Saturday, January 9, 2010

Photo - Dinosaur Park Tilt-Shift

Dinosaur Park

Ivanhoe Park in Bellevue is a quiet tree-covered open space that has a basketball court, play area, and lots of grass. It's usually pretty empty even in the height of summer, either because it has a smallish parking lot or no bathroom. Consider it a neighborhood park, one where those two amenities are not needed when a person can walk there.

The Clark Boys call this Dinosaur Park. One of Jack's climbing videos was shot here. The above photo is also from Ivanhoe. But it wasn't just a matter of taking a shot with my cameraphone and moving on. It's mobile photography with a twist.

What you see was made from 35 separate hand-held shots with a cameraphone. I mapped out a grid pattern in my head, and took photos methodically by snapping one and then moving the camera to the right before taking another. Then I would move up and do the same thing, only moving right to left. When I got home after walking, I stitched all the photos together in Windows Live Photo Gallery to make the basic image. Then I cropped and tweaked the colors in Picasa. Then - this morning - I discovered that I could also treat it to something called "tilt-shift" for free online. The process makes a regular photo look somehow like a miniature. My final step: sit back at the computer and say "Whoa!"

Lots of fun. This just made my camera into something more viable. Try it yourself HERE!

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