Photography: creating illusions

I took this photo in January out of the window. I was warm, but these guys on the horse and cart were freezing.  I’ve edited it by converting the colour picture to sepia and I blurred the background a little more to highlight the subject.

If you use spot focusing and zoom in then the background tends to blur and the subject is sharper and in focus.

 

I took this shot at the Boer war re-enactment. It looks sepia too, but I actually used colorize in PhotoScape to add a little green to the overall colour.

Good photography isn’t about showing people what’s there. It’s about illusions, taking a snapshot of a place or people and presenting an image that people can relate too. This image might suggest the countryside, in fact it’s the heart of the once industrial Black Country.

This shot was taken in March just as the leaves were starting to come on the trees. The spring colours reflect the sunshine really well.

We had sunshine in March, but it was cold. You can see the ice on the tow path in this picture. I think this is one I submitted to a photography competition. I went back a few times trying to get better shots in late afternoon. The images I submitted were used in Boating World magazine.

This shot is from November 2013. If you get a good shot, it’s always worth going back and seeing if you can get a better shot. That guy was still fishing there!

These photographs are all illusions, they only show part of a story and the editing can create a even less realistic illusion. We can make just about anything look nice or interesting by taking the shot at the right angle. We can also take people into the past with sepia editing.

What do you think? Do you like today’s images? I still have flu, so I used images from my library today. I hope to be back to normal soon!Please comment if you have a question or observation. You can also follow me on Twitter. 

 

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