So... How 'Ja Do That??

How are you guys doing today?
I got the sweetest emails and comments from you all. I am so humbled, and I deeply thank you! I have been praying for many months that God would give me my own voice here at The Love Shack... something that would be fun for others to read, to look at... and also be pleasing to God somehow. I'm not sure how He's going to use me or this blog, but I pray every day that I can use this creative energy that He has given me for His purpose. I want my life and this blog to be a sweet fragrance to Him.
I'm finding I've got tons of creative energy stored up inside (I get it from my mom- she's amazing, though!), and photography and photo editing are my passions. Sometimes I feel like God speaks to me through the lens of my camera and through my editing equipment. I know, sounds strange... but it's true!

Kelly from Kelly's Korner gave me permission to post her daughter's (Harper) picture. This is the picture I edited for her, and she surprised me by posting it on her blog (HERE). Since my inbox was full of questions about how I edited Harper's picture, I thought I'd just post the answer right here. Are your ready?

Above is the original picture that Kelly took. Oh, my gosh! Isn't Harper the cutest?! I can tell that Kelly took a solid picture with a nice camera and lens and a good amount of light. This makes post processing a lot easier. I use two editing programs: Lightroom 2.3 and Photoshop Elements 7. I'm self-taught, so I'm sure there are lots of alternative (and even better) ways to get the job done (Please let me know what they are, by the way)! I'll just give you the general run down of how I "antiqued" Harper's picture:

1. Opened the original image in Lightroom, evened out the white balance and then auto toned
2. There are many awesome pre-sets in Lightroom. There are also lots of free pre-sets out there on the web. I chose aged photo.
3. This is where the fun, creative stuff happens... there are an endless amount of changes that can be made at this point, too many to list here, but color temperature and tinting are what I tweaked the most. Really, the possibilities are endless. You just have to edit to you own liking and the feeling you are going for.
4. I imported the image into PSE7. This is the program I couldn't live without- and where most of the technical stuff happens. First, I cloned out a few boo-boos. I like to use unsharp mask on the irises only. I don't like to mess with the whites of the eyes or somehow my subjects end up looking like freaky dolls!
5. I burned the background just a smidge to give more depth of field and put focus on beautiful Harper. Oh, can't forget to use the sharpen tool on the drool!

Does anyone have any idea what I just said? Because I don’t.

Ok, one more look at precious Harper. She's eye candy, I tell ya!