The 365 Project: Week Two

I've been keeping pace with taking a photo a day so far.  This week's Picaboo theme was transportation and the challenge was to use manual settings.  I'm not one who ever has her camera in the blah and boring auto setting but I haven't messed too much with the full out manual mode either.  I usually prefer Program mode on my Canon so I can adjust the ISO, color, and macro settings.  For the challenge I played with the aperture priority (Av) and shutter speed settings and got a cool shot with the ceramic owl beads.  They basically let you play with the lighting and focus of your subject.  I picked a medium value that put the most focus on the first bead without completely blurring out the rest and had generous lighting.  I'm glad I played around with it since knowing how to mess with it can land me some cool shots for my Etsy photos!

Ok enough camera talk!  It was cold and snowy so I didn't get too many "transportation" shots like I wanted.  I had this whole plan of going some old train tracks I know of and getting a cool black and white shot of the snow just barely covering the tracks.  However with my husband's truck in the shop and him using the Jeep for work (and he works 13 hours a day) and getting dumped with snow it just didn't happen!  Perhaps when hubby's truck is back from the shop I can get my shot :)

I did however get some interesting pictures for this week!  I was irritating our tail-less cat Sasha with some close ups and got this great stoic pose moments before she decided enough was enough.  Then Kaylie and I were watching the cardinals outside when this very pretty male pheasant popped out under the trees for a quick meal under the bird feeders!  I was afraid I'd scare him away so I took the shot through the dirty window but he's pretty nonetheless!   Then I got a nice shot of a bright red cardinal and had fun giving the photo a retro look just for the heck of it!

I'm excited to see what they will announce next week's theme to be tomorrow!  If you're interested in starting The 365 Project yourself, it's not too late!  Check out Picaboo's blog if you want to follow their themes and challenges, it really is fun!  You can also see my photos from last week if you missed them!