Surprise!

We've got a guest photographer today. I want everyone to meet Sara. She was the winner of Scott's wordless Wednesday.
Everyone give Sara a warm 3C1D welcome.

A little from Sara in her words...

I didn't get quite what I was hoping for but one decent shot of the bunch will do, especially when the model grows weary of being the subject of meticulous instructions ("Smell the flower, honey!") and apparently doesn't want to get her knees dirty in the dirt (after picking up trash and planting in the woods at school all afternoon). If it looks to you like my daughter is rolling her eyes at me, I think you might be right. The tie-in is the flower. It's red of course. You can't see it but there are yellow tulips right beside it. Of course, the red is her favorite so I went with it. But she is wearing yellow so the color ties in, too.
The project definitely bred discontent with my current camera. I used a point and shoot, the Canon Powershot (and not even a new one) with a trigger that's retrofitted with a paperclip. I'm hoping a new camera is in my near future. We'll see! Thanks for letting me play today! Sara

Boy we can relate to the unwilling model and the working by sheer will camera. Thanks so much for playing with us Sara. We hope you can join us again soon.
Go on over to Sara's blog and check her out.

Want to play with us too. We promise it's easy. Go here and make a comment. Doesn't need to be anything fancy. Just say pick me and maybe I'll pick you. Tomorrow night the winner will be announced.

xoxo,
Brandi

Happy Easter Everyone

I hope you've had a wonderful, indulgent Easter spent with family and friends.

We've got one of our great 3C1D friends with us tonight. I'm sure you all remember MamaLu.
Here's what she's got to say today.


Here's my shot for today. The leaves pick up the green from the grass in Saturday's picture with Scott and Justin. Since today is Easter, and as it's (supposedly) spring, I wanted to depict renewal and rebirth. The daffodils are easy to tie in with that theme. With humans, one type of renewal and rebirth is based on emotions triggered by memories that never die, but lie dormant until a word, a photo, a song, a scent - something - triggers them. These are precious gifts, as are the flowers in spring. Enjoy.
Mamalu




Bring on the spring! From all of us, to all of you, Happy Easter.

Sunday with Dan

Happy Sunday everyone! I hope you had a great weekend and are ready to plow into another week. Joining us tonight is Dan, our regular urban coorespondant. Here's his post:

Pilsen, two to three miles southwest of the Loop, is noted for its murals. Historically, the murals have given this largely Hispanic community a colorful means to state its aspirations and reject the chains of prejudice that sometimes hinder immigrant groups. The murals portray many themes; from native Aztec religions to the Virgin of Guadalupe; from images of violence to priests blessing babies; from militant uprisings to children's education. One of these murals has served as the backdrop for Santana and his band in a street scene in the video, "Game of Love". The church on whose wall it lives had a fire in December of 2000, severely damaging the sanctuary. Now the church had already been closed for a decade and the rest of the complex used as a state of the art day care and child education center, so the sanctuary was not in use. However, when people entered the room after the fire, the mural depicting the Virgin of Guadalupe was untouched even though the stained glass windows next to it had melted. This, then became the rallying cry for continued efforts to rebuild the sanctuary and its surrounding community and a local artist painted an additional mural of the Blessed Virgin on the outside of the church, thus entering the Santana video.

Well, it's 2011 and the sanctuary still has not been rebuilt. The steeple tower shows broken glass and signs of disrepair. The street in front of the church has been closed off with concrete barriers to keep gangbangers from having easy routes to the arterial streets after a drive-by. The child care center, however, is going strong and they have painted their own mural on the side walls of the historic church. Even in the midst of violence, continuing poverty, and unsuccessful rebuilding projects, grace remains alive in the education of the children. Education and encouragement of communities - isn't that what murals really do?

My tie in with Scott's post is "Smiling Faces".


Nikon D3000
VR 18-200mm F/3.5-5.6
18 mm Focal Length
F/ 18
1/160s
ISO 800

Outstanding once again Dan. I especially love your prose. Thanks so much for joining us Dan and keep up the awesome work!

Scott

Is it coming?

Our latest Wordless Wednesday winner is here tonight. Welcome back to MamaLu.

She's been here before and needs no introduction.

Her thoughts in her words...

That startlingly aqua vehicle got me to thinking... And I thought too hard, and was torn between two shots...

We know that winter is NOT done yet! But we in Chicago (in Illinois, the Midwest) know the premise of spring in color and light amidst our monochromatic winter world.

