There are still some leaves left on our trees despite Storm Barney. The sun has managed to break through occasionally and those shafts of sunlight created some magical moments. This is Hornbeam Carpinus betulus. I can’t tell you how happy I am that these leaves are still clinging to the trees… at least for now. They are ragged and quite past their best but under the circumstances they are looking good to me today!

A reader recently commented that she liked the way I used leaves that were not perfect in my images. At this time of year there are no perfect leaves in my garden and I don’t mind that at all. To me there is real beauty in the way the leaves change colour becoming spotted and mottled until they eventually become quite brown and crispy. Here’s a picture of Hornbeam leaves newly emerged in spring. Now they are quite perfect I would say!

I usually have a clear idea of the shots I’m going to take before I pick my camera up. I think about where the light is coming from and how the background will change if I move around. It’s a sort of dry run in my mind. Then I like to try to get the picture I’m aiming for in camera. I would much rather be outside taking photos than sitting at a computer processing them. Usually I take about 30 photos to find 5 or 6 that I’m happy with.

Sometimes small things appear in the image that I didn’t spot outside. There may be a tiny fly or beetle, some straggly silk from a spiders web, a wind blown weed seed or even a few strands of fluff from a jumper or wool from a sheep. It’s quite amazing what turns up in my photos! I usually discard those images.

Having said that there is a simple way to improve an image if you want to remove some imperfections. Here’s a photo of some Oak leaves. On the left is the original photo with lots of tiny spots on the green leaf and on the right I have removed a few of those marks.

I used the free photo editing programme Picassa by Google to make these changes.
If you would like to try it just download the programme and view your images with the Picassa Photo Viewer slideshow.
Select the picture you want to improve and click Edit in Picassa below the image.
Your photo will open with some editing buttons on the left.
Select Retouch and click the small circle over the blemish then again on an unblemished area and the blemish is removed.
You can repeat this as often as you like to achieve the look you want.
Then save your image as usual.
Here’s a link to a short video which shows you exactly how it works.

I would be happy to use the image below as it is for a blog post header but if the marks were tiny insects I would probably remove them.

What’s looking good in your garden today?
Do please let me know if you try Picassa. I would love to know your thoughts on it.

Thanks for reading, liking and commenting and most of all for joining in with Looking Good today.
Hope you have a lovely day. Gillian 🙂