Just some Halloween Fun for today.
You may not celebrate Halloween but I sometimes love to just have a bit of fun with it.
It is always an occasion to edit photos and have some fun with imagination.
Here is a neighbor's cat from a few years ago:
Well this weekend I thought it would be fun to use some makeup and entertain the neighbor kids.
A bit of makeup, a skunk hat, a wig, and a cape.
I set up the tripod in our yard and thought it would be fun for the kids to come and trick or treat. We live way out in the country and have never had anyone trick or treat.
I arranged a time for the neighbors to come down and enjoy some time.
And they did!
We had such a good time!
After we had our fun, I saddled up Siera and we went for a ride.
I did trade the skunk hat for my helmet and off we went.
Sorry at this time, no photo of me and my mule with my flowing cape as we cruised the woods and the trails.
She was rather unconcerned about the wig, makeup, and cape.
Siera was even ho-hum when the 'new' neighbor's dogs came out and barked and carried on.
The weather was beautiful and the day was fun.
Whatever you do today, just enjoy it.
And Still Life...
I'm trying to set myself up in the spare room that used to be our mess called a bedroom.
The room itself needs to have most of the corners re-taped and spackled AND the both rooms need painting to freshen them up.
However winter will come and I am sooo tired of remodeling. So it will wait until spring.
Right now I am setting up my own space for some Still Life work and actually going to build a light box along with getting a light. More on that when I investigate the light I am thinking about.
Still Life can be done anywhere. Outdoors, indoors, on the floor on a chunk of wood, the porch, anywhere you can think of.
The photo above was done when the zinnias were still in bloom and I had found a little vase that my youngest boy had gotten me many years ago.
The final photo with a 50mm lens was this:
I then moved into our future bedroom and used the neat floor pattern to take this shot.
I loved the floor color and texture and didn't worry about the rule of thirds. I just did what felt right.
So now I'd like to move into an area where I can leave things set up and 'play' with lighting and setting things up.
Viola!
The new Creative Room of Wonders.
I'm pretty excited about this.
A place I can use and not have to clean it up from the living room or kitchen floor.
How neat is that?
Other still life stuff:
I am looking forward to having some fun when the temps drop and snows are whipping along outside.
I asked my husband if he'd like to go for a ride. He didn't answer right away.
We'd gone to the creek and back early in the morning and he'd come up the steep ridge road and was surprised in some ways that it wasn't as hard to do as it was this spring. I pointed that out to him.
Last year he had throat cancer. He'd had a stroke which affected his balance and he was sure he would never hike or ride a mule again.
I asked him again. "Want me to catch up Fred? And we could go for a little ride?"
"Okay."
Well I didn't need to wait around. I went out with two lead ropes and caught up Fred and Siera.
Siera came trotting up to the gate.
"Oh look, you came when the sun did another cycle!"
I smiled and let her drop her head into the halter. Fred pushed past me into the catch pen.
"Fred is grumpy, you haven't taken him out for a while."
I caught them up and led them to the horse/mule trailer. I removed some burrs from both Fred and Siera's tails and Rich came. Siera stiffened and stepped back.
"I don't like him. Make him go away. He isn't riding me, is he?"
Fred glanced over. "Nah, he wouldn't ride you, you are a female ditz."
Siera has never really taken a shine to Rich, maybe it is his deep voice or sometimes a bit harsh attitude when his mule won't do what he/she is supposed to do.
We saddled up and took off through the woods. We came out on the cropland at Peterson's. All the corn was off the fields.
Siera could now see the Big Scary Machinery. It wasn't so scary now. In fact it was silent.
We rode across the fields just chatting and enjoying our time out. Rich looked content and so did Fred.
Siera came to a halt and locked legs.
She turned her head and pointed with her ears.
"I see it I see it. Human sneaking along the woods!"
And darned if she wasn't right. There was a bow hunter walking along the edge of the crop land. He blended in so well that if she hadn't pointed him out I wouldn't have seen him.
We moved on down to the creek. Rich hadn't seen the damage the flood had caused in the valley. I don't know why we call it damage when there was nothing there anyway. Mother Nature re-arranged things that's all.
I showed him where I crossed the creek yesterday and Rich just shrugged and said he'd like to go back home.
We used to go on very long rides. But seeing that is was Rich's second ride this year, I said nothing and simply enjoyed that fact that he was riding.
I asked him how it felt. And he replied "Good."
And Siera seemed quite a bit more calm with Fred along. She relaxed and rode quietly with her ears bobbing out sideways but flickering around.
We rode down the road towards home. I chuckled when Siera picked up the pace and I asked her to slow down.
Rich asked me what I was laughing about.
I said. "I think I have it figured out. I had Cheyanne the flighty half Arab horse who freaked at everything in the world.
Then I had Badger who was Mr. Laid Back Nothing Will Bother Me.
