think of them as tools, like brushes or something that I can use to make my photo more mine.
    I don’t know. It’s hard. Photoshop and digital photography is just such a different medium than using film and chemicals, it’s almost impossible to compare the two. I love the freedom I have with the digital format–taking as many photos as I want without ever worrying about the cost, immediate feedback, and the ability to take a shot that SOOC is unattractive, and manipulating it into something that I love! It’s just so fun.
    And I really love the pioneer woman too–I feel like she’s just putting tools in my hands so I can go build my own house.

  12. HippyHappyHay’s photos always make me smile. She truly does have her own unique style in a way that I think I don’t! Great photo to showcase.

    I love Photoshop. I actually started using it for scrapbooking long before I ever started taking photography seriously. I just got Photoshop CS3 about 3 months ago, so I had never used an action until then. I love them if you know exactly what sort of look you want and you want a fast way to do it. If it’s a photo that I’m not sure of yet, I usually do it the old school way and try out a bunch of different things and see what works for the photo.

    As for inspiration, um, I swear this isn’t shameless flattery, Kate, but I absolutely *love* your photos. You have a unique style as well. You may think you have a boring 1-2-3 approach, but you always seem to have a unique perspective, a good eye for color, and a talent for capturing emotion. That’s the hardest thing for me to do. The first photo of yours that actually caught my eye was a self-portrait you did in the NICU. I’ve been glued to your photos ever since.

    I’ve also learned a ton from a group on Flickr. It’s actually not a Photoshop group, it’s "Photographic Techniques: Children & Babies". I’ve learned a lot about the mechanics of photography, technique and Photoshop from the photographers there.

  14. I try a little bit of what everyone likes to share for how they do it, but mostly, I like to think my style is inspired by me and what I like. I just play, and I think that’s how I’ve learned the most.

  15. Hay – so if you don’t use photoshop, what do you use for post-processing? I’m so curious.

    Julie – thanks for passing on Stacy at the Land of KA… going to check that out right now. It’s always great to get some new tips.

    Leigh – you’re right about PS making us lazy… it would be an interesting experiment to go without tweaking for a time, and see how it feels to strip back down to basics and focus on in-camera composition and exposure…. amazing that you’re going back to film. Very cool.

    Angella – I’ve heard great things about Lightroom too.

    LawyerMama – (blush) thanks. That’s so nice of you to say. I think we all feel like we’re in a rut no matter what the rest of the world thinks… and thanks also for the Flickr group recommendation. I’ll go have a look.

  16. At the moment I have been using Picnik, just for it’s simplicity and ease of uploading to Flickr. Of course you are limited by the small amount of actions, but I try to stay true to letting the photo speak for itself. I think I tend to over edit, which is behind my reluctance to jump into Photoshop.
    I really don’t want to get into manipulating my pics to such an extent that they don’t resemble the actual reality. But that’s just for my own stuff, I am totally in love with some of the Photoshopped stuff out there!

  17. I’ve downloaded some free actions, but they don’t seem to have the instant button-press result I thought they would. They all seem to alter the image in extreme ways — more than fits my taste. They are customizable, but I’m not so patient trying to figure out what the action’s author did in the first place, so I usually abandon using the action (hooray for "undo") and end up just doing all the tweaking myself from scratch.

    I also love Lightroom for my photo processing — it’s definitely helped improve my workflow. I use some of the presets to get me started — usually the auto tone and color punch, but sometimes I even undo the color punch if it seems too much.

    I wish I could "get it right" in my camera, but all my images seem to have an overly warm color-cast to them…so I almost always need to do some sort to "fixing."

  18. The first stepping stone for me was finding Barb Uil (http://blog.jinkyart.com.au/) and her Itty Bitty Actions (www.ittybittyactions.com). I didn’t get the actions, but rather the tutorial which actually taught me so much more because I learned how the actions worked and how to do it myself. From there, Scott Kelby’s books have been indispensable and also Bryan Peterson. His stuff is great, not for Photoshop work but for in camera technical stuff along with the really hard stuff of seeing things creatively. All the Photoshop magazines out there too are great for quick tips. And places like this, Shutter Sisters has been a great place to see and hear what others are doing and how they are doing it. I get lost in links galore and sometimes fall pretty far into the rabbit hole, not sure where I started!

  19. Clearly taking decent pics and then knowing what an action is are on my things I must do list. I have at least purchased PSE – there may be hope for me yet.
    Gorgeous photos on your site – I’m in awe!

  20. my sister and i started our own Photoshop blog, just so we could teach ourselves (she has Elements, I have CS2). We’re just learning by doing, and then posting what we did. It’s here, if you’re interested:
    http://heylucy.typepad.com/photoshop_sisters/

    We are definitely novices, but we’re having a lot of fun.

    I love Pioneer Woman, and I’m dying to get some actions (that sounded funny…), but for now I’m happy to just play around and try this and that. I can also recommend any Photoshop books by Scott Kelby, they are very easy to understand, and it’s like he’s holding your hand through each step. I also really like what picnik can do, it’s super easy to use, and I love how you can edit your photos right from flickr.

  22. I love the ethereal tones of the photo above…very nice.

    I really like Ree’s work, too. I think she is starting to use less actions, since most of her early photo tutorials centered on actions that she used. The problem with actions is that many versions of Photoshop Elements don’t support actions (you need the full version of CS2/CS3), and it can be a crutch to learning how to use the program. I think it is important to learn how to do everything yourself first. Scott Kelby’s books are really good at teaching Photoshop.

    I do use actions, but they are ones that I have written for my own workflow. Different cameras produce different results, and everyone has their own "style" that they like. It is hard to get a one size fits all action; however, using them can really cut down processing time.

    I have learned a lot on the forums at http://www.ilovephotography.com. You are exposed to a lot of different styles and great photographers that will usually share how they achieve their style.

  23. I’ve never used an action, but I am really interested in checking out the tutorial you linked to – I’m going to do that tomorrow. I try to get most of my effects with actual light – but I really need to learn more of my software now that I’m using Lightroom.