Don’t forget our next meeting is on Thursday, May 19, 2022. It will start at 6:30 PM to take advantage of the daylight. We will meet at Camp Brewster. See the post about the upcoming meeting May 19… for a Map. If we have bad weather we will set up the birds inside.

Raptors, Raptors, and More you ask? It’s me your humble president.

Fontenelle Forest Photo Display

Speaking of raptors, we changed out the photos displayed at the forest with the raptor photos. We did not have enough space for all. So we will put those photos on display after the ones on the racks have been on display for a month or so. Thanks to Jim and Andre Kuhn and Kathleen Crawford-Rose for their help in swapping out the pictures.

Milky Way

Hello FFPC members,

Phil has asked me to organize the astro-photography event with Ken Smith. Ken and I have discussed a few things in very general terms.

I will have a signup sheet at our May meeting this Thursday.
Please give some thought to the following:

– Possible event date(s) will be centered around the “New Moon” – nights with no moon.
IMPORTANT!  Participants must expect to be flexible on dates, as the weather will dictate if we will be able to shoot on a specific night.  Ken is a meteorologist, and will keep an eye on things for us.

Upcoming “New Moon” dates are Tuesday June 28th, and Thursday July 28th.  Ken has calculated 2 viable date ranges: June 26 to July 3rd (not Saturday July 2nd); and July 24th to August 1st (not Saturday July 30th).  Ken has church commitments on Sundays, which is why we don’t want to have an excursion late on Saturday night into early Sunday morning.

– We will be somewhere , far from civilization, late at night, in the dark, with no bathroom facilities.  Something to think about. 

We will need to arrive before sunset to get set up and organized.  Dark conditions will be around 10:30 or 11:00pm until 4:00 or 4:30am.  Ken thinks most people would be ready leave by 12:30 or 1:00am.

 – Ken does not have a set site where we can assemble a group.  
If YOU have friends or family in very rural NE or IA, within 2 hours or so of Bellevue, please consider contacting them.  Ken is willing to visit potential sites and scout them for suitability.  We will not go on private land without permission.  I will bring a Dark Sky map to the Thursday meeting if you want to take a look.

Here are links to Kens amazing photos and astro-photography presentation:

https://kensmithphotography.smugmug.com/Astrophotography/i-FC8tX4j
https://kensmithphotography.smugmug.com/Astrophotography-/


Thanks,
Brent Headley

Photo Contest

PHOTO CONTEST UPATE: Members  can send their digital copies for the competition anytime now.  Send them to ddturner2@cox.net.  Questions: 402-680-1186.

{the information sheet said that the copies should be sent starting May 25.  But anytime is okay.}

See you Thursday.

Donna T

There will be the “novice”, “advance”, and “anything goes” forms available.

It will have been two years since we have had actual photos turned in for the contest. Your photos should be FRAMED . This is different from the photos turned in to be displayed at the forest or the library. Please reference the contest rules .

Featured Image

Can you identify the bird, shown as the featured image for this post? Leave your guess in the comments below. The feature image is the picture shown at the bottom of the home page under “FROM BLOG“.

Lunar Eclipse

Did you get out to photograph the eclipse the other night? Send me some of your pictures and I will post them on the website. Send to webmaster

Fontenelle Forest Photo Club Meeting minutes

Location:	Fontenelle Forest
Date:	4/21/2022
Time:	7PM

1. Welcome by President Phil Mininni.
2. Attendees: 27. No Zoom meeting was held.
3. New members: None

Judy and Frank: Out of town. Kathleen took Raptor photos for Forest display. Kathleen will ask Judy for some photo topics for the next club year so we can take them over the summer. Fountains will be the next topic for photos to display so please bring to the May meeting.

Kathleen: Treasurer’s report: amount in Treasury is: $1476.67. She asked the club to donate $300 to the Raptor Program to help provide food for the Raptors. Unanimously approved.

Brent: No news.

Sue: No news.

Donna Gray: Due to personal reasons she has resigned as our photo club contest organizer. We wish her the best and hope to see her at future meetings.

Terry and Donna Turner: Have volunteered to take over Photo contest duties.

Kathy Holm: No news.

