Thursday, February 23, 2012

Altered with Picnik, Basic Edits: Exposure, Sharpened, Cropped; and Effects: Advanced/Cloned, No. 4

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Pioneer Courthouse Square, Portland's living room. I cloned the young man's backpack out of the photo and a small round object which was in front of him on the bricks. Normally I wouldn't do such cloning, I'd try cropping it out. However, I decided, "Why not?" I've got little more than two months left with my beloved Picnik, so I'm going to go for it. I really like the results, too. I like the sunshine, especially below his right knee and the sort of glow around him on the bricks; the shadows following the concrete forms along the curve; and the glistening, rain-wet bricks in both patterns.

I took this photo on an unusually sunny winter day in Portland, January 21, 2012, downtown. It would have been my dearly departed husband LeRoy's 65th birthday. I was out and about after that morning's top-knotch lecture at the Architectural Heritage Center--one of the best lectures I've attended:
Real Estate Development and the Re-Shaping of Old Portland
Focusing on the early days of Portland, Dr. Tracy Prince, author of Portland’s Goose Hollow, presented a slide show of historic photos and maps to demonstrate how dramatically different the terrain of Old Portland (the west side—from the Willamette River to the West Hills) was from today’s terrain. This changed terrain includes: building the Great Plank Road which ran through the narrow and dark Tanner Creek Canyon; burying Tanner Creek, Johnson Creek, and Balch Creek; filling Couch Lake and Guild’s Lake; filling the 20-block long, 50-feet deep Tanner Creek Gulch; building streets upon 30-50 foot pilings in areas that today’s residents would describe as flatlands; and 1870s Oregonian stories about 25-foot deep cuts required when B Street (Burnside) was graded beyond the gulch. Such incredible alterations to Portland’s natural landscape were seen as necessary for growing a young frontier city and to accommodate real estate development.

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The photo as it came out of the Nikon D50.

7 comments:

Melissa said...

Your crop gives it a nice composition too. :)

Jack said...

You are getting very good at editing your photos, Lynette.

Michaele said...

Love the changes : )

Randy said...

That first shot is absolutely marvelous.

Gunn said...

Well done and well seen!

Regina K said...

Fantastic alterations.

Anonymous said...

Wow! Expert cloning -- I think that was a nice choice, that photo is so striking.

You mentioned Picnik closing..sad day, I know! I'm part of a team of former Picnikers who, just 2 short weeks ago, released PicMonkey into the wild! Because it's built by some of the same folks, it should feel quite familiar. And, because we're in the beginning stages, we'd love to hear your feedback! Check us out and let us know what you think!

Cheers,
Jenn