This is Sox Park (US Cellular Field) just before sunset with its beautiful rosy-golden tones, taken from the city works building just west of the park.

This is the Chicago skyline from the Museum campus by Adler Planetarium taken just after sunset...

When the wind is less gusty I'm going to head back and retake these shots with tripod and with attention to depth of field.


I for one am beyond ready to start seeing signs of spring. This photo gives me hope.

Thanks for joining us Mamalu. Hope to see you again soon.

xoxo,
Brandi

Sweet Home, Chicago - Dan Style

Happy Stupor-Bowl Sunday everyone! I mean Super Bowl Sunday. What was I thinking?! Scott here with the latest WW Wednesday post winner, coming at you live from Chicago with Big Dan, another tried and true friend of 3C1D. Dan has posted before and we're thrilled he's back once more. Here's his shot in his own words:

5:00 A.M.

I wake up to take my wife to work, grab a cup of coffee and immediately snatch my laptop to see what I need to before going out to shoot. As Wordless Wednesday's winner, it's my turn to post.

That Scott is a smarty. Sure, he hits the pink from the previous post. I had already thought of that yesterday and had a great shot of a pink stool that was used to keep dibs on a shoveled out parking space on Chicago's crowded streets. But no, Scot had to do some reading and came up with the idea of shooting through his window to use color and texture to create one of his typical great shots. Great... just great.

Driving through the empty streets toward Rush in yet another snowstorm, the flakes kept melting on my window. Ah, Scot... I have the answer! I drive home like a maniac to get my camera because I know that I have about 20 minutes before the street lights that highlight the water droplets start turning off. My goal? Jim's.

Nikon D3000
VR 18-200mm F/3.5-5.6G
31mm
Manual Focus
F/18
1/10 s
ISO 1600

Jim's is one of the original hot dog stands from Maxwell Street. It originally drew working class immigrants from the city's Near West Side with cheap, tasty food. During the sixties, it became the go to lunch spot for people looking to buy back their stolen hub caps on sale in the Maxwell Street Flea Market just steps away. When I worked nights at Rush, it became my 3 AM lunch break, complete with "salesmen" walking up to me selling porn videos, white gym sox, and designer watches. Yes, I did see huge rats running around. But the rats were always outnumbered by the people, especially on a hot summer's night.

Urban renewal and the southward expansion of the University of Illinois brought the demolition of Maxwell Street and the corner stands that brought joy to so many hot dog lovers. Jim's and one other hot dog stand moved a block east and 3 blocks north and rebuilt. It's not quite the same, but people still line up 24 hours a day to get their fix. You can see it as you drive south on the Dan Ryan, just south of Roosevelt Street. And, if the wind is blowing just right, I can still smell the hot dogs and fried onions as I step out of the doors at Rush, a mile and a half away.

My tie in from Scot's picture? The technique of shooting through something to give texture to the subject. There is kind of a soft focus for both the foreground and subject that is intentional. If I were to frame this picture, it would be small and set in a large frame. I don't want people focusing in on details. I wanted to give the picture a feeling, rather than a clear shot of a Chicago icon. If there is beauty in the city, I think it lies in the memories of the millions of places that become part of the one's life. This picture is not really about Jim's. It's about 3 AM in the heart of Chicago.

Thanks Dan for sharing. And I couldn't agree more about the feeling you've captured. It really does have a 3am in Chicago feel. Excellent work once again!

Sweet Dreams - welcome back Amanda

Evening all! A special night here. Our good friend Amanda is back as a guest. You might remember her previous visits This or this. We love some Amanda. She's a tried and true e-friend to 3C1D.

Before I have her wow you yet again. I need to announce the winner for last weeks slightly different Wordless Wednesday.

Big Dan, you the lucky man, random.org says so. Well, first it said Scott was but I made it try again. :)
My thought in the tie in was love. Sere's hearts and Jay'me doing her labor of love. It was weak but I threw the post together in 5 minutes. Cut me some slack.

Now that that is out of the way. I'll allow you to enjoy what Amanda has to offer. You'll notice she has a new camera and she's really rocking it.

Hold your breath....




Taken with:
Canon Rebel 300D
35-80mm lens at 80mm
1/40
f/5.6
ISO 800
Edited With Photoshop CS3

I have always wondered what he dreams about. I watch him sleep and
wonder. It's pretty crazy to think he is almost 1 year old. I read
Seres' post and immediately thought of M sleeping. I thought I would
share my favorite thing to do. I have MILLIONS of pictures of him
sleeping, but this one might be my favorite. I love the lighting
though the focus could be better. Hope you enjoy looking at M as much
as I do and thanks again for sharing guys!