4. Our presenter was member Donna Turner and she showed us some of her post processing skills. It was an excellent presentation.
5. Thanks to Linda Shuett and Linnea Baney for the treats tonight.
6. ***Treats for the May meeting: Will be provided by Jean Lindfors but we also need at least one more person to volunteer to bring them. Email me at s.mininni@yahoo.com if able. Thank you.
7. Next month, May 19, 2022 the meeting will be at Camp Brewster for our Annual Raptor Shoot. It will be at 6:30 (note time change) with the Raptor Shoot first then afterwards will be the meeting.
8. Forest partnership with the photo club– Phil, Kathy, and Brent had a Zoom meeting with Dana Meyers and Emily Prauner. They are working on a MOU (Memorandum of Understanding) with us. It was suggested by us that if we can’t provide enough photos of the Forest could they just be photos focused on Nature. There were no hard decisions made on photo selection. Emily was a guest at this meeting and spoke about opportunities to display some of our photos in the Forest newsletter. The Baright Gallery is being revamped. They spoke about having a student discount for joining the Forest as well as we could have one for joining our club.
9. Photo Contest: Setup is Saturday May 28^th from 10-12. Awards will be Thursday June 16^th for our regular meeting held at Bellevue University. Take down of photos will be Saturday June 25^th from 10-12. Watermarks or names are not allowed on the front of the photos. Jay Davis has agreed to be our Judge this year. Labels were available to pick up to put on your photos. Winning contest pictures will be displayed at the Bellevue Library.
10. Ken Smith (Astrophotography) is still willing to take people out May 30^th from 12 midnight to 4am or July 28^th 11pm to 4am or maybe sometime in June. This will be in southeast locations in Iowa. Should be two groups of 9 people max. 18 showed hands that they were interested in doing it.
11. A suggestion was made to maybe come up with a card to display at various places to promote our club.

Submitted by Club Secretary: Sue Mininni

6:30 PM at Camp Brewster to take advantage of day light! Bring your own drinks.

Business meeting will be after you are done taking pictures. I hope to see you all there.

Raptor Shoot

The Forest Raptor group will be showing their raptors for us to photograph them. Don’t forget your cameras. If you are not a member of the club, you are invited to come to our meeting(s) anytime to check us out. I welcome you to come and take some pictures of raptors up close and not through a fence.

Camp Brewster

Located just north of Fontenelle Forest.

1313 Bellevue Blvd. North
Bellevue, NE 68005

From I-80, take Hwy 75 (Kennedy Freeway) South to Chandler Road. Turn left onto Chandler. Stay on Chandler approx. 1 mile until the road ends at the stop sign at Bellevue Blvd. Turn right onto Bellevue Blvd. Continue approximately .3 of a mile to Camp Brewster (on the left)

Fountains for Bellevue Library Photo Display

Judy is collecting your photos of “Fountains” for the Bellevue Library photo displays. Bring them to the May meeting.

Don’t forget to put on the back of your photo your name, contact information…etc. Photos should be boarder-less 8X10 or 11X14 sized pictures.

May Photo Contest

Check out contest info here

Short Videos about Raptor photo taking

That is about all!

Please comment below. If you have any questions comment or email your webmaster here . Thanks for letting me be your president and webmaster. Phil

Donna Turner has sent me the Harold Davis series of videos. I went ahead and got the links for the subjects she notes in her email to me and posted them here. Then there is a section on 3D Flowers. And another section on Photographing flowers on a lightbox. You don’t have to search for them. The links are below. Take your time with the videos. Watch them at your convenience. I know this post is lengthy. Leave comments below.

If you have any questions, Donna’ s contact info is;

Donna Turner Ddturner2@cox.net

402-680-1186

HAROLD DAVIS FLOWER PHOTOGRAPHY ON A LIGHTBOX

On U Tube look under Harold Davis Photography on a lightbox. There are several similar Webinars so watch for the titles recommended. Matching the length of time of each webinar helps.

