Not Lost Yet

I went out driving around the other day with my camera. It was one of those times that as I went, I would make random turns. I ended up finding some really pretty country. A lot of horse pastures and a few big houses. After about thirty minutes I decided I had to stop because I was beginning to forget which roads I had taken. I figured I would eventually make it back to the main road, but I didn't want to end up on the other side of the county when I did.

I didn't find too many opportunities to take photos. One time I stopped in the middle of the road to check out an OLD barn that was down in the woods. As I got my camera out, I looked in the rear view and saw a guy standing in the road watching me. He was about a quarter mile back. I kept getting my stuff ready until a car approached from behind me. This was a small road with no shoulder, so I decided to skip the photo and moved on.

The one shot I did take was of this horse pasture:When I got home I didn't think this was a great shot. So I started playing with it in Adobe Lightroom. First I cropped it. I didn't want as much sky in the shot and the house on the left was distracting. I kept the horse off to the right third of the shot.

Next, I played with the idea of black and white for this. I didn't like the complete black and white, so I went back to color and started to de-saturate all colors one by one. I took all the color out except for red and orange. Next I went to a section called split tone. It allows me to change the light area tone separate from the dark area tone and then adjust the balance of each. I played with it to get the look I wanted. Although the day I took this was unseasonably warm, in the 70's, I wanted this to have a very winter feel. This process took about fifteen to twenty minutes. Here's what I ended up with.

I was pleased with the results. I believe this shot is a lot more interesting compared to the original. With the software that is available, you can change a photo in endless ways. Sometimes, changing a photo can be as much fun as taking it.