sneak peak behind the camera

alright here is a peak behind my lens.  The picture of Kenzie that i got yesterday wasn't exactly one that I had time to focus on and compose correctly since Xander was about to walk into our neighbors yard and Kenzie only looks at me for about .126937309 seconds.  I snapped the photo right as she looked at me and it captured her eyes in their gorgeousness well enough, but it just wasn't quite what i wanted.  So here is a before and after edits.

I cropped to the rule of thirds to focus on her eyes.  Then I upped the exposure a little.  I tinted the grass behind her with some slight orange and brightened it up so it sorta faded into the background.  After that I exposed the entire photo slightly more and brought up Kenzie's skin tone so that her skin wasn't washed out.  Then I tinted everything with a light red to give it the ethereal feel.  Once that was done i fixed the focus onto her face and blurred everything else ever so slightly.  So hopefully the pic doesn't look over editted, but there is definitely some work behind the scenes. I normally try to do more of this before I even take the photo but with these two movers and scooters, who has time!? 

:::sigh:::

I haven't taken any really GOOD pictures of my children in a while.  This was brought even more to my attention by my dad...I know i know....you come here to see the kids.  LOL.  So i decided ok, i can do this...no problem.  With Alexander walking now i figured it would be easy to get a few cute shots of him and his sister without having to pull grass and leaves out of his hands.  I was wrong.  I was very very wrong.  With walking being so new to Xander he has to explore anything and everything.  It's like the boy has never been outside of the living room and thus he must explore everything like it's a newly discovered planet.  This child...i swear he is going to give me a run for my money.  Kenzie as usual never looks at the camera.  She will smile and say cheese and look up, down, left, right, but NEVER at me.  When she does...it's a fluke.  So needless to say the session was a major FAIL. 

MOM! LOOK AT THIS NEW AND FASCINATING CREATURE THAT I HAVE NEVER SEEN EVERY DAY BEFORE!  IT IS ABSOLUTELY AMAZING AND THUS I MUST EXPLORE FURTHER!!!

I did get one good one of Kenz.  So until I can have someone on 'posing' duty and I can just snap pictures...this is the best I could do.

a neat cheat sheet

that's some impressive rhyming huh?
For anyone just starting out and trying to learn their camera...i thought this was a neat little cheat sheet to look and learn from...