Photos of the Week - Week 8

Critique Group Challenge: 

Week 8, Three

Photo by Michael Novak

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Michael says: 

Gig on the beach. Winter ocean rowing has been underway for the very hearty crews here in New England for weeks. The photo is a close-up of the sternside of a pilot gig, sitting on the beach just beyond the high tide mark, ready to be pushed into the water and taken for a row. On March 2nd the first race of the season in this area takes place off this beach--a 3+ mile race on a triangular course that ends back at the beach. Over 100 rowing type boats compete from singles to 6 person crews in 32' Cornish pilot gigs. Crews bring their boats from all over New England to compete--and then celebrate/party. The weather can be windy and bitterly cold or sunny and mild (40s-50s). The Cornish pilot gig was designed and first used off Corwall, England in the late 1700s to take local pilots out to large, heavily ladened merchant ships and guide them safely into port and to the docks. The local gigs would race out to the ship to get the job of piloting the ship in. Today the traditional Cornish gig--32' long by 4'9" wide--for 6 rowers plus a cox is rowed and raced in clubs around the world. I find old gigs fun to photograph, especially in small parts.

52-Week Photo Challenge Class
Week 8 - Mirror Image

Week 52 Photo Challenge:

Week 8, Mirror Image

Photo by Thomas Bradley

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Thomas says:  

Smart Phone Photo Challenges
Week 8 - In Motion

Smart Phone Challenge:

Week 8, In Motion

Photo by Linda James

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Linda says: 

2024 AI Image Club

 2024 AI Image Club:

Week 8, Wild West

Photo by Lois Bennett

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Lois says:

I found this week's theme rather difficult to get a good image. I tried various apps including Wonder, Firefly and DaVinci. There were lots of problems with people's faces and hands. This one was one of the best, which was generated in DaVinci (Android). My prompt was: " Cowboys playing poker in a saloon in the old wild west." 

Photos of the Week - Week 8

Critique Group Challenge: 

Week 8, Three

Photo by Ricky Tims

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Ricky says: 

During a stroll around a small lake in Wichita Falls, TX we were greeted with geese, coots, and ducks. I had to be patient while the ducks meanodered from hither to yon trying to get THREE of them in a shot., but they were looking away. I gave a little whistel and they all tunned profile. I guess that makes sense since they look from the sides of their heads. One enterloper manages to photo bomb, but he.she is a bit disguised.

2024 AI Image Club - Wild West

2024 AI Image Club:

Week 8, Wild West

Photo by Ricky Tims

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Ricky says:  

Smart Phone Photo Challenges
Week 8 - In Motion

Smart Phone Challenge:

Week 8, In Motion

Photo by Ricky Tims

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Ricky says:

One of my favorite things to do is shoot from a moving vehicle with a slow shutter. A huge chuck are crap, but there are many that are miracles. My bad for doing this with DSLR, but for our travel this week, this was just a shot that made me happy - and it is "in motion'

Photos of the Week - Week 7

Critique Group Challenge: 

Week 7, Morning Routine

Photo by Brian Lyon

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Brian says: 

Like everyone else my Morning Routine usualy starts with coffee etc. I decided I'd go past that Routine and get to my Morning Routine at work. Everything starts with me there so if i don't get things going nobody else gets going. Heading to one of the Mills with some logs as another Bear Lake valley sunrise begins.

52-Week Photo Challenge Class
Week 7 - Black & White

Week 52 Photo Challenge:

Week 7, Black & White

Photo by Laurie Bucher

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Laurie says:  

Smart Phone Photo Challenges
Week 7 - Selfies

Smart Phone Challenge:

Week 7, Selfies

Photo by Kevin Kenward

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2024 AI Image Club

 2024 AI Image Club:

Week 7, Sacred Space

Photo by Ellen Lindow

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Ellen says:

My prompt was T"he alter of a medieval cathedralwith stained glass windows. Before the alter, a coffin lies in state with a long flowing rainbow flag draped over the coffin" I first tried this in Artist.ai, but the flag drape was skimpy and short and regenerated never made it better. I put the prompt in Bing's AI image generator, which is what Michael liked to use. The Cathedral seemed really bright, so I put it in photoshop and reduced the brightness except for around the coffin.

Photos of the Week - Week 7

Critique Group Challenge: 

Week 7, Morning Routine

Photo by Ricky Tims

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Ricky says: 

This mug came up during a recent Facebook live conversation where I was telling the story of how Hugo and I met. This was the first gift he sent me from Luxembourg (where he was living at the time). It would be another 9 months still before we were able to meet face to face. I took some bacon and egg photos, but this one had much more meaning for me - a simple mirror image of the morning coffee.

2024 AI Image Club -  Snowy Woods

2024 AI Image Club:

Week 7, Sacred Space 

Photo by Ricky Tims

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Ricky says:  

Photos of the Week - Week 6

Critique Group Challenge: 

Week 6, Curly

Photo by Shannon Hiebert

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Shannon says: 

If you know what this is...AAAAAND know how to use it....You are officially 'OLD'. I was in a bit of a hurry taking this, so I tried to get the highest F Stop number with the lowest ISO as I needed to take it hand held. I decided to take it a bit under exposed so I could get the best focus on the curl and I just thought that I would make the appropriate adjustments in the editing. Made it into a black and white dreamscape and some adjustments back in LrC. After the editing, I'm especially excited to see a bit of reflection of the 'Curl' seen in the base of the phone.

