on photoshop action sets.

I use Photoshop a lot to make quick edits to my photos and have always been fairly happy with the results (I am by no means a Photoshop expert. Like, at all. ;)). I've heard of "action sets" for Photoshop, but had never used any. My, oh my. I discovered these available as a free download over at The Pioneer Woman and they are SO fun (I know, I know - I'm probably super late to the party on what and how cool action sets are). The click of a button and your whole photo changes. She has two sets available for download here. Below are a few of my faves from each set :)

My original photo

Seventies

Heartland

Sepia

Warmer

Cooler

Fresh

Dim the Lights

Boost

Pioneer Woman - Black and White

West

 Vintage

Photographing Lights: Bokeh

So I finally found out that this super cool technique of taking photos of lights is called "Bokeh" (I know, I'm probably really behind on this one). I love how it looks like confetti. Love it. 

I am by no means a photographer (nor do I really know camera and photographer terms, etc) and credit all of my semi-decent photos to my amazing Canon Rebel XTi, and now my 50mm f/1.8 lens. I was on pinterest the other day and came across this tutorial on taking photographs like this and was glad to (finally) know what it is called. I experimented and was SO excited about how the photos turned out. 

I used my Canon 50 mm f/1.8 lens with these settings:

f/1.8

1/125 sec

1600 ISO

The dial on top is set to "M" and I adjusted the f-stop by pushing the Av +/- button and turning the other wheel on top to 1.8 (all seasoned photographers reading this, my apologies for my lack of knowledge on terms ;)). If you go here, there is a basic tutorial on changing all of these settings.

I took the photos at night so there wasn't any extra light (like the tutorial suggested) except for a nearby 60-watt table lamp. I used the manual focus (so no auto focus). The photos below show how the lights become bigger circles as you un-focus (?).

I also experimented with a plain string of Christmas lights. The photo is in focus and progresses to completely out of focus.

And I then made a lens hood (?) to create different shapes of light. Seriously, I was giddy about how fun these were turning out (the picture below shows my other lens 18-55mm as an example - I took these pictures with the above-mentioned lens). Basically you put the hood on the lens and do the same thing as above, only the lights are now shapes.

Flowers and Hearts! Yay!