Photoshop

What is photoshop and why was it created? Well google defines photoshop as graphics editing program. Most of you probably already know and for those who don't, in my words photoshop is a computer program that gives you an opportunity to play around with you pictures. Changing the background, changing the color of the picture, deleting all the bad parts and much more; all of those are possible by using photoshop. There are special classes that you can take about photoshop. I remember when I was still in high school I took a photoshop class at DeVry University. It was a fun class and I learned a lot of new things that I never knew. I still can't figure out how to use it fully but there are some pictures that made me proud of my photoshop skills. THe picture to the right, is the picture of my hometown in Ukraine-Ternopil. I took a year ago or so, when I went there to visit. It was in autumn, but the picture didn't go without photoshop. I played around the color and made it look foggy on the back. It looks kind of mysterious and interesting in many ways. I would like to share the originla photo, so you could compare but sadly I do not have the original photo. But hopefully you can imagine what it looked like before, it looked like a regular autumn day with no special affects to it.
There are some more pictures that I would like to share, with the same little story behind them.

Amazing

To tell you the truth, I had difficulty to decide what to write about. I wanted to share something that I really liked but also something that everyone would enjoy. I like photography, like I said many times before, but not to some extend that some people like it to. I've seen so many different and creative ideas, there were represented in a picture by a certain photographer. Sometimes when I see pictures that really grab my attention I just save them to my computer. Sadly I don't know the name of the author of all those pictures, but I would like to share some pictures that were taken either by random person or a photographer. They turned out pretty funny and I hope your mood will get better after seeing them (To see the picture better you just need to cleck on in). Enjoy :)
By posting these pictures I want to show my point, that so many things can be done with photography! So much more than we would ever expect.

David Muench

Photograph by David Muench

 This  name might not be familiar to many of you, it wasn't to me either. When I became interested in photography, I didn't bother to pay attention to other photographers. As all of you probably know, when you are interested in certain field, you are interested in it fully. Meaning, you know how was it created, who are the famous people in this field. As of photography, there are so many photographers out there and if they are well know, they probably put a lot of effort into this job. David Muench is a a landscape photographer, meaning he travels around different places and takes pictures of the landscapes. He started of when he was a little kid, he used to travel a lot across U.S. In his biography that I found online (muenchphotography.com), I found out that for David there was not other life than taking pictures."His 4 x 5 large format camera is as much a part of him as his innovative eye." 

Photograph by David Muench

 Well now many of you probably ask, why did I decide to write about this photographer and post his photos on here. One of the reason's is because he has the same interest as me and the other one is that I love taking pictures of landscapes. I didn't mention that earlier, but that is one thing I like about photography. Why I like that? Well, I guess because you can do so much with it. Sometimes the world looks so peaceful and beautiful, but we can't always see how beautiful it really is. Like the second photo by Muench, if you look at it for a second, it gives me (and hopefully you too) a feeling that the world is such a peaceful place and just like the photo represents- it's beautiful.
P.S I'll try to post some of my landscape photo's pretty soon, I just can't do it now because I got a new laptop few day's ago and still nothing on here :)

Oh boy, I remember when I first got my camera. I don't remember anymore what type of camera it was, it wasn't great for sure; but I love it. I remember spending hours to figure it out. Yeah, you could say I was too excited about it. Then one day I bumped into Macro mode. I didn't understand why the picture was turning out so smudged. I didn't realize that it was the mode in which the picture has to be taken from close-up. Well, I spent more and more trying to figure out how to work it. This are some pictures that I got out of it. I'm still working on my skills, of making good macro pictures. But since those day when I just got the camera, I've learned that in order to take a good picture in that mode you need to focus the camera very well. Keep holding the capture button until the image looks exactly the way you wanted it or at least something similar. Sometimes pictures still turn out bad, but it might also be because of the lighting. I always try to make sure that the lighting is good too. To make the pictures that I posted today I used the lamp, to make the light fall on the flowers to give it the special effect that they have. If you look at the photos you can see how the color varies, just like the contrast. There are so many different things with macro, you just have to play around with it. So have fun!

What a Season

Fall. Some might love this season, some hate it though. Well, I think this is THE best season. When it comes to photography, the colors turn out unbelievably beautiful on the picture. Not only on the picture, but in general if you take a look around they make you feel warm and right. Well I love to take pictures when this season comes, I like to walk around and enjoy everything that's around me. I didn't love fall at all, before I came here. Because when I didn't know how it is in Chicago, the first thought of the word "fall" was cold and rainy. It doesn't stop raining at my home country and the colors don't vary as much. The trees are yellow for a week, and than they are gone. Too bad for whoever didn't get to see it. They reason why the colors are gone so fast is because of the weather; it gets windy. Now in Chicago, we are in the middle of October and the trees are still colorful; and it was still warm outside. You just want to take your camera out and take pictures. I don't understand the people who don't want to.

I added the picture to the post that I took a year ago. It was by my high school and you can see the how so many colors are combined. Yellow, orange and red. They make the picture warm, so you wouldn't even mind going to that place right now. I took a few pictures, but sadly I can't post them all because when my computer broke I lost all of them. But I had one left which is this one. And I'm so glad I can share it with you.

