Some soft tones for you this morning. This is almost SOOC (straight-out-of-camera) except for some tweaking of the brightness. 

I played with the exposure and focus here.   This was taken in a place called Tlaquepaque (pronounced “tuh-lack-ee-pack-ee”) in the Sedona, Arizona, area. Lots of nice shops and art galleries. If you get a chance, visit Sedona. You’ll be driving along in the flat desert and boom! gorgeous red rock formations in the distance. I have to go back, because I was there nursing a broken heart and just didn’t feel like taking pictures at the time.

 When I shot film, ALL my photos were SOOC. I took a b&w darkroom class, but changed very little. I never had the money or inclination to process color photos. The world of digital photography has changed all that, but I find too much processing can ruin an otherwise nice shot. I’m still learning my way around this new world and am often flummoxed by the hypersensitive digital sensor.

I’ll crop and adjust the saturation or brightness, but I won’t add a sailboat to a sunset that wasn’t there. Too manipulative, maybe. I am intrigued by the effects available, though. You can create something that looks like an oil painting or watercolor on the computer now, as I did here.

Did you know you can download a free version of Photshop Elements 8 for thirty days? Just go to adobe.com and follow the instructions. Their “help” button is good, and the Web has all kinds of  tutorials for Elements. The best part? Elements is about $700 cheaper than the full Photoshop.  Warning: addictive!

It’s an absolutely gorgeous day, so I’m heading outdoors….