wild and free: June 2011

30 June 2011

giveaway winners!

Sorry it took so long for me to post this! To be honest, I kinda forgot about the giveaway altogether. ;)

Without further ado, the winners!

Winner of the 10$ Shop Credit to iloveitall is:

comment number 55;

Winner of the popsicle earrings in your choice of colour from ArtbyAshLigon is:

comment number 3;

Winner of a print of your choice from pixelcloud is:

comment number 9;

Winner of this beautiful bracelet from Rachel is:

comment number 33;

Winner of the 10$ store credit to Carissa Black bags and accesories is:

comment number 39;

Congrats Winners! Please email me as soon as possible to claim your prize! Thanks to all who entered!

On another note, I apologize for the some-what boring posts lately. I've been in both a photography & blogging funk for awhile. Tomorrow I leave on vacation for 10 days. I have interviews with some of my favourite bloggers, so look out for those! It's not that I don't want to post, because I really do, but I don't want to be spending my entire vacation on the computer. I'll still be reading others posts and commenting, so I'm not disappearing completely! Hopefully when I get back I'll feel renewed and creative!

See you soon!

-Hope

29 June 2011

little somethings photo challenge | june favourite

**Don't forget to enter my 50 followers giveaway!**

Along with Click It Up a Notch's photography contest, Little Somethings is also having a June Favourite themed challenge this week! :)

This picture has been posted in blog world a total of 4 times since Saturday, but man it's my favourite!

before & afters

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A couple of days ago I was searching online for free editing software's and found Gimp. I had already learnt to use gimp in grade 8 so it wasn't all that hard to figure it out. Not only is Gimp easy to use, but it's also free and it can do almost anything that Photoshop can!

Before now I have never edited my pictures, but I've decided to start editing my portrait pictures to make them look a little better! :) Since I haven't picked up my camera much other than for my 365, I thought I'd share some before and afters of the edits I've done on my cousins grad pictures! :)

All I really do is crop the picture to my liking, adjust the brightness and contrast and boost the eyes if they're visible. It's really simple, yet makes all the difference in the world! :)

I do all the cropping with Windows Live Photo Gallery, which came with my computer, then upload them into Gimp, do the edit, then save it as a copy. After I'm done editing them all, I save them onto my hard-drive and convert all of the already edited pictures that are still on my computer to black and white using the same thing I use to crop them. That way, I have 3 copies; the original, the edited, and the edited in black and white!

Let me know if any of you guys use Gimp, because if you do I wouldn't mind doing some tutorials! :)

-Hope

28 June 2011

click it up a notch photography contest | june

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I actually haven't entered a photo challenge or photography contest in awhile, but it's that time of month again over at Click It Up a Notch! Here's my June favourite:

I actually just took this picture on Saturday at my cousins graduation, but it's already become an all-time favourite!

-Hope

{not alot of} sunshine & summertime

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Up until this week we've had absolutely beautiful weather, but now all we seem to have are humid days with grey skies, which kinda sucks. I'm still trying to wrap my finger around the fact that summer is finally here. The mid-day naps, late nights and sleeping in are doing a pretty good job of convincing me though. ;)

Although sleepovers, a graduation, and visiting with family is what these last few days have been made up of, I haven't been picking up my camera as often as I'd like, and I don't have any new pictures for you guys, so here's an adorable video for you! :)

I promise new pictures soon!

-Hope

26 June 2011

my cousins graduation

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Yesterday I was lucky enough to join my aunt, uncle, grandma, and a few others down at the seawall to take my cousin Kasey's grad pictures! This was my first group photo experience and I must say, it's quite hard to get everyone looking at the camera with their eyes open and a smile on their face. There were tons of other people there taking pictures too, so the subjects aren't even looking at the camera in the majority of the pictures. Despite all that, I am very pleased with how they turned out! :)