I Heart {Sepia-Toned} Faces

This week's theme at i Heart Faces is sepia toned.

I had a hard time deciding between Beauty and Ms. Smartypants for my kids entry, but I was so pleased with how the conversion turned out in this photo that I had to enter it. I converted this photo to sepia in GIMP, then added film grain and burned the edges in Picnik.



My adult entry is a portrait of my good friend Colleen at seven months pregnant. I originally converted it to black and white, but tinting it sepia in GIMP only took a minute and I really like the way it turned out.


For more sepia toned images, head over to i Heart Faces and browse through the 500 or so links you'll find there...

Fan of the Week!!!

There isn't an i Heart Faces contest this week, but contestants are encouraged to share their vacation photos with readers. Since my husband never takes us anywhere *wink wink* I've decided to share something exciting that happened to me over the weekend instead. You can checkout the full post over at i Heart Faces, or just read the excerpt I've "borrowed" below:

Congrats to our Fan of the Week!


Carebear @ Not Quite a Fairytale... Beauty and the Little Beast
(formerly - Two Under Two. Whew!)


Carebear has been one of our biggest supporters from the beginning and we want to give her a big shout out!!



Her self portrait was one of our favorites!!


We love reading her blog which is full of inspiration, wonderful photos and fun mommy stories.


Be sure to visit Carebear’s blog to say congrats and thanks for commenting on so many of your blogs and for being such a great supporter of I ♥ Faces!
We ♥ you Carebear!!

Isn't that awesome?! Thank you Angie and Amy - I'm honored and flattered and such a big fan!

i Heart Faces Pet Week!

This week at i Heart Faces there is a "Happy Birthday" category and a "Pets" category. I don't have a single birthday shot worthy of entering, but I do have a pet photo I absolutely love.

I snapped this on Saturday at my mom's house with the point & shoot I'm still stuck with. I was practicing macro shots of flowers when I happened to glance up and notice the little Beast chatting with his favorite playmate. I'm glad I didn't pause to correct the settings on my camera because a second later they were off and running and I would have missed capturing this adorable moment. It's definitely not a perfect shot, but it is a perfect memory!

Silhouette Runner Up

As I've been making the rounds viewing the awesome i Heart Faces Silhouette entries this week, I've noticed a lot of bloggers posting their photos that didn't make the cut. Because I worked so hard to capture silhouette shots, even keeping my kids up WAY past bedtime hoping to catch the sunset (didn't happen - I swear it doesn't come until 9 pm in Seattle!!!), I'm posting the shot I would've entered for the kids category had there been one this week!



You can view my actual entry in my previous post! Thanks.

I Heart Silhouettes

It's silhouette week at i Heart Faces. I dragged the family to the beach to practice, practice, practice Susan Keller's tips for my kids entry, only to learn it was a one entry contest again this week! So my shots of Beauty and the little Beast were pushed aside in favor of my adult entry, a photo I took many weeks ago of my good friend Colleen (seven months pregnant) and her 19-month old daughter.

Hit Me With Your Best Shot!

This week at i Heart Faces is really special. They are requesting the very best closeup face photos from both amateurs (that's me!) and professionals. The winners will be published in an i Heart Faces photobook by Blurb!

Thank you to everyone who responded to my cry for help in choosing which of my top 5 face photos to enter (prizes will be awarded soon!). Although many of you liked Ms. Smartypants in braids, and a few liked Beauty's photos, a huge majority of you voted for this photo of the little Beast:

I hope we made the right choice!



I am submitting this photo into the www.iheartfaces.com Blurb Book photo contest. I am granting I ♥ Faces permission to use my photo in a printed version of a book for commercial use and possibly advertising of a photo book on both the Blurb and I ♥ Faces web sites.

Please Help Me Choose My BEST Face!

This week at i Heart Faces is HUGE. The very best faces entered this week will be published in a BOOK!!! That is a lot of pressure and I want to make the right choice, but I have looked at these pictures so many times - and I look at these faces all day in real life too - so I cannot make a clearheaded decision. That's why I need your help!

Which of the following photos do you consider the very best face photo (some of them have been previously posted here, but the contest calls for my BEST photo whether its been submitted before or not)? Which one do you think the talented photographer judges at i Heart Faces might consider worthy enough to PUBLISH in an actual book - remember I'll be competing against some much better photographers!?






I'm leaning towards the last one of the little Beast in the tunnel. Thanks in advance for your feedback. Perhaps a prize randomly awaits one of you helpful commenters???

