A little too much on the old to-do list has made this vacation weekend a little less than a vacation chez Juniorbird.com. I could see it was heading for twilight on a bright Labor Day when I finished the last task, and I’d been wanting to shoot all weekend long. With nothing to do at the last minute I thought of the old saying in the title and headed for the lemon tree in the backyard.
“!http://juniorbird.smugmug.com/photos/363900358_MSpkR-M.jpg!”:http://juniorbird.smugmug.com/gallery/5861708_qYcMZ/1/363900358_MSpkR
“!http://juniorbird.smugmug.com/photos/363900822_nrnF2-M.jpg!”:http://juniorbird.smugmug.com/gallery/5861708_qYcMZ/1/363900822_nrnF2
“!http://juniorbird.smugmug.com/photos/363901493_AXcRB-M.jpg!”:http://juniorbird.smugmug.com/gallery/5861708_qYcMZ/1/363901493_AXcRB
The lemon tree’s next to the hammock, in the bright sun. Further off, in the shade of the neighbor’s trees, is an old, broken-down brick barbecue.
“!http://juniorbird.smugmug.com/photos/363903318_kyzTH-M.jpg!”:http://juniorbird.smugmug.com/gallery/5861708_qYcMZ/1/363903318_kyzTH
“!http://juniorbird.smugmug.com/photos/363903728_azk9q-M.jpg!”:http://juniorbird.smugmug.com/gallery/5861708_qYcMZ/1/363903728_azk9q
“!http://juniorbird.smugmug.com/photos/363904495_XZUTX-M.jpg!”:http://juniorbird.smugmug.com/gallery/5861708_qYcMZ/1/363904495_XZUTX
One of the things that had bothered me about the photos I’d taken with “my new(ish) Canon”:http://juniorbird.com/archive/003339.html was how much more mechanical and less warm and intimate they looked than, say, those “I took in Southeast Asia”:http://juniorbird.smugmug.com/Travel/200720 with my “old”:http://juniorbird.com/archive/003263.html “Minolta”:http://juniorbird.com/archive/002119.html. Now, Canon offers this feature — Picture Styles — that lets you tune what the final product you shoot turns out to look like.[1] To be honest, I don’t know why I never got in there before, but a few weeks ago I finally fooled around and set a custom Picture Style that matched what I wanted, visually. I decreased the sharpening, which Canon is really aggressive with, to get a slightly more natural and intimate feel; increased the saturation, to add richness; darkened the photo to get the deep blacks I wanted; and also changed the default white balance to add natural greens and intimate ambers. I’m happy with the results — getting towards the look I want! Now maybe I need to create fun “new Picture Styles”:http://web.canon.jp/imaging/picturestyle/file/index.html for film types I’d like to shoot, like orthochromatic black-and-white or cross-processed Velvia.
fn1. So long as you’re shooting jpegs, anyway.
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