Then I rode Opal who was like riding a mule on Speed with Attitude, who also could swap personalities and ride like Mrs. Laid Back.
I've ridden Fred who is Mr. Chilled Out most of the time.
Now I am riding Siera who is like the Super Calm Mule who has a split personality. She is a mix of Badger, Opal, and Cheyanne the major Ditz.
She is split between calm, and pissy. Calm and angry, loving and irritable. I can now say that I have stopped comparing Siera to Badger and realize that she is her own mule."
Rich shrugged. "The Split Personality Thing works well for Siera. After all..." Rich grinned at me, "...she is a female!"
We let the mules go and both Fred and Siera stood near us for a while before turning back to their pasture and walking away.
It was a good day. The sun was low in the horizon, the temperatures were decent and we had gone riding together.
I can't think of a better way to end our day.
Oh yes. Siera did drop her head and stare at me as if to say.
"Tomorrow when the sun cycles?"
I smiled.
I went to get Siera and take a nice little ride before my husband and I tackled moving our bedroom from upstairs to downstairs.
Mica was near the gate and Fred was down in the apple trees. I didn't see Siera anywhere.
So I called out.
From behind some brush some long ears appeared. She seemed to tilt her head and think about it for a moment.
Next thing I knew, she was loping towards me. Odd. Siera is pretty lazy and she is gaited so she rarely lopes unless there is a reason.
She stopped at the gate and turned her head to me.
You came! You came!
I showed her the halter and the lead rope. She stood still while I put it on her. Fred came walking up and tried to push his way in. Siera dropped her ears and bobbed her head.
Fred backed off.
Mine, mine. My person. Go away.
Silly mule. I was happy to see that she hadn't gotten full of burdocks again and in no time at all we were saddled and headed up the driveway.
Heavy shots rang out not far away from our mailbox. Siera tilted her ears towards the noise and kept walking.
I heard a combines to the west and I thought I heard them to the east too on Peterson's.
Well, that would stink as I wanted to ride down the camp road to the creek.
I dismounted Siera in the hay field on the ridge and decided to check out her saddle cinch and think about things for a moment.
You may notice that Siera is wearing what may appear to be a 'necklace'. It serves more than one purpose. When we are riding solo, it is nice to have a little bell to keep deer from leaping out of the corn in front of us. I used to have that occur on Opal. The result was an airborn 180 degree leap. Opal, Badger, Sunshine, and Fred rarely startled but when they did it was a real quick reaction.
The bell also provides a rather pleasant noise. I used bells on my old mare Cheyanne and found that they distracted her from traffic noise when I rode her on the roadsides in Kenosha.
Siera on the other hand generally freezes when she is startled.
Siera took the opportunity of the equipment check to see if the field contained any good food.
Yummy! Good! Let's just stay here!
I remounted and we headed up the field and out towards 'PeeWee's' ridge so I could see if they were indeed combining the cropland.
And they were. And now that we were on the driveway it seemed the combine, tractor, and a truck were headed our way.
The shots behind us kept ringing out. I knew it bothered me more than it bothered Siera.
Monster. Monster. Monster Alert.
I moved Siera into a field and close enough to the road to get a good look at the equipment, but not too close as to cause her to freak out. One thing she dislikes is machinery.
Her ears perked forward and she stiffened up hard as a rock as the huge truck and hoppers came by. The jake brake rattled and rumbled. When the driver saw us in the field he eased up.
I want to bite it. Let me bite it.
One of Siera's reactions to scary machinery is to want to chase it. However I had her stand still. I could see that one of the combines was headed our way.
Siera stiffened again locking her hooves into the dirt below her. I don't think a logging truck could have moved her.
After all the machinery passed, we settled into a nice pace. Siera's long paso llano strides ate up the ground and we were soon on the trail into the woods.
Siera kept her ears perked for any disturbances in the woods. She did come to a halt and stared intently at the brush. A doe walked out, saw us and bounded back into the woods.
We headed down to the creek. The crossing was ruined in the last flood so Siera and I found another way around it.
Siera has moved into another phase. She trusted me enough to go through the mud sucking creek.
This creek will eat me. The mud will eat me.
"No Siera it is fine. It won't eat you. Honest. It will be fine. Trust me."
We messed around for a bit then headed back towards home.
I stopped in the combined section of the corn field. Siera found some goodies.
And it was all good.
We had a great ride.
I let Siera go at the gate and she stood next to me.
Are you coming after the sun makes another round? Are you coming back? We can chase machinery monsters if you like.
I rubbed her ears. "Soon."
OH I know ... I know!
I ranted about editing just a bit ago, saying take that shot, make it perfect, be...a true perfectionist.
However.
Here is a sample of a before [above] and after editing [below]. I used a graduated filter in PaintShopProX7 to give the sky a bit more of a punch and the water a bit more blue.
