The Art of Editing (Which I'm Only Learning)

  I've always been that girl that loved to take pictures, but I certainly have not been a "photographer" very long. My first attempts at photography was with disposable cameras at summer Bible camp in elementary school. They were... well... let's just say that they will not likely ever be recognized as works of art. Not with my forgetfulness to use the flash at least. =)

 About a year ago I got my own digital camera from birthday and babysitting money and that was basically used for events like camp, retreats, conferences, etc. Sometime last year I discovered an online editing service and used it the way most teen girls use it... to make silly pictures to share on facebook.

 Last spring I lost my semi cheap digital camera, but I was never too disappointed because it was already starting to break. I started to use my dad's digital camera, which is much better quality, to take pictures of my adorable little brothers, my big brother's grad party, and things like that. I discovered that I really liked photography and eventually, in about July, I discovered that I could do a lot more then just silly pictures with my online editor and my hobby of photography and photo editing developed.

 Now the majority of my "photography education" has come through trial and error. The benefit with learning by trial and error is that you are always learning something new. Some of the things that I've learned lately about editing photos is that, 1) Edited pictures don't always need to look edited. 2) Simplicity is key in most cases. 3) Don't use anything goofy unless just doing a silly picture that you know is silly and such. 4) There are so many ways to edit a single picture so don't just stop at one if it's a good picture.

 Now that brings you to the pictures below... I took this picture in August and just today I decided to take a look at it again and try several different ways to edit them. Now it's your turn to tell me what photos are your favorite or tips for more ways to edit the picture. (I know, I didn't do a black and white picture... shame on me...)

(Oh, and don't ask me what I did to them exactly... I use different ways to curve the lighting and such so I rarely can remember what I did afterwards.)

(And, I realize this isn't the best photo ever. It was one that looked awesome on the camera but on the computer the way it is focused is sort of blah. But it was just the picture that I chose to edit at the time.)