PHOTOGRAPHING FLOWERS FOR TRANSPARENCY WEBINAR PART 1 INTRODUCTION 1:12:45

PHOTOGRAPHING FLOWERS FOR TRANSPARENCY PART 2 ARRANGING & EXPOSING 1:23:16

PHOTOGRAPHING FLOWERS FOR TRANSPARENCY PART 3 PROCESSING A HIGH-KEY LAYER STACK 1:20:56

PHOTOGRAPHING FLOWERS FOR TRANSPARENCY PART 4 ADVANCED TECHNIQUES 1:23:17

PHOTOGRAPHING FLOWERS FOR TRANSPARENCY PART 5 OVER TO YOU 1:20:38 ( AN CONTINUATION OF PART 4)

( There are several similar programs but the above are a series)

If you want to go further with the LAB process:

Creative LAB Color Part 1: Getting Started 1:26:54

Creative LAB Color Part 2: Advanced Techniques 1:04:45

Photo cards I recommended are Strathmore Photo Mount Cards Available at Dick Blick or Amazon

3D Flowers

3 D FLOWERS

1. Select flower and move to Photoshop. Crop it to a square. (Crop—ratio 1:1 click.
2. Make 4 copies of it. Shortcut is Control J on a PC or Command J on a MAC.
3. Go to Image —canvas size. Change to a percent and change both percents to 150. Click OK. This puts a white border around the picture.
4. Highlight the top copy in the layers panel on the right.
5. Get the move tool (first tool) and holding down the shift key put the cursor on the big main picture and move a copy to the right until just touching the main picture. (The copy will magically appear.)
6. Go to Edit —transform and flip horizontally.
7. Go to Edit — free transform, click and handles will appear. If some are off the page and not visible do control/command zero or control/command – and the picture will shrink and the handles appear.
8. Holding shift grab the middle far right handle and squish the side picture until it is within the white boundary. Click (check mark)
9. Edit –transform—perspective. With shift and move tool, Grab top outside handle and pull up until you are at 45 degree angle (see upper bar) click.
10. Highlight the next layer. Using shift, move the picture left until just touching main picture.
11. Edit –transform and flip horizontally.
12. Edit – Free transform. Grab middle handle and with shift squish to inside white boundary. click
13. Edit—transform—perspective. With shift use handle to move to 45 degrees. click
14. Highlight the third layer.
15. As before, with shift move the layer this time up.
16. Edit—transform and flip vertically
17. Repeat steps 12 and 13. Squish to the white boundary. click
18. Highlight fourth layer, move layer down and Edit—transform and flip vertically.
19. Repeat steps 12 and 13.

OPTIONAL LIGHTING:

20. Lighting: click on layer in stack that shows the left side.
21. To darken, click Image—adjustment–Brightness and contrast. Decrease -100
22. To lighten, go to opposite side layer in stack, click Image –adjustment–Brightness and contrast. Increase +100.
23. On top image, darken -50% with Image—Adjustment—Brightness and contrast.

QUESTIONS: Donna Turner Ddturner2@cox.net

402-680-1186

Photographing Flowers on a Lightbox

Donna Turner ddturner2@cox.net

1. Lay lightbox flat on the floor of a normally lit room.
2. Put camera on tripod and place it over lightbox as high as you can and still see the camera screen

Set camera on:

1. low ISO –100
2. Manual exposure
3. Manual focus capable of at least 5 times magnification
4. F stop of F11 to F16 depending on distance from lens to flowers. Choose one and don’t change
5. Long exposure noise reduction ON

3. Artfully arrange flowers on box. (This is the hard part.)

1. Scissors, tweezers, paper clips, tape, museum gel and little pebbles are all helpful in holding flowers in place
2. Easiest to cut heads of flowers and leaves from stems.
3. Take practice shots at shutter speed of ½ or 2 seconds after turning light box on.
4. Remember you don’t see depth in lightbox photography.

4 . Then take a series of 6-8 shots.

1. Start with shutter speed of 1/30 then 1/15, 1/8,1/4 and continue with one stop

difference until you get to 4 or 8 seconds where it becomes too light.

b. Change only the shutter speed.

Transfer to lightroom.

DO NOT CROP PICTURES UNTIL THE END

ce ca cc cv

ce–(control e on a PC, command e on a MAC)

Move picture from Lightroom LR to Photoshop PS

Ca (control a on a PC, command c on a MAC)–Select picture in Photoshop

ca– (control a on a PC, command a on a MAC) Copy picture in Photoshop

cv – control v on a PC, command v on a MAC) Put picture on top of another layer in Photoshop

1. In Lightroom highlight the longest exposure (4 or 8 seconds) and take it into Photoshop.

(Photo –edit in Photoshop or use shortcut ce)

*( If there is something extraneous in this first shot (like a scissors or the edge of the light box, it is easy to remove. With the eye dropper tool, sample an area near where you want to make a change. Then with the brush tool set on white, remove it. It won’t show up on subsequent pictures.)

2. Back to Lightroom (LR) highlight the next longest exposure and take it into Photoshop ( PS) (ce)

A. With that picture highlighted Select All (ca)

B. Then copy (cc))

C. Go to first image in PS. It will be on the black bar on the left. Paste. (cv)

3. In PS go to Layer – layer mask – Hide all. Very important. That takes you back to lighter image.

4. Now you are going to use the paintbrush to lightly paint back in from the darker image.

Lower opacity (ex. 50%) and flow (ex. 50%) on top bar. Your layer mask will be black so you are painting with white.

Then with pencil set to fairly soft , start painting in color. This is where the creative part comes in.

If you make a mistake hit Control z to undo.

5. Back to Lightroom, get next picture, ce, then ca, then Ccc. Back to first image and cv.

Layer – Layer mask—Hide all and paint as before.

6. Keep going back to Lightroom for another picture. You won’t necessarily use them all.

Lower opacity as you go.

7. Now you can crop!
8. To clean up any bad spots on your flowers, Do control and the plus sign to magnify image. Maneuver around using the space bar and the mouse and use the spot healing brush in PS.
9. When finished Save All with layers intact. You can save with all layers by holding down Control, Shift, Alt and e all at the same time
10. Then flatten Image and make further adjustments in Lightroom – if desired.
11. Save

( This whole process if much easier if you tether your camera to your computer with a cord.) In Lightroom go to file,Tethered capture, Start tethered capture, ,Fill in session name , Ok. Enter your numbers and then you can just sit at your computer to take all the pictures)

The photo club will meet this Thursday at 7:00 PM. There will not be a Zoom call for this meeting due to technical issues with the WiFi at the Forest.

Donna Turner will be our speaker

Donna will discuss her unique photos and the process she takes putting them all together. Like the image below.

Forest Photo Display

Bring your raptor photos that have been taken at the Forest. Judy and her team will hang them up at the Forest’s display racks. Don’t forget! if you do or the photos are not yet printed Judy will accept them after the meeting, just arrange with her or Frank to get them to her.

Blending in Photoshop

Here is a short tutorial on blending two images in Photoshop

That is all for now. Please comment below. We can discuss at our meeting about future photo displays, what was discussed between the board and the Forest, Changes with our photo contest and much more. Thanks for your support!

Phil

Fontenelle Forest Photo Club Meeting minutes

Location:	Fontenelle Forest
Date:	3/17/2022
Time:	7PM
Attendees:	Number in attendance-in person was 19 and on Zoom there were technical issues so had to shut it down. There will be no Zoom meeting in April, only in-person. The meeting was being recorded to be posted on YouTube.

Agenda items

1. Welcome by President Phil Mininni.
2. New members: None

Judy and Frank: They have enough of the sunrise and sunset pics for the library. Please bring pictures of Raptors from the previous photo shoots if you have any to the April meeting or any photos taken at the Forest for use at future Forest displays.

Kathleen: Treasurer’s report: amount in Treasury is: $1476.67

Brent: Apologized for last meetings mess up on zoom

Sue: Nothing to report

Donna Gray: Contest still on at Bellevue Univ. See rules and dates on our website.

Kathy Holm: Nothing to report

3. Our speaker was Jay Davis who was a past president of our club. He talked about commercial photography. He used to a studio in downtown Omaha at the Hot Shops but now works out of his home. His presentation was very interesting. He showed some wonderful photos.
4. Thanks to Phil and Sue Mininni, Brent and Mary Headley and Keith White for the treats tonight.
5. Next month, April 21 Donna Turner is going to show us some of her post processing skills.
6. Bellevue Times-They posted about our club and information like when we meet, etc.
7. Forest partnership with the photo club- Another meeting will be set up with them to discuss some issues we still have.