The shot below is what is looked like to me in my mind's eye.
I like to change things up and sometimes when I take a fall or winter photo all the colors just seem wrong.
What I see in my eyes is not what the camera shows me no matter how hard I work at it.
For example, I was out in the pasture the two days ago and the lighting was subdued but the colors were absolutely brilliant.
There is not much difference between the Original here and the edit. Just enough added warmth added in Viveza 2, from the Nik Collection. [The Nik Collection is free for download now as they are not developing it any further.]
More of a difference here. The yellows are more defined without the saturation becoming too offensive. This is more how my 'eyes' saw it. However, my camera is set to 'natural' and doesn't 'up' the saturation. There are settings on most cameras that allow you to take jpegs on a more colorful setting.
Here is two of our elderly donkeys. On the left is Princess and on the right is Emma.
I took this shot into ON1, a program that is now my favorite.
I took a bit of liberty with how I wanted this image to brighten up.
And then there was Julie...she was kind enough to pose again.
I thought the clouds and the skies were fantastic and needed to be brought out in the photo.
For this edit, I used PaintShopProX7 and Topaz Adjust 5. I edited the sky and the foreground separately.
And then one more edit. Julie's colors seem dim in this shot now. So I went back and did a bit of dodging on her body...
I do edit. I like to keep it somewhat realistic unless I am going for something completely odd and fun.
There you go. Fall color edits with donkeys as my star models.
Siera was positive that the Round Hay Bales were dangerous.
So sure in fact that when her rider asked her to step up to them....
She had to bite them. After all, a good bite would ensure that the bale did not move nor attack her or her rider.
As they moved down towards the neighbor's farm, Siera decided to 'SneakyDoodle' past the offensive culvert that she knew lurked under the gravel road.
After dealing with the Hay Bales that she knew hid Mule Monsters of which her rider was not aware of, she came upon the pen of goats.
Surely if she ignored the goats they would not bother her.
Her rider assured her that they were penned up and wouldn't present a problem.
Siera knew otherwise.
Goats were sneaky.
Goats were creative.
However she eventually faced them and walked right by them.
Since the remodel, we have removed the outside thermometer from it's old place on the old kitchen window.
When I woke up on Friday, I saw white across the yard and across the meadows. The night before was supposed to have a hard freeze, but this looked as if we'd really gotten cold!
I love the frost patterns that can be found in the yard.
Sometimes I wonder if the frost photos aren't just a bit more dramatic in black and white and not color?
All I know is that fall is so fleeting and so full of photographic opportunities that I wish there was more time to spend exploring.
I walked up to the ridge and was slightly surprised not to see any frost. But the sun had already been shining for a little while. The autumn air was heavy with a haze and the trees were absolutely brilliant in the morning light.
I love these moments and wish I could hang on to them forever.
I went out to catch up Siera. I merely opened the gate and then wandered out into the pasture.
It only took her a few minutes to notice me. And when she did she walked right up to me. I turned and walked towards the catch pen. She nosed the halter and lead rope.
You came! You promised! You're here!
Oh Siera I did come.
I gave her a huge hug around the neck. Then I backed off as Mica and Fred came on the trot.
I opened the pen and let everyone in. I looked at the big gob of massed twisted burrs and hair that was Mica's tail and decided it would be a good idea to clean her tail.
My hour or so of riding time would be better spent cleaning up mules.
I haltered her and then led her out of the pasture.
Siera stared hard at me.
Her? You choose her? Over me?
It didn't last long, she found some long grass in the pen and started to eat. A mule's heart is truly in their appetite.
I used scissors to remove the burrs stuck in Mica's mane and then proceeded to 'roach' her mane. I didn't do as good a job as a pair of electric clippers, but it looked better without gobs of burdock in it.
I worked and worked on her tail. Mica stomped and moved about. She was tolerating the work, but not happy about being tied to a tree while there was so much fresh looking grass just for the grazing around her.
The hair mass was just nasty. Since Mica has never had a long flowing tail, I decided just to cut it and let it regrow.
When I was done with her, I got Fred out. Siera nickered and then resumed eating.
Gotta love Fred. His biggest concern was: "Don't separate me from my Girls!"
I managed to keep his tail intact only cutting out some twisted knots.
Apparently with our remodel, we'd forgotten to mow the pastures and knock down the burdock plants.
I'll be fighting burdock in the Merry Meadow from now until hunting season.
Sigh.
However, everyone got some time on a lead line and had some grazing outside of the pasture.
As Siera told me.
The Grass is Always Greener on the Other Side of the Fence.
Yes Siera, I happen to agree with you.
See you tomorrow?
Unless it is raining.
No, I'll see you tomorrow.
Sometimes mules can be so demanding.
However any time spent with a mule is more satisfying that most anything else I can think of.