Oh my! I want to lose my senses and have another baby. So sweet, so innocent, so perfect.
Go check out Amanda's work on her blog

See you soon!

xoxo,
Brandi

Pack me up

Brandi here. I cannot tell you how excited I am to share this photo with you all. RJ is our latest winner from last weeks Wordless Wednesday. As usual, this weeks Talkless Thursday (same thing as Wordless Wednesday but a day late because I suck) is still up for last minute entries. Go put your name in the comments section and join us like RJ has.

RJ, the lucky dog, is joining us from Hawaii. Usually an Illinois resident, he's in Hawaii for a little rest and relaxation. I'm not sure what the weather is like there but I can tell you it sure beats the sure cold weather in Illinois and most of the continental United States.

Here's what the sunned, RJ has to say.

Rj here, happy as can be since I'm sitting in the middle of Waikiki. Ahhh...sunshine, blue waters and Mai Tai's of course.

Well I would like to express my gratitude to 3C1D as they inspired me to start up my own blog (http://all5hz.blogspot.com ). Well done and keep all those great pictures coming.

I'm currently using a Canon Eos Rebel Xti. It was given to me as a gift so I figured I'd better learn how to use it. I've got a long way to go but I'm really enjoying getting out and taking pictures of the world that surrounds me.

So how do I tie in to Scott's wonderful picture of Brandon. Well loosely....very loosely!

Let's see, I used "natural light", it was "converted" by use of my HDR program (Photomatrix)

And to play off the Rrrrr....Matey theme, there are ancient stories of how Shaolin Buddhist monks were called upon to battle Japanese pirates raiding the coastline.

So my picture is of the Byodo In Buddhist Temple on the Windward side of Oahu. It's just a beautiful place that is surrounded by ponds with Koi fish and Black Swans. It also sits at the foot of the Ko'olau mountains. I took 3 pictures at different exposures. Then ran them through the HDR program. You can play with the lighting to your liking. I hope you enjoy it and if you get a chance to get out of the freezing Midwest I highly recommend Hawaii.

Mahalo!

Rj



Stunning! Absolutely stunning. If you all would like to donate some money to send me to Hawaii, I would be eternally grateful. Sere and I were on the Big Island a few years back for Sere's wedding. I have spent much time since then wishing I could return. This photo only makes it worse.

Go over to RJ's blog and check out his other photos, they are pretty awesome as well.

Aloha!
Brandi

Mamalu in the kitchen

It's Sunday and you know what that means....

GUEST PHOTOGRAPHER TIME!

Woohoo!!

Mamalu was the winner of Wordless Wednesday two weeks ago. This weeks Wordless Wednesday winner will be announced by Scott tomorrow. Run over and get your name on the list.

Mamalu on joining us...
Thanks for the opportunity. This is great fun, but soooo easy to get carried away! I pulled out a lot of kitchen “machines” (or would they be tools!) to come up with this.

I use a Sony DSC-V1, a 5-year-old 5.2MP point-and-shoot. It was once top of the line in Sony’s “pro-sumer” line, and it has served me well. One day maybe I’ll move up, but for now, I’m happy with it.

Mamalu on the photo...
"Machine? Or tool? I like both, so here’s my gears for today, and I think I’ll use this one right about now! Enjoy!"

Mamalu (aka Mary Lou Griggs)

Cheers to you Mamalu



Mamalu we don't care if you have a camera phone photo from 2001 to share, with subject matter like this, you can join us anytime!

Superstar!

Our poor Jay'me is having a difficult day. She arrived on my (Brandi) doorstep and said "the kids had games, we ran out gas, had to get towed, the gas gauge is broken and I have nothing to post."
I gave her a giant hug and said "I can take care of that."

My darling "Aunt" Mel sent me the below photo and asked me what my professional opinion was. After I got done laughing (it took days) at the idea of me being a professional I told her I loved it. I've been looking for a time to share it will all of you and the time has finally come.

I have no idea what she took the photo with and I know none of her settings. All I know is I love this photo.
You all have probably figured out I like random abstract pieces of steel, gears and such. It's just the way I am.

Jay'me gives the post her seal of approval and yet neither of us can come with a tie-in. We're going to go with red. Sere's sons jacket and the gear are both red-ish. Weak but it works.

Tomorrow night we get another treat MamaLou will be joining us as last weeks Wordless Wednesday winner. There is still time to put your name in the drawing for this weeks winner. Just click here and leave a comment.

That's all from here kids.

xoxo,
Brandi and Jay'me

Guest Who Has Joined Us?

Hey everyone. Scott here posting the latest guest effort from the recent Wordless Wednesday winner. The winner was Scott (no, not me), known alphanumerically as S4. I'm known as S12, just to clear up any confusion...or perhaps to create some. Anyway, here is S4 in his own words:

This is my first time appearing on the blog and I am excited to participate. I have been "playing" around in the world of photography for the past few years.

My tie in to Brandi's photo is that this is a night shot with a light in the distance.



Nikon d40
ISO 200
Shutter Speed 30 seconds
Aperture f/22.0

The only thing I couldn't figure out from the EXIF file was the lens. It's not really pertinent to this shot however, considering the aperture and long shutter length. I'm thinking there was a tripod involved to allow for such small aperture and long exposure. The focus is sharp and the noise is low, both difficult things to accomplish at night. Well done S4 and thanks so much for joining us.

That's all for now folks. Stay tuned for Sere tomorrow and have a great week!

Scott (S12)

Another photo from the urban correspondant

Hey kids, Brandi here! BigDan won last weeks Wordless Wednesday and he'll be tonight's photographer.
BigDan first visited us here. He came back for more. Silly, silly boy.

Dan always says it best himself so I'll turn things over to him....

Sere's picture made me immediately think of finding a place where Kath and I could have 5, 10, maybe 15 dogs. We absolutely love them. Both of our dogs are special needs dogs and when we went on her web site and found out she had retired breeders, we almost called the realtor. But, as cute as the puppy is, I also thought Christmas.

After mass, I took a couple or twenty beautiful shots of the Nativity Window in our historical landmark Church. It was back lit by the morning light and the central birth scene is gloriously surrounded by hundreds of pieces of glass, all picking up bits of light. The window is two stories high and was originally made in the 1880s. It is truly irreplaceable. On the drive home, I was beginning to compose a paragraph about the progression of various ethnic groups that have made up the congregation in its 150 year history and how the art of the church reflects those changes when we were stopped at Western and Roosevelt by a couple of cops and and a private van blocking the intersection. We pulled into the White Castle parking lot, got out of the car and watched motorcycle after motorcycle after motorcycle parade by in their journey from 83rd Street to Belmont. I was shooting like mad, but pretty soon slowed down and started waving. Within minutes I had tears streaming down my face as Kath and I waved and they honked back. The sound was incredible, almost moving your soul... and then, every once in a while people would laugh as some scooter would putt by. It seems we had run into the annual Toys for Tots Motorcycle Parade.

I am a sucker for acts of kindness. Whether it is God's Son coming to us to teach us about Peace or several hundred motorcyclists riding down Western Avenue to bring toys for kids in need, to me, it is all Christmas.


Nikon D3000
VR 18-200 mm F/3.5-5.6
Focal Length 170 mm
F/10
1/200s
ISO 400

Thank you Dan. Thank you for sharing your story. Thank you for being a wonderful, kind, human being. Thank you for hanging out with us here at 3C1D.
Go check out Dan's blog here. While you're there (or here if you like) wish Dan a Happy Birthday, for today is his special day.

Thanks again, Dan. Come back anytime, we love having you.

Amanda, how much do we love ya?

We are so lucky to have our first repeat guest photographer.
We were first introduced to her here and then she won again last week

In Amanda's words:

I thought I would give a little more detail this time. As you know my name is Amanda and I love photography! I have considered myself a photographer for about 10 years though I have taken breaks. I recently started to edit using Photoshop CS5. My main subject these days is my son, but I am in love with taking landscapes and macros. Ialso crochet and sew when I have the time. I am currently working on newborn props for myself and my aunt who is a great photographer.
Sorry if that rambled... :-)

Didn't ramble at all Amanda. It's so great to get to know you even better. To see more of Amanda you can pop on over to her blog http://querylovephotography.blogspot.com. Go on over and follow her, I do. Oh and this is Brandi in case you didn't know.

