…and hopefully they don’t scare too many people off.

I have always had a desire to “play around” with photography. Now that I have purchased my Nikon D80, I have begun to take my first steps. My first jump into photography was taking High Dynamic Range (HDR) images. This is a process where multiple images (at different exposures) are combined to really show off details. There are two schools of thought on this type of photography: the first being those who like to show off details in a more realistic manner as can be seen with the naked eye (but which normally don’t show up in pictures) and the second being those who like to force images to be very artistic (almost with a halo effect around trees or even watercolor-esque). The first photo below is an example on Flickr from Artie which shows the detailed version type. The second photo is also by Artie on Flickr showing the more “artsy” approach.

Unfortunately, until I can afford to buy the program necessary to process the photos, I have to switch to another type of photo. The latest I thought I would like to get in is called tilt/shift photos. Normally this requires a special lens to either tilt or shift the lens to produce different effects (hence the name). But once again, cost is very prohibitive. The cost of the lens ranges from $1,000 to over $2,500, so we would call that quits, right? Nope! You can duplicate the method by using a photo editing program, so here is the grand unveiling of my first fake tilt/shift photo!

Tomorrow, I’ll give you installment two on my grand scheme of photography!