**SEE PREVIOUS POST BELOW FOR WINNERS OF THE I HEART SEATTLE GIVEAWAY AND PICTURES OF BEAUTIFUL SEATTLE!!!

I Heart {Laughing} Faces

This week's theme at i Heart Faces is Laughter, a great week made even better by the fact that this week's judge is the incomparable Ree Drummond - the Pioneer Woman herself! See her linked over there in my sidebar under "Blogs I Heart"? I do, I really do! She was one of Time Magazine's Top 25 Bloggers of 2009! I've seen some of her posts garner over 18,000 comments. And now there is a chance she might be stopping by my blog! Isn't that intimidating?! If you've never entered a photo at i Heart Faces before, this would be the week to start!

My kids entry is the little Beast preparing to peg me with a snowball on his very first snow day. I love the genuine fun and humor in his adorable little face. That day in the snow is one of my favorite memories because we all laughed so hard. BTW, daddy made that perfect snowball then coached the little Beast to throw it at me...



My adult entry was taken almost exactly a year ago at a rare breakfast out after church. The little Beast was trying to make faces at me and it cracked his daddy up! Maybe you can tell from the picture, maybe not, but my husband has the world's BEST laugh - he puts everything he has into it!



Blogger is cutting off the right-hand edge of each photo for some reason, but you can click on it to view the whole thing in GIGANTIC form if you'd like...
For more fun faces, head over to i Heart Faces!

I Heart Faces, Constructive Feedback Friday

HELP!! I'm a beginner and I often find my photos under or overexposed. I know that I need to work on getting the exposure right straight out of the camera, but when I don't, are there tricks for rescuing a photo that I've ruined? I don't know, but I hope the experts at i Heart Faces can provide the answer! They'll be dropping by today to offer tips for fixing my photo!

Below is a shot I took of Beauty several months ago on my Sony Cybershot. She has the cutest expression and I want to salvage this photo but don't know what to do with it, since it's so terribly composed and underexposed. I've tried two different crops, increased the exposure, upped the contrast and played with color and effects in Picnik. Nothing has worked. Maybe you all can do better. Thanks in advance for any advice, examples, tricks you can offer! Please feel free to leave some suggestions for what I could do in Photoshop or Elements since I often use GIMP which is similar enough that I can usually translate PS directions into GIMP tasks. Thank you.

The original: f/2.8; 1/25 sec; ISO 100; 9 mm (I know, I know. I needed a higher ISO and faster shutter speed. I took this the first day I ever put my camera in manal and didn't know what I was doing!)

Sepia:


Color Pop:


(At the last minute, just before linking up, I changed the photo I wanted help with. The first few comments are from regular readers who saw the first photo I posted. Thanks)

i Heart {Hats} and Faces

This week's theme over at i Heart Faces is hats. My kids entry is a recent shot of Beauty in her cupcake hat and rainbow-colored tutu. This was the day after she started crawling and she did NOT want to sit still and have her picture taken!


And my adult entry is hubby and the little Beast in their sun hats during our family vacation last July. (stupid Blogger cuts off the edge of the picture if I resize it bigger, grrr...)


Please feel free to offer constructive criticism of my photos; your feedback helps me improve, thanks! And despite tons of online research and 2 hours playing with cameras at Best Buy, I'm still using my point and shoot. If you have an affordable, quality dSLR recommendation for a beginner, please leave that advice in your comments too!

To view more people in hats, head over to i Heart Faces.

i Heart Faces - What The %@*#?! Wednesday

Wait, what the %@*# day is it?! Wednesday? Crap. I totally missed this week's i Heart Faces contest. Shoot. It was reflection week, and I had this photo set aside from our trip to the beach a couple weeks ago. It's Beauty's first encounter with sand and sea...

I Heart {My} Faces

This week's challenge at i Heart Faces is the hardest yet: Self-Portrait. Here are the rules:

"...you must take the photo and you must be holding the camera when you take it (you can’t use a tripod or anything else to hold the camera for you.)"

My adult entry, ("show us your face…and your face ONLY") is almost kid-free, except for the little Beast's arms and knee growing out of my head in the background. Bonus points I think for posting a photo of me when I'd just woken up - the light was just so lovely that morning (thank goodness for naturally flat hair and photo editing tools that helped me get rid of undereye circles!).



My kids entry is Beauty and me (yes, she's eating my lens cap) reflected in Ms. Smartypants' sunglasses. I looked over to tell her something and caught a glimpse of myself in her shades. I instantly thought, "i Heart Faces!!!!" This shot was great in theory, but leaves a bit to be desired upon execution. I wish I'd moved my mom and our picnic so they weren't reflected in the other sunglass lens. I wish I hadn't had to soften and clone out all the background distractions. Any other tips for how I might've improved it?

I Heart {Easter} Faces - Amateur Week

Well, because my kids are little stinkers, and refused to cooperate both times I tried taking Easter portraits, I had a hard time finding anything worth entering this week. Fortunately, my mom managed to coax a smile out of Beauty in her Easter outfit and I snapped this one decent shot. You can view it bigger by clicking here.

