Summer in our part of the world is compressed into a few short months of floral photograph opportunities. If I am absent from my yard for more than a few days, some of my flowers will have bloomed and moved on to the all important job of setting seed. But I can always count on the Iceland Poppies – Papaver nudicaule – to be show stoppers all summer long.
I’ve asked a few orange ones to pose for me, so that I can demonstrate to you what versatile little flowers they are with a little help from the photographer!
This bunch posed against some iris leaves, and were backlit by an obliging shaft of sun. Some themes add a nice outside border to the photo when it is uploaded, but not all themes do that.
I imported the picture into a program like Photoshop Elements, GIMP, or FastStone Image Viewer where I cropped it to get rid of the bits I didn’t need, and adjusted the lighting. Then I saved it.
Next I opened the saved picture in FastStone Image Viewer where I reduced the size, added borders and my Copyright. That gave me a photo I could put into my blog.
Of course, there are lots of other things that can be done to a photo with a programs like Photoshop Elements. This is the same photo rendered as Pastel Art.
This is the photo again made to look like a Watercolor.
And here it is in Black and White. But wait, there is more!
Here is the black and white background with the orange poppies. Didn’t I tell you these were versatile flowers?
Now, I have to give full credit to the Poppies, because they truly are the stars in this photograph. Then I have to thank The Car Guy for letting me use his Canon EOS 20D Camera. I set it on full automatic mode and just click away! As for manipulating the photos, well I am a rank amateur compared to real photographers using professional programs. I use GIMP and FastStone Image Viewer (both freeware that gladly accept donations)!
Amusives 