O.T. There was a little friend at my door this morning...

[Ray]

[url]http://www.pbase.com/carbone/squirel[/url]

Ray
P.S. Those are rather large files.

[JodiFrye]

Ray, I would say that last one is a keeper ! Superb !

p.s. you weren't kidding when you said ' rather large files '..I guess ;)

[Beth Haney]

Cool! A boyfriend for our "Chuck"! We have a very spoiled Eastern Gray that is convinced she's a member of the household - the ruling member to be exact.

[Ray]

Beth, "she" (btw, how can you tell if it's a he or she ?) was here only for a few minutes but
already was feeling at home. I think we're gonna see her again soon :-)

Ray
"Beth Haney" <member@adobeforums.com> a écrit dans le message de news:2ccd7e02.1@webx.la2eafNXanI...

> Cool! A boyfriend for our "Chuck"! We have a very spoiled Eastern Gray that is convinced she's a

member of the household - the ruling member to be exact.

[Ray]

It's already been put in a frame! :-)

[Ray]

Sorry for the quote Beth... my friend was talking to me when I hit the enter key before removing the
header and body... (can't run and chew gum at the same time!)

[Chuck Snyder]

Ray, a lot of folks here in Texas also like to shoot squirrels.....but,
alas, not with cameras...

[Ray]

Chuck... was it really necessary to talk about how to cook a chicken brochette without chicken ? ;-)
I know these little animals are not always welcome because they do more damage than anything else.

[Mike O'Sullivan]

I was worried. I read this as "rather large flies" till I clicked on the file.

Phew!

[Ray]

Mike, for some people, 2~3Mb translates into 4 minutes download time... I didn't want to get my head
cut ;-)

[Leen Koper]

I'm glad I'm on cable; it took me just only a few seconds to load.

Ray, I love the one with the overhanging leaf. The image is nicely backlit; this separates the squirrel from the background.

But nevertheless now you have got a hell of a job ahead. ;-)

Taking the risk I might seem to be someone who is always commenting on somebody elses images, but I think there is a lot more in the image than we see now. The fence is rather distracting. You can blur it, but if you are able to select this squirrel ;-), blur the background and tone it to a darker colour, preferably an out of focus mixture of colours like browns, greens and yellows; then this image will be absolutely perfect.
If you think this is too much fuzz, have Grant put it up for the Challenge; maybe someone else will do it for you..;-)
I can hardly wait to see what our Jodi is capable of.

BTW, that 10D does a good job in focussing, as this is a rather difficult subject to focus on.

Leen

[Ray]

How the h... am I suppose to select the background with every Squirel hair running in every
direction? ;-)

Thanks for the suggestion, Leen, but this is only a casual picture, nothing more. One of Life's
instant joyfull moment. I usually don't spend time on these pictures (I got several of them,
perhaps I should..?). But, I did send it to Grant this morning. If it gets picked up, this would
be my 5th challenge submission! I'll become the official "supplier" of the Challenge ;-)

That makes me wonder.. am I taking so bad pictures that they make perfect candidate for fixing..?
Lol (just kidding)

Ray

[Leen Koper]

Ray, you are letting me down.
I'm spreading the word that in Canada lives a genuine bilingual photoshop artist, desperately in need of a new Mac "ordinateur", and now you, with all your talents and motivation, you are telling me you cannot make a selection of just only a common grey squirrel?
;-)

Leen

[Ray]

Huhmm... Let me rephrase... I'm still unsure what tool(s) would help me the best amongst those :

- Ask a friend
- Use a real pair of cisors
- Call the squirel again, and have someone standing near the fence with a black cardboard

:-)

Seriously, I will probably be able to do it with Photoshop's extract command (not available in PSE).
I'll give it a try later this week, if time permits. I'm currently enrolled in two classes
(Photography and Bryce 5). The later taking all the time I can spare.

Btw, you're right about the picture (as if I needed a proof..!) because on the Canon 10D board,
someone suggested EXACTLY the same things as you did (blur the background, get rid of the fence).

Ray

[JodiFrye]

I don't know, i'm thinking that image looks darn good the way you took it. We shouldn't always feel that we have to 'fix' our images. Playboy does enough of that for the rest of the world....and then some. It was a quiet Sunday morning in Montreal. A squirrel came for a visit. He sat on my doorstep. It was a pleasure to take pictures of him. No work to bother the soul. Just a friend to share my peace....

....not... "and then i put him in Photoshop because he just wasn't perfect enough "....sorry, my opinion.

[Chuck Snyder]

Jodi, that's one of the real joys of digital photography and PS - you CAN
fix it if you want, any way you want. But if you want to leave it
alone...you can do that too. Near-total artistic freedom - what could be
better?!

:-)

Chuck

[JodiFrye]

Chuck, yes of course but Ray already said he printed it. He should feel proud.

[Chuck Snyder]

Jodi, I agree!

p.s. please say hello to Milo for me!

[Lynn D. Green]

Well put Jodi.........hard to improve on that one in my book.........just because we "can" does not always mean we "should"........

Lynn