Now on to the photo. Here's the story behind the picture:

When I looked at Scott's photo I instantaneously knew what my subject would be. I took a similar photo in high school, though it wasn't as cool as Scot ts, of a glass ball that had a little world with butterflies and green in it. I love that photo, but I didn't want to recreate what I or Scott had done, just use the inspiration. So I got my glass ball that has orange and air bubbles inside it and found some natural light with some cool background to reflect inside the ball and voila! I got what you see here (with a little editing thrown in)!

Thanks again! I really do enjoy your challenge and I find it is very cool that you give your readers a chance to have a go at it.

Canon Powershot A495
Exposure 1/1250
f/4.5
ISO 800

Excellent job Amanda! Gorgeous as always.
I'm already getting excited about how to follow it up.

Scott awarded last Wednesdays wordless winner already. Kevin McQuire you need to give us a shout at 3chicks1dudephoto@gmail.com so we can make proper arrangements. As Amanda would tell you, it's an easy process. We like to share our sandbox so we always play nice.

Thanks again Amanda!!!

Justin in the house! And a winner

Justin was the proud winner of last weeks Wordless Wednesday with Sere. Not to be confused with this weeks Wordless Wednesday with Sere. That lucky winner will be announced down below.

For today's mission though, we've got Justin. Here's a little bit about Justin by Justin.

Everyone else started out with their relationship status, so I might as well do the same. I have been married for about two and a half years, no kids, one cat. I live in my parents' basement (go me!) due to my unrelenting student loan debt and terrible employment luck. All thanks to my wife, Macbook Pro, and XBox 360 for making sure my life doesn't totally suck, or at least that I'm distracted enough to not realize it. I consider myself an amateur filmmaker, though I need to advance from the "awesome idea" stage to the "actually making movies" stage. I appreciate the opportunity to post on here and hope you like it.


And now a little about the picture in Justin's words.

It was such a nice day outside for a softball game so I took my POS camera along to see if anything came to mind. I wanted to get the softball in the same shot as a round sun, but the clouds decided not to cooperate. I am more of a film guy so I liked the way the jet trail gave movement to the shot. So I took a few pictures and decided to just see what I could do with them in post on my NLE system with full 64-bit Photoshop CS4. I have no idea what I'm doing so I just tooled around with standard settings like brightness/contrast and hue/saturation then messed with colors and the like. If I ever get to guest shoot again I'll either make them post a video or I'll steal a nicer camera from someone.


Fujifilm FinePix A820 (only the best)
Settings: I refuse to give out my trade secrets

Justin's tie in is obviously, sports. I (Brandi) love how the last three photos have all been sport related and yet none of them are remotely similar. Thank you Justin for joining us. I think you did a terrific job.

Now on to the business of winning. For this weeks wordless Wednesday we only had three guesses. I took that information and put it into random.org and let them generate the winner. Moving forward all contests will be chosen that way. We certainly don't want to play favorite around here.

True Random Number Generator

Min: 1
Max: 3
Result:
2

The result is comment two. Comment two was Amanda. Congratulations Amanda, you get to come join us again! We're excited to have you back. Just send an email to 3chicks1dudephoto@gmail.com and we'll chat again.

Sere is going to get the week going for us. Hoping the week is fantastic in every way.

Everyone Meet Kristine

We've got our latest Wordless Wednesday winner Kristine joining us. Kristine was the randomly selected winner from Scott's post.

A little about Kristine in her words...
About me
I am married with no children but two cats that we love. Currently living in West Michigan but born and raised in Crystal Lake, Illinois. I have always liked taking pictures but my true passion lies in music. I love to sing and it has given me the chance to go so many places.

A little about the photo in her words...
This is a picture of one of my 6 nieces. This season lends itself to running and jumping into large piles of leaves and Abbie loved it so.
We were thankful that the rain held off so we could have a little fun outside.


And now beautiful Abbie...

Nikon D90
18-105mm VR kit lens
ISO-200
Aperture f/5.6
Shutter 1/125
sb-600 flash

Thank you so much for joining us Kristine! We loved having you and little Abbie is such a gorgeous face to have grace our little blog.
Please come back anytime!

Welcome Myndi!

Clap your hands ladies and gentlemen. Lets give Myndi a warm 3C1D welcome!

Here's a little info on Myndi by Myndi-
I'm married with 3 kids and love my life! I wouldn't say I'm a great photo taker, but hey...I have a camera, and when I think of it, I really like to take photo's.
I'm going to add in that Myndi is 3C1D family. She's actually married to Sere's brother and she's a friend of mine. Weather you're family or a stranger like last weeks winner Amanda, we love equally around here.

