Hi. It's been a while. I haven't been dogging it - I promise. I got around to fixing my computer, and it all went smoothly enough to make me feel relatively competent. So, to bring me back down to earth, I decided to retire the image editing software I'd been using for the last 15 years or more and educate myself in the ways of Photoshop. I started out watching video tutorials about Photoshop, and that introduced me to LightRoom and finally, to Wacom tablets. It didn't take long to convince myself that I couldn't get along without all three, so I've now installed Photoshop CS6, LightRoom 4, and bought an Intuos 5 digital drawing tablet. Any one of them has a substantial learning curve, so I've got my hands full with all three.
But I can't spend all my time at the computer, so I went out this morning and took pictures for a couple hours. There's a lot to be said for being outside for a while. I ought to make a habit of it. . .
It rained last night. Spring will be here in about 10 days and, hopefully, we'll have a rainy season for change. I wanted to see if any of the local streams were affected noticeably by last night's precip - but I couldn't really tell since I don't check regularly. In the picture above, I found some standing water in Bull Creek's limestone bed; that was probably from last night.
The creek was flowing nicely. The little bit of Whitewater provided some interest, but I'm not sure that those suds are supposed to be there. I'll check back at some point in the future and see if that's the normal state of things here.
The creek here is pretty shallow, and the shadow across the image is from the Highway 360 bridge above my head. The creek-edge flora is pretty ragged - this park is very small and isn't used very much - but it's pleasant enough and the access is easy enough to suit my purpose.
There's really nothing special about this shot, but working it over in Photoshop answered a few questions and taught me a few things about the program that will be helpful in the future.
I've moved a mile or so south now, to the Pennybacker Bridge over Austin's Colorado River. These shots were taken from the southwestern approach to the bridge, looking northeast. The bridge was finished in 1982 and carries traffic on the Capital of Texas Highway (Texas 360) through the cliffs of the Balcones Escarpment. The Escarpment is the boundary between the Texas Hill Country and the Coastal Plain. I plan to take some pictures of the bridge from the cliffs, looking south. But, as you might expect, I'd have to resort to some climbing which I wasn't prepared for today.
I did bring both cameras and took a few sets from the southeastern approach for some HDR work. When I got back to my desk I was surprised I had not reinstalled that software yet. But it only delayed me a few minutes; the software is up and running once more.
These pictures actually give you a better idea of the bridge's rust
color than the earlier standard shots. There's a county boat ramp and
parking beneath the bridge, along with the gate keeper's shack and the
pair of port-o-potties in the foreground.
With any luck, I'll get out a few more times this week and get additional pictures posted before I tackle my taxes. Of course, there's still a lot of LightRoom and Photoshop to keep me busy; it's a perfect excuse for procrastination. . .
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