I am working on a photography project for my soon to be completed main bathroom. I want to do a gallery grouping of black and white pictures and have decided to use downtown Kansas City as the theme. I took several downtown pictures last fall when I was taking a photography class, but I really have been wanting to take pictures of the Kaufman Center for the Performing Arts. Since I am a bachelorette this week (DG is at the Sturgis Rally) I went on adventure this evening and took pictures just as the sun was setting. Here are the color versions of the two I like the best.
When I got home I started looking at a few of the other downtown photos I have and started trying to select the other pictures I wanted to use. I found one I had taken at the Richard Berkley Riverfront Park that I thought would look good in B&W, except there is a sign that really distracts from the composition. Here is the original.
I decided to try some Photoshop magic and see if I could remove the sign. I have to say that Photoshop is one of the hardest software packages I have ever tried to use. It has SOOOO many features which for me just adds to the complexity. After about 8 months of playing with it, I am finally making progress with its tools. Here is the photo after removing the sign.
So do you think this cheating? Before I started using Photoshop I must admit that I had a tendency think this was cheating. I read some thoughts once on digital photo editing by Rod Hanna, a professional photographer, who embraces post processing by explaining it as no different than the tricks that were used in the developing room many years ago. So I decided that if it is good enough for someone who has made his living from photography for fifty years, surely it is good enough for the likes of me who needs all the photography help she can get. Besides that, it is just so darn much fun to play with pictures in Photoshop.
By the way, here is the B&W version of the picture above.