Myndi's Inspiration-
This was such a fun experiment! I went out today through our neighborhood and took some pics of what I thought would relate to the Rex in front of all that green. I thought about toys, an animal, like a squirrel just like Brandi thought, anything green, which would be ok...but then I thought about teeth. So, this is what I can up with, the teeth from Rex to the teeth in the Halloween decoration I saw in out neighborhood the evening. I don't photo shop, so this is the pic my camera takes.

And what a great photo it is Myndi. Check it out gang.


Cannon Rebel EOS
aperture f5.6 @ 33mm
shutter speed 1/250 sec
ISO 400

This dude is seriously scary. Thanks so much for joining us Myndi.

Sere's up tomorrow. Can't wait to see where she's going with this!

xoxox,
Brandi

Urban Correspondant - guest photog

Brandi again. Sick of me?
It is such an honor to post today's Wordless Wednesday winner guest spot. The winner from this week is a dear friend of mine. I've been telling him he needed to make a guess so he could join in the fun here. I'm so glad he did.
I think Dan says it best so here he is....

Hi! I'm Dan Kopanke, a lifelong Chicagoan who is passionate about the history of this city and its people. One of my favorite memories from youth is standing in the hallway outside of the cafeteria in the Museum of Science and Industry and looking at the classic pictures from the city's newspapers. I was always intrigued by the stories behind the pictures. Lately, I've been combining stories about the food that I cook, the city, and my own personal journey through life on a blog called www.pilsenearth.blogspot.com . Check it out!

I was tempted to post a picture of the skyline taken from my terrace. The interplay of light and clouds against the dramatic buildings has made for some stunning photos. But I decided to play by the rules and use Amanda's picture as a guide for mine. The connection is "looking up". But looking up means something different in the city. This picture is of a building on Blue Island in Pilsen. What you see are the top three stories of a four story building. As is common in this area, the first story is retail. At the top of the picture you can see some of the decorative cornice and you will also note the stonework above the windows. Pilsen, a very large Hispanic community, was first settled by East Europeans in the 1800s and the buildings had features that reminded the people of their homeland. The chain on the right lower side is from some long gone hanging sign. I have no idea what the pipe coming out of the building on the left side is doing. It may have been some sort of hanger for a sign because you can see what looks like red paint running vertically in that general area.

From 3C1D's "Urban Correspondent", have fun shooting!

Technical Data:
Nikon D3000
Lens Nikkor VR 18-55 mm F/3.5-5.6G
Focal Length 45 mm
Aperture F/5.6
Shutter Speed 1/125s
ISO 125
No editing was done.

Scott's familiar face will be returning tomorrow. Can't wait to see what the extra time has given him to 'cook up'.

Welcome Amanda

Hi Gang! Brandi here. Wanted to introduce you all to Amanda. Amanda was the winner of Wordless Wednesday with Jay'me two weeks ago. She's joining us today as our guest photographer.

Here is a little about Amanda in Amanda's words.

My name is Amanda and I have been interested in photography since high
school. I have a wonderful 8 month old and a husband who can be
wonderful too!! I started my blog in June and have been learning and
growing in my skills since with the help and encouragement of blogs
and challenges like 3 Chicks and A Dude.

The skinny on Amanda's photo in her words -
While I was looking at Jay'me's Friday Faces post I panicked a little.
How in the world was I going to find a link that would work with a
picture I took?! And then have it put up among these great
photographer's work and have it be okay!? Then I took a breath and
headed out with a couple of ideas. I was looking up a lot while
walking with my boy and saw this tree and it spoke to me I guess. The
great part it was a gloomy, moody day and it translated into the
picture. Then in post processing I played up that part. So just to
be clear the link between Jay'me's picture and mine is looking up a
tree!

Thank you for this fun opportunity,
Amanda


Here is what you're really after, Amanda's mesmerizing photo -

Canon Powershot A495
Exposure: 1/50 sec
Aperture: f/3.0
Focal Length: 6.6 mm
ISO: 800


After you've posted a comment here telling us your thoughts or feelings on this photo head on over to Amanda's Blog and give her some 3C1D love. She's got some great work over there.

To keep pace on a fantastic weekend we're going to have Dan with another guest photo tomorrow. Sah-weet!

2 for 1

It's a special week here on 3C1D. We get to have not 1 but 2 guest photographers.