Treats for the April meeting will be provided by: Linda Schuett and Linnea Baney. Thank you in advance.

Submitted by Club Secretary:

Sue Mininni

Donna Gray has had to resign to take care of personal issues at her home. She will not be able to continue as our Photo Contest coordinator. We need to find one or two volunteers to take the reins of the contest coming up in May/June.

Donna writes;

I must apologize for the timing this close to the annual contest in May.  I will certainly help whoever takes over the contest duties, as much as I can from home.  I can forward past records and the name of the contact person at Bellevue University.   Jay Davis has agreed to be the judge and someone will need to touch base with him to coordinate activities.

Please contact the webmaster if you are interested. You can also comment below your willingness to help your club out.

Phil

Our March 17 meeting was recorded and is now on YouTube. We still experienced difficulties with the Forest’s WiFi. And the recorded audio was experiencing some echoing. Jay Davis was our speaker. His presentation is on commercial and architectural photography. It was a very interesting discussion.

Thanks to Jay!

https://youtu.be/UUGTvKrnn6c

Raptor Photos for Forest Display

Greetings Photographers.

We are planning to gather  raptor photos for our next display at the Forest Nature Center.  These should be photos taken at one of our many photo shoots at FF or at one of their raptor programs.  They have a large selection of birds in their aviary and education program.  Please pick out a couple of your great shots to bring to our next meeting. April!

Same requirements as usual.  No mats or frames.  Sizes 8×10, 8×12 or 12×14.  Boarder less if possible.

I must apologize for the unmitigated disaster of our last club’s meeting. In theory it should of worked well. Unfortunately, it didn’t. First of all I want to make it clear it was not because of our presenter, Allen Kurth. Allen, Kathleen and I did a test run on line and it worked out excellently. If we all had been on the Zoom call and not in person it would have worked out. I am reminded how well it went when Peter did his presentation during a Zoom only meeting . Thank you to Allen for trying.

First of all, the wireless internet connection was terrible. Next, was the lack of good audio volume for those of us that attended the meeting live at the forest. And our digital projector’s display was not large enough for us at the forest to see clearly enough of what Allen was doing. And lastly it was my fault for not anticipating the troubles we experienced at the meeting. It was clearly a waste of your time to attend this meeting. That is on me and I am sorry. If we try this again, I recommend that the next president do a Zoom only meeting.

Thanks to Kyle, Brent, and Kathleen for their help with the meeting.

March 17, 2022 Photo Club Meeting.

Jay Davis will be our guest speaker and will do a presentation on Architectural and Commercial photography. Jay is another past president of the club. Jay’s website has information about Jay and Jay’s business.

We will attempt to do an in-person meeting and a zoom call at the same time. We will have Jay’s laptop connected to our projector and we will have Kyle on the camera looking at the projector’s display screen.

We may have Jay share his screen with the zoom participants for better visuals.

Camera for Sale

From Alan Brodin:

I am in the process of converting to Mirrorless cameras and am starting to sell off some of my DSLR equipment.

I have a Nikon D500 in Like New condition with less than 12,000 shutter releases with a battery grip I am selling for $1,000. I have all the original box, packaging, charger, and battery. See attached.

I will also have 2 Nikon D750’s to sell once my new Z9 gets here.

Please contact the webmaster for Alan's contact information if you are interested.

Photoshop

Field Trip

Would any of you be interested in a Zoom only meeting? And if I can get Allen to agree to show us what we attempted to do at the last meeting, perhaps we can have a successful presentation. This would be on a different night from our regular 3rd Thursday of the month. Think of it as a field trip on line. Please comment below or contact your webmaster if you would like to participate.

Video

Allen was attempting to give us some help post editing photos at the February meeting. Photoshop can be as easy as you need or as hard as you make it. I find myself in the middle. The video below has a lot of info for the 13 minute length. I recommend you pause the video at each subject and have your Photoshop program loaded and play with the tool shown, then move on.

YouTube is a resource with hundreds if not thousands of tutorials for learning Photoshop.

I have a goal to be able to take out a person in a photo and insert a different person in place of original person. What are yours?

That’s It

I will close for now and hope for better times to be achieved for all of you. Please leave a comment below on what you thought of today’s post.