52-Week Photo Challenge Class
Week 6 - Long Depth

Week 52 Photo Challenge:

Week 6, Long Depth

Photo by Jack Rigby

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Jack says:  

Smart Phone Photo Challenges
Week 6 - People/Pets

Smart Phone Challenge:

Week 6, People / Pets

Photo by Veronica Haberthuer

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Veronica says: 

2024 AI Image Club

 2024 AI Image Club:

Week 6, Mythical God / Goddess

Photo by Kim Upshaw

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Kim says:

I used different apps. They all came out pretty good. It was hard to pick. My prompt was: Mystical Goddess in the clouds...Bing ai on PC

Photos of the Week - Week 6

Critique Group Challenge: 

Week 6, Curly

Photo by Ricky Tims

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Ricky says: 

A mouse, maybe, if you can imagine. This is strips of paper from my studio, curled with scissors and shot on white. I used a super colorful photo that had white border and blurred it to oblivian and blended it it with Lighten - flattened and made additional Saturation adjustments. Then did a mirror montage.

2024 AI Image Club -  Snowy Woods

2024 AI Image Club:

Week 6, Mythical God / Goddess 

Photo by Ricky Tims

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Ricky says:  

Photos of the Week - Week 5

Critique Group Challenge: 

Week 5, Sound of Silence

Photo by Rebecca Smith

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Rebecca says: 

Ahhh...Finally, silence! I'm sure at least once the thought of doing this has crossed our mind. Grateful for a friend who played with me for my photo this week.

52-Week Photo Challenge Class
Week 5- Wheels

Week 52 Photo Challenge:

Week 5, Wheels

Photo by Janet Wheeler

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Janet says:  

Smart Phone Photo Challenges
Week 5 - Power of One

Smart Phone Challenge:

Week 5, Power of One

Photo by Mary Lynn Abe

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Mary says: 

2024 AI Image Club

 2024 AI Image Club:

Week 5, Under The Sea

Photo by Steph Adams

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Steph says:

Inspiration for this week is from photographer and visual artist, Emma Hack. She is know for painting on bare skin in front of elaborate wallpaper by Florence Broadhurst. 

This piece was a challenge in MidJourney because it doesn't like the words "body painter" and soft blocked me everytime I tried. So I had to work around those words a bit to get it to look right but it's as close as I could get.

Photos of the Week - Week 5

Critique Group Challenge: 

Week 5, Sound of Silence

Photo by Ricky Tims

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Ricky says: 

Hello darkness my old friend. A clear night after a snowstorm. We live in our country's largest government-protected night sky preserve. I added the double exposure with a contemplative me. I'm not sure this is a success, but the scene didn't seem as successful as I would wish without something extra so this was what I chose.

2024 AI Image Club -  Snowy Woods

2024 AI Image Club:

Week 5, Under The Sea

Photo by Ricky Tims

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Ricky says:  

Photos of the Week - Week 4

Critique Group Challenge: 

Week 4, Color Shift

Photo by JoAnn Banks

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JoAnn says: 

I thought this was going to be fairly easy, but it ended up being a lot more difficult than I thought it should be. I placed a slice of orange on my light pad to take the photo. Then in PS I selected each orange section and changed the hue and saturation. My goal was to create a mini color wheel. I clipped each hue and saturation adjustment to each orange section that I had selected creating many layers. Then I cropped to square and added a colorful stroke around the image.

52-Week Photo Challenge Class
Week 4 - Leaves

Week 52 Photo Challenge:

Week 4, Leaves

Photo by Doris Steppler

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Doris says:  

Smart Phone Photo Challenges
Week 4 - Books

Smart Phone Challenge:

Week 4, Books

Photo by Carol Huston

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Carol says: 

2024 AI Image Club

 2024 AI Image Club:

Week 4, Amusement park

Photo by Allison Haggatry

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Allison says:

Wild roller coaster ride

Prompt: roller coaster, black metal scaffolding, mad design, minimalist, steampunk, vintage retro, graffiti, pastel colors
Model: SDXL
Art Style: Dali
Edited further in PS.

I've been playing with Imagine some more. Trying to see how the various sliders affect the final result.
If you enter a Seed number (ie 1234) and don't change the prompts you'll keep getting the same result.
Changing the CFG scale slider from the default of 3 to a max of 15 gives a simplified variation on the original image.
If you change only the aspect ratio (from 1:1 to 4:3) then you get quite a new result.
I find that a lot of the AI results seem random, well it is bc it uses a random seed each time. But by understanding how the sliders work maybe there can be a bit of control of the final result. If I randomly get something interesting then I'll reuse that seed and vary the other parameters to see what happens.
So many possibilities! 

Photos of the Week - Week 4

Critique Group Challenge: 

Week 4, Color Shift

Photo by Ricky Tims

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Ricky says: 

Our bench sits on a meditation area called The Eye of the Raven. It was snowing - so this is cold and gray. In Photoshop I added a layer and pained a multi-colored gradient - blended that with a blending mode (I think Overlay), and then reduced the opacity a bit. I think it looks altered, but not crazy altered. I wanted to see the details and also preserve the snowflakes. I shot this with my 600mm from our breakfast table.

2024 AI Image Club - Amusement park

2024 AI Image Club:

Week 4, Amusement park

Photo by Ricky Tims

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Ricky says:  

Smart Phone Photo Challenges
Week 4 - Books

Smart Phone Challenge:

Week 4, Books

Photo by Ricky Tims

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Ricky says:

I enjoy seeing the curve of the pages and the repetition of that shape. Edited in Prisma app with Huawei HiAI.