I'm more a novice than an amateur, but I am learning so much each week at i Heart Faces! I would love any advice or feedback you could offer to help me improve my photos! Thanks for stopping by.


f/3.2
1/160 sec
ISO 400
Sony Cybershot DSCH50 (point-n-shoot)
Edited in Picnik

Constructive Feedback Friday

My favorite blog, i Heart Faces, is trying a new feature: Constructive Feedback Friday. I would love some advice from the talented folks that hang out over there, so I'm posting this shot of Beauty. I had just started playing with natural light in this photo, but my house has very little of it, so the original was really dark.

I love the picture, but don't think it follows the "rules" of composition, etc. I also wonder if I over-sharpened and dodged the eyes? How could I have processed, cropped, edited it differently to improve the finished product? (I don't have photoshop!) Or, I'd love feedback on how to improve the SOOC shot too! Thanks for your advice!

My edited version using GIMP (Blogger cuts a little off the right side of photo, so you may want to view it on my Flickr Photostream):


Original SOOC:
f/3.2, 1/25 sec, ISO 100, 10 mm focal length, Sony DSC-H50 (Obviously should have bumped up the ISO, but even at 400 my camera produces so much noise, grrr...)

I Heart {Friend-ly} Faces

This week's contest at i Heart Faces is "My Friend and I". My entry is a recent portrait of two brothers who are very good friends to my little Beast, and to one another. They have an adorable sister too, but if I entered a shot of all three of them, I'd be breaking the rules, which say only 2 faces per picture this week!


For more photos of friends, click the button below to head over to i Heart Faces! But before you go, be sure to enter my "Play That Funky Music" Giveaway!

I Heart {Pouting} Faces

This week's theme over at i Heart Faces is Pouting. I had such a hard time deciding which picture to use. After getting feedback from family and friends, this shot of the little Beast came out on top. I LOVE this photo. We were at a friend's house and they had just mowed the grass on their beautiful property. The morning dew made the grass clippings stick to the little Beast's feet, which he HATED. This photo makes me laugh everytime I look at it. Enjoy!

I Heart {Flash-Less} Faces

Thanks for stopping by, and *HEY WHILE YOU'RE HERE, be sure to ENTER MY FABULOUS "Support Our Troops" GIVEAWAY*!

This week's i Heart Faces theme is "No Flash". When I got serious about my photos a few months ago, the first valuable piece of advice I received was to turn off my flash. Even though my point-and-shoot performs terribly in low light, I took that advice and haven't used my flash since that day. The picture I'm entering for this contest was taken near an East-facing window, just days after I turned off my flash for good. I love the clarity of Beauty's skin, the amazing catchlights in her eyes, and her hint of amused smile. This is easily one of my faves of all the photos I've ever taken.



For more gorgeous no-flash photos, head over to i Heart Faces and browse the other contestants' entries!

I Heart {Green} Faces!

This week's theme over at i Heart Faces is green, in honor of St. Patrick's Day. Winter continues here in Seattle, which means my ideas for green photos were snowed hailed rained out. I did let the little Beast go outside with his green raincoat and umbrella to stomp in puddles, hoping to capture a great shot. Problem was, everytime I crouched to take his picture, he wanted to put the umbrella over my head, so all my shots of him are thisclose. Oh well, at least we can appreciate his beautiful GREEN eyes in my kids entry for this week! (Update: Thanks to everyone who has complimented his eyes. They ARE naturally green, but also are reflecting a green umbrella! And post-processing brightened them a bit too!)



My sister also braved our crazy Northwest weather so that I could snap this photo outside in my carport yesterday! She is my adult entry:



For more and much better GREEN faces, click the button below and check out all the contestants at i Heart Faces!

I Heart {Cropped} Faces

{UPDATE} I earned an honorable mention over at I Heart Faces this week! Thanks to site-founder Amy for liking my photo (BTW, I think your idea of a grouping of four in different colors is a GREAT one!) I cannot believe my photo was honored! I really just participate for fun and learning, and because the community of photographers there is so generous and kind! I couldn't be more thrilled with Amy's compliment!!! If you haven't already, head over to I Heart Faces and check out the winners. They are AMAZING. (My shot pales significantly in comparison!)

This week's I Heart Faces theme is Creative Crop, and we're allowed to share our original "before" image and our cropped "after" image. I'm entering the little Beast playing at the park for my kids entry. I tried a square crop on this because I thought it complimented the circular "frame" of the tunnel window. I also played around ALOT with post-processing just for fun. Critiques are encouraged, thanks!

Here is the original:

Check out all the other creatively cropped images by clicking on the button below: