Phun with Photos

Today marks a week since I replace the horrible Panasonic Lumix FX75 with the impressive Canon PowerShot Elph 300 HS. I haven't looked back since, and the little elph hardly ever leaves my pocket! I never miss an opportunity to take a few good shots and today I experimented a bit with image modification skills (GIMP for those who are curious).

I recently decided to surprise my special someone (no, not Chaz) with some great looking roses and today I noticed they had started to bloom quite nicely. This provided a perfect opportunity to experiment with the camera's color accent mode. Here are some of the picture effects thanks to the camera's internal processor -- no modifications were done to these pics after they were taken.

Original Pic

Color Accent - Yellow

Color Accent - Red

It was some pretty nice snapping, but the fun really started when I decided to clear the background of all the unnecessary elements.

After countless tries I finally had a picture I was happy with, no flash to overexpose the front flowers' colors and no extreme shake-effect. After a little GIMP effect to make the background transparent it was then a simple matter of adding a black & white gradient to make those pinks & reds really pop.

Original Picture

GIMPed Transparent & Gradient

Of course now that the black & white artistic category is done I've been handed down a new assignment...take all the pictures again tomorrow with some natural light in the background and -- most importantly -- no clutter on the table!