Phil

In one of my last posts there was confusion in what I said and what the meeting minutes provided by the secretary wrote. Someone thought the secretary wrote that some members were still a bit skittish attending in person at our club meeting. These were my words not the Secretary. Please observe the title of the section in posts that I submit to the website. On this post I have only included the minutes from the February meeting so there should not be any confusion.

If there are any changes or modifications needed, please comment below!

Phil

Fontenelle Forest Photo Club Meeting minutes

Fontenelle Forest Photo Club Meeting minutes

Location:	Fontenelle Forest
Date:	2/17/2022
Time:	7PM
Attendees:	Number in attendance-in person was 23 and on Zoom was 10. The meeting is being recorded to be posted on YouTube DUE TO THE TECHNICAL DIFFICULTIES, WE HAD TRYING TO HAVE OUR SPEAKER DO HIS PRESENTATION ON ZOOM WE HAD TO CUT OUR REGULAR MEETING SHORT. THEREFORE, SOME OF THE CONTENT OF THE MINUTES WERE NOT ACTUALLY SPOKEN IN PERSON BUT WOULD HAVE BEEN IF THE NIGHT HAD GONE AS PLANNED. THANK YOU FOR YOUR UNDERSTANDING.

Agenda items

1. Welcome by President Phil Mininni.
2. New members: None

Changes are being made at the Forest that may affect our photo displays. 1. They are remodeling. 2. The Baright gallery may be going away. 3. A place for our photos will definitely change.

The Forest wants to display only photos taken at the forest which may limit our photo taking. We took a small vote and about 19 members disagreed with this and about 3 members agreed. It isn’t easy for all members to walk the forest property due to physical limitations. Members suggested some of the following:

*This is an unreasonable request

*We do what they ask because they allow us to use the facility for free.

*We pick the subject for the forest display.

*If we can’t get many forest shots then in our display maybe highlight 3 photos of the forest within the other photos on display.

*Do a “four seasons of the forest” display.

*Display the photos of the Forest that were entered in our Photo contest whether they were a winner or not.

Maybe as members shoot photos of the forest or at our raptor shoots, create a folder on your computer and keep all forest pictures together so they are readily available when we ask for them for our display.

Judy and Frank: Accepted photos of sunrise/sunset for Library display. Holding off on hoof stock photos for the forest until it is worked out or understood exactly what the Forest wants displayed. Phil will set up a meeting with them again to discuss. Also, if you want to sell any of your photos that are on display there is a sign that says ask at the desk and then they contact the photographer with the buyer information.

The library is moving to the area of the corner of Cornhusker and Fort Crook Road amongst the businesses located there. No date yet on when the move is to occur.

Kathleen: Treasurer’s report: amount in Treasury is: $1464.67

Brent:

Sue: A member suggested to Phil that the responsibilities of the Secretary of the photo club are very lax in content. I try to record the information being provided and discussed. This is a small club with 57 members, all of whom do not attend, and sometime the content of discussion is very minimal and I will not apologize for how I do this task, but at any time if I have missed something or typed any content incorrectly any member is welcomed and encouraged to mention it for submission or correction. Thank you.

Donna Gray:

Kathy Holm: Kathy had sent Phil a suggestion on how to attract young people to join was to see if the Forest would have a lower membership fee for young people and maybe our club could offer a student membership rate.

Bellevue Times

We have our meeting info posted on the calendar in the Times. Thanks to Kathleen for working with the editor.

Forest partnership with the photo club

The forest is excited about the club’s potential participation in more of the activities the forest holds during the year.

1. Walking tours
2. Photographing events
3. Giving photo hints to their members, i.e., on walking tours

Flora and fauna

Landscapes

4. Possible night walks

3. Our speaker tonight was past president and current member, Alan Kurth showed us some of his workflow of post processing photos using Lightroom and Photoshop. Unfortunately, it did not go as well as planned due to the technical issues. Maybe in the future Alan can present again in person at one of our meetings. Thank you, Alan, for your efforts.
4. Thanks to Lorraine Feldhausen and Diane Kinney for the treats tonight.
5. Our speaker for March will be past president Jay Davis on Architectural photography.

Submitted by Club Secretary:

Sue Mininni