What's around you?

Chicago, I wasn't born here. I didn't grow up here. All I knew is that it has some really TALL buildings. I was born in Ukraine and all buildings are pretty much the same, it's a five to ten floor buildings with apartments. No tall buildings, no small ones either. I know that those who never visited Ukraine can not draw a picture that I am talking about right now, but that's not what I plan to talk about.Only five years ago, I moved to Chicago. Even though it was totally different from what I expected, it was also much better in so many different ways. It shocked me how beautiful it is in downtown, by the lake and etc.. But it shocked me even more to find out, that there are many people who don't have time to see and enjoy the city because of many different reasons. Some people live in the suburbs and they don't have what it takes to come to Chicago so often and see it. I've been taking pictures of this beautiful city for so long, that I can't even choose which photos (taken by me), I would want to share. Since all of them represent the city, that is one of THE best ones I've ever seen. And trust me, I've got to see many.

Doesn't Take Much

Do you REALLY need a "professional" camera in order to take good pictures? My answer to that is- absolutely no. It doesn't take much to take good pictures, just some creativity and imagination. Well, what can you say about a 3.2 megapixel camera? It might not make much sense to those who don't know anything about camera's. Professional photographers will probably say that that's not even a camera. In some way they might be right; I'll say it's not the best one. My phone (which is the G1 htc phone) is actually the advise with the worst camera that ever made. "The worst" was just a loud term I used, to express what I think about it; but the camera itself is not that bad. It's just it takes forever to take the picture. No zoom in. Nothing. Who can argue about this camera being "so great"?
  A picture on the left, is my work from last year AND it was taken with that same camera I not so long called "the worst". In my opinion, the picture turned out very well. Not only do I like this picture because of how well it turned out, but because when I look at it I can bring back so many memories and just go back to that same moment.

   Now the picture to the right, another phone picture. Not as good as the previous one, but the tone and the color are recreated very well. Like one of my friends said: "The flowers turned out so clear". Meaning that you can see them very well, sometimes when a picture is taken by the phone small details seems to be unclear and the picture looses it's meaning. To take a good photo, you don't need to be a professional; you just need to spend some time on getting it the way you want. Another major point is imagination, to take a photo some imagination should be involved or else it's not as interesting to look at. I tried to combined both points into my pictures- creativity and time. And this so far is what turned out when I was working with my phone.

"You have it with you all the time"

    Yes, I do. When I go out with my friends to visit different places, they don't event take their camera with them anymore. I wonder why? I'm not as crazy about photography as the girl in the picture (not my work), but I love it.     Weirdly enough, last week after I started working on this project I decided to talk to my friend Taras, who is my old friend from Ukraine and a photographer. The first thing he told me, was that he decided to explore his career as a photographer even more. I didn't really understand what he meant at first; but all that meant was that he started taking pictures of different events such as wedding, graduation and many more. Isn't that cool? You make money while creating art and enjoying the party! I would love that, too bad I'm in a business major...! Anyways, what I meant to say is that as a photographer there is always a way to grow and explore.   

This picture was taken by Taras, as I said my friend and photographer. In my previous post I described how why I love taking photo's this much. I can tell you right now that this is an exact example why. I think you don't even need words. Everything about this photo is perfect. At least, it seems to be so.

How it all started

I'll begin where it all started for me.  I remember I liked to be in a picture, but never had I thought I would be the one walking around, taking pictures of almost everything. I can only guess how many people make money by taking pictures, for me it's just a hobby. However, starting this hobby made me realized that for some people photography is not just another picture they can post on Facebook or MySpace, it’s a captured moment with a deep meaning behind it. Adam Ansel, famous American photographer for his black-and-white picture, he said that  "You don't take a photograph, you make it."

    I took this picture a few years ago; looks like just a heart on a pavement but I remember that it took some feelings to actually make it feel the way it does. Why I like this photo is because it makes me think, was this drawn by hand or did it appear by itself. Did it ever happened to you that you look at the picture and later realize that you can stop staring? It happened to me. Even with this one; every time I look at it I can stop but stare for some time.

    Taking pictures, not only help me learn more about it, but also helps me tell the story of something. You can't always tell the story in words; that's why in my opinion you need a camera and a good shot to show something.

    We are surrounded by photography, many art pieces are also created with the help of a camera. Photos help to capture, that one moment that can't be recreated any other way. This picture to the right is one example of that. I took this picture to show something that human eye cannot see on everyday basis, only camera can recreate it.
     Not so long ago, when I was still a kid and lived in my home country which is Ukraine, cameras only started to become very popular. My family had a camera that already took color pictures, but some families didn't even have camera's that take black-and-white pictures. Today, you can do anything with a picture. You can give it a color, you can make it black-and-white and much more.  The picture on the bottom is also one of my pictures. It's a colorful one, even though I love black-and-white pictures; this photo shows more life and a good example how camera's became more popular and more. In this blog I want to talk about photography, mostly mine and how I feel about photography.