Posts Tagged ‘VA’

Mason Neck Park

©TimeLine Media - lilly pads on the walking trail

Here are some photos taken at Mason Neck State Park. This large park is full of mature trees that shade the roads and trails that surround you as you travel from the main road to the Visitor’s Center. The banners on the way into the park brag how well-rated the state parks of Virginia are rated nationally. I am biased being originally from the area, but this is an excellent example.

The admission price is especially well worth it for what you have access to at this park. All of the main facilities that are available are at a section of the park that is right by the banks of the Belmont Bay. From this view of the bay from here, you can see Woodbridge, Virginia and see where the Occoquan River flows to the Potomac River. Additionally, there are lots of easy to moderate difficulty trails to walk with plenty of views of the river. On this occasion, it was one of the mildest days we had all summer, and with billowy clouds in the sky, made some very nice photos!

Belmont Bay

©TimeLine Media - shore of Belmont Bay from Beach Trail
©TimeLine Media – shore of Belmont Bay from Beach Trail

As can be seen, there are leftover structures from piers, to blinds, and other conservation projects that line the shore. It is very accessible from trails. The area is known for bald eagles nesting in the trees. It is a popular spot for photographers to capture these birds, but I didn’t bring my big glass to try myself! Some of the trails take you over the marshlands to observe coastal plant life, tadpoles, and dragonflies.

©TimeLine Media - lilly pads on the walking trail
©TimeLine Media – lilly pads on the walking trail
©TimeLine Media - shore of Belmont Bay from Beach Trail
©TimeLine Media – shore of Belmont Bay from Beach Trail

TimeLine Media – www.timelinedc.com
703-864-8208

Enjoying Sunday

©TimeLine Media - Butterflies in Garden

It’s a beautiful Sunday out there! Just a perfect day to work on the garden and the yard, so I won’t be too long on the blog today. There are flowers and critters all over the yard, so I’ll just head out there to make some practice photos. Hope you are enjoying your day off too! This coming week in the blog, I hope to finish the article on the Great Gatsby poster, and put up a post on shooting some interior rooms. Lots of new techniques for doing this that I am trying. Without as much help from the sun and clouds, and window light bouncing around the room, there is a lot of experimenting that is needed to get nice photos inside. In the meantime, here are some photos from outside!

©TimeLine Media - Butterflies in Garden
©TimeLine Media – Butterflies in Garden
©TimeLine Media - Butterflies in Garden
Butterflies in the garden ©TimeLine Media

Luckily we have these flowers in the backyard that attract the monarch butterflies. To be sure patience is needed as they do not follow directions very well – lol! While I was out there, I was as quiet as possible hoping that my calm will wash over them and I could snag some photos of them.

©TimeLine Media - Sunday Butterflies in Garden
©TimeLine Media – Butterflies in Garden
©TimeLine Media - Crepe Myrtle bloom on a Sunday in the garden
©TimeLine Media – Crepe Myrtle bloom on a Sunday in the garden

TimeLine Media – www.timelinedc.com
703-864-8208

Great Gatsby Poster Part 1 – Tech Thursday

©TimeLine Media - portrait, background, and both merged

Movie Inspiration

This project came out of an event happening at our dance studio this October. An upcoming theme night in October would be dedicated to the novel and movie, “The Great Gatsby” by F. Scott Fitzgerald. With such an over-the-top production as Baz Luhrmann is stylistically known to produce, the poster likewise had to reflect the movie. We looked over all the posters from the recently released movie and found several types for different settings. All the photography was amazing, as well as the graphic design for the setting of the portraits. This particular version I thought would work well:

The Great Gatsby poster © 2013 Warner Bros.
The Great Gatsby poster © 2013 Warner Bros.

The poster would have to have 7 portraits of the staff of the dance studio, so this would be perfect. Initially I cut faces out from photos I already have from the dance events, but my limited Photoshop skills did not make it work. So, I asked the studio if I could make 3/4 portraits of the staff to use for the poster. They were all excited about the idea, and we knocked out the shoot in 2 hours!

Afterwards, I thought that maybe I could just swap portraits in for the ones already in the poster. That did not work as it would be too difficult to take out the people underneath cleanly before putting in the new portrait. By now, I realize that I really underestimated what it would take to make this poster happen. So I went back to the original poster, and looked into creating the Great Gatsby poster from scratch.

Poster Design

There are repeating background for each of the portraits, and the text and borders were metallic to resemble gates surrounding a large estate. Illustrator would be used to make the backgrounds designs. I started drawing straight up and down lines and diagonal lines exactly 45 degrees from the original lines. When the space was filled, I copied the design, and flipped it horizonally to make a mirror images on the other half of the drawing to make the top of the image.

I then took these top two mirrored images, copied them together, and flipped it vertically to get the bottom half of the background. It actually turned out well! Here is how one of the portraits turned out. I’ll show you how I finished off the poster in a future post after the portraits and background were completed. From left to right are the starting portrait, the graphics made for the background, and both put together to be put into the poster.

©TimeLine Media - portrait, background, and both merged
©TimeLine Media – portrait, background, and both merged

TimeLine Media – www.timelinedc.com
703-864-8208

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