Contest For a Best Photo Forward Webinar Ticket

[JenFW]

Hi, Everyone.

I'm de-lurking to host a contest here.

I've been a member of Stitchin' Fingers for ages. Since Sharon started it, I think. I come here to look at photos and be inspired. Really-really. I click the "Photos" link, sit back with my chai, and let the colors, designs, and creativity fill me up. I am grateful to active members for enabling me to do this.

I don't need to tell anyone here that photographing needlework isn't easy. I've been struggling with it for years, waiting for a good weather in Alaska so I can photograph my work outside in natural light. Even then, it's rarely, if ever, perfect.

Best Photo Forward Webinar

I finally decided to ask for help, and the result is a webinar: Best Photo Forward: Refining Photos of Fine Embroidery with Photoshop Elements.

Melissa Shanhun, a leading digital scrapbook teacher in Australia (and a needleworker to boot---woo-hoo!), and I have teamed up to create and present this workshop specifically for needleworkers. We will learn the following:

• What Photoshop Elements is and why we should use it
• How to convey more accurate colors
• How to stretch and square warped or crooked images
• How to resize images for the Web
• How to frame a piece digitally

This is a live event, taking place on

March 20, 2012 at 8:00 p.m. EST (That's 8 p.m. on the east coast of the US.)

Participants receive the following:

• Access to the live workshop
• Handouts and resources used in the event
• Ongoing access to the workshop recordings
• Sample files so that you can see follow along with the demonstrations
• BONUS Photo Fixes for Real People – a jump start on using Photoshop Elements to improve your photos (Valued at $20). In this, