Fair Time

It is almost time for the fair and I am in the process of selecting pictures to enter. The stakes are high! 1st, 2nd, and 3rd place winners in each category win money prizes of 1.50, .1.00, and .50. Okay, I don't do it for the money. I enjoy putting my photography next to others and seeing what the judges think. This year I am entering the professional photographer's division since I am now charging money for my work. Before I always entered as an amateur. Even though I am proud of my pictures, I am also nervous. 

Most of my pictures fall either under the portrait or the children category, so I really have to narrow down my favorites. In those 2 categories, there are black and white, special, and color sub-categories. Here is one I am working on as a special effects portrait:

 

Straight out of the camera the picture is cute, but I envisioned other things when I first saw it. I wanted it too look like a vintage photograph that you could find in an old album at grandma's house.

First I removed the background that was a bit too cluttered. Also, a vintage camera would not have captured all those details 100 yards away. I used some special effects tools in photoshop to make is grainy and added a little gaussian blur. I turned it black and white and added a frame from Somethingbluestudios.com that included a wrinkled effect (thanks Kelleigh). I wanted to put printing on it so everyone would know who this sweet baby is and altered the font a bit to make it look like a great-great grandma wrote on the picture herself.  Here are the results: