Scott[o]Smith’s Digital World

2007 was a first of many things for me. It’s been a great year, here are a few highlights.

• Converted from Windows to a Mac.
• January - Created a Pro Flickr account.
• July - Registered www.scottosmith.com
• October - Scott [o] Smith’s Digital World was born.
  • 66 Blog Posts.
  • 2500 Views.
  • 20 comments.
• 12,423 - Photos taken.
• 28 - Gigabytes of photos.
• 5 - Photowalks
• Made many new friends that are amazing photographers.

I’m looking forward to ‘08 and sharing it with all of you.

Canon XTi * Canon EF-24-105mm f/4.0 lens * ISO 100 * 1/500 second * f/4.0

On my drive around Antelope Island State Park the other day this shack caught my eye. I probably wouldn’t have given it much thought if the snow wasn’t stuck to the side of the building. The night before we had a pretty good snow storm and by examining the photo you can tell that the the snow was horizontal for a while. The wind was still blowing when I took this photo and was drifting around the shack and on the road. It was certainly a day for taking pictures from the car. On my drive I saw quite a few jackrabbits, bison, hawks and a coyote. Antelope Island is a quick ten minute drive from my house and provides something new for me to photograph each time I visit.

Canon XTi * Canon EF-24-105mm f/4.0 lens * ISO 100 * 1/1250 second * f/4.0

Today’s shot was taken at Jensen Park in Syracuse Utah. The mountains in Northern Utah have received many feet of snow this past week. The Wasatch Mountains provide a great backdrop this time of year.

Canon XTi * Canon EF-24-105mm f/4.0 lens * ISO 100 * 1/80 Second * f/4.0

From one of my favorite childhood movies, Rudolph the Red-Nosed Reindeer. I have a few ornaments on our family Christmas tree that are considered mine and this little guy is one of them.

Canon XTi * Canon EF-50MM f1.8 lens * ISO 100 * 1/80 Second * f/1.8

We were fortunate to have a white Christmas this year in Utah. Wishing you and your family a merry Christmas and a safe holiday.

Canon XTi * Canon EF-24-105mm f/4.0 lens * ISO 100 * 0.4 second * f/4.0

All the presents are wrapped and under the tree. What a great time of year to be alive and to be surrounded with great friends and family.

Canon XTi * Canon EF-24-105mm f/4.0 lens * ISO 200 * 1/60 second * f/4.0

For about a year now I’ve used Photoshop Lightroom and have been impressed with what it has to offer. I’ve had a few occasions where Lightroom wasn’t able to “fix” a photo the way I wanted it so I decided it was time to purchase Photoshop CS3.

The day after I purchased CS3 I stopped by my local bookstore and picked up a copy of Scott Kelby’s book: 7-Point System for Adobe Photoshop CS3. I’m a big fan of Scott’s and really enjoy his books and podcasts. I’m only into it a few chapters and have all ready put it to use.

While visiting family in Idaho last weekend, I made a stop at the Mormon temple in Rexburg. After walking around in the freezing weather thinking I got some great shots I was disappointed when I viewed them on my macbook. My delima: the steeple was way to dark and any attempt to fix it in Lightroom was not successful. Bumping up the exposure to lighten the steeple would wash out the main building and any attempt to corrected the exposure for the main building would leave the steeple too dark.

I put one of Scott’s 7 points tips to use: Painting with Light. He says: “Painting with light is the ability to control the light in your image, it fixes exposure problems and brings out the detail in ares that would have been lost… putting light right where you want it, but in a much better way than simply dodging and burning”.

Using Smart Objects Layers and “Painting with Light” I was able to keep the main building exposed correctly and also have the steeple match the rest of the building. This book isn’t the one and only for Photoshop but it gives you a glimpse into what Scott’s workflow is and how he is able to produce some amazing shots.

Canon XTi * Canon EF-24-105mm f/4.0L lens * ISO 100 * 4 seconds * f/8.0