*^($( Happy Dance(*^#_*&

You met Amy on Sunday and now we get to introduce you to Allison.
Alli won Wordless Wednesday two weeks ago.
Sorry it took us so long to have you with us Alli. We're glad you're here.

Allison is not a photographer or even an aspiring photographer, that I know of. She's a great friend that loves and supports our blog and guessed correctly. Being the super champ she is she took her point and shoot camera out and took this photo to share with us.



Here's what Allison wrote in her own words...
my camera...sucks
my idea...capture nature's sepia early in the morning
my other idea...corn rows where the light is just hitting the tops
my talent...none
my opportunity...fun!

Alli, thanks for playing with us. More importantly thanks for supporting us. This blog is not just for aspiring photographers it's for anyone that likes to look at life through the lens of another person.
I think Allison did a beautiful job of capturing exactly what she set out to get, which contradicts her no talent claim.
She graciously provided us with two photos but I'm a stickler for rules, so I picked my favorite. Aren't I lucky that I got to see both. I just loved that I could feel the crispness in the fall air in this photo. It speaks to my midwest soul.

Jay'me will be stepping up for Wordless Wednesday tomorrow. Let this post and Amy's post inspire all of you to join in the guessing. Wouldn't you just love to see your photo here too?

XOXO,
Brandi

Welcome Amy!

Everyone give Amy a warm 3C1D welcome.
Amy is the latest winner of the Wordless Wednesday contest. She made a correct guess on Sere's post here.

A little about Amy by Amy -
A mom of 2, massage therapist, and a person stumbling into mindful living through yoga, qigong, and mediation. I love to read, bake, and now take photos (mostly of my children and whatever catches my eye).


Canon EOS Digital Rebel XSi
18-55mm 3.5-5.6
1/200s
f5.6
ISO 200

About the photo - in Amy's words
I added some fill light and saturated the photo to draw out the red in the train. I also tried this photo without flash first and then this one has flash to capture the end of the train. I had a fun day of playing with my camera downtown as I am extremely new to photography. I am currently in a digital photography class and it's only week 2. Prior to that I only used my automatic setting on my Canon Rebel. It is nice to be able to control your photo as I learn how to utilize my camera more.Thank you for allowing me to guest post - it forced me to go out and play with my camera more. This is the train I took home after my adventure came to an end.

Amy, I (Brandi) speak for all the chicks and the dude when I tell you GREAT JOB! Keep going in photography, you have a great eye for composition and we look forward to having you join us again in the future.

Another fantastic day, another beautiful picture to inspire your soul. Live big!

Sere is going to start off the work week with something fabulous, I'm sure.

Poison

In the immortal words of Brett Michaels from Poison circa 1989

Every rose has it's thorn,
just like every night has it's dawn
just like every cowboy sings a sad, sad song.

I fully understand why all of you from my generation hate me now. I accept it.


Nikon d40
18-55mm 3.5-5.6
ISO 200
f5.6
1/320sec @50mm

Seeing Scott challenge himself to do a shot he's long wanted to attain pushed me over the edge to finally get this picture. I've made quite a few attempts at this photo. It's a difficult shot to get without a macro lens and it certainly would be sharper if it was a macro lens but, some days we just have to work with what we're given.
I set up some tripod lighting, created the most ridiculous set up, using things I had around my house (like my favorite black skirt) and camped out on my bedroom floor for the better part of an hour. Taking shot after shot making adjust after adjustment. On something like this where the smallest movement in light position effects everything I had to be careful.
I would love to hear from some of the macro "professionals" following our blog for some tips for improvement. I'm always open to some constructive criticism, can't get better without it.

I am happy to report though, that at the end of my hour I had several pictures to choose from that I would happily post and have connected to my name. This, my friends, is a successful mission.


******
In other blog news - Amy, the proud winner of last weeks Wordless Wednesday will be joining us for her guest post tomorrow. Can't wait to "meet" her.

Additionally, with Jay'me's absence we never announced the winner from Wordless Wednesday two weeks ago. Congratulations Allison! We'll be sure to keep you posted on when Allison will be joining us for her guest feature.

If both you girls could kindly send an email to 3chicks1dudephoto@gmail.com to get further instructions that would be wonderful. I promise the entire guest photographer process is super easy and I'll make it as painless as possible.

Looking forward to the new faces. Stop in to see what Amy gives us tomorrow and then Sere will start off the work week on Monday.

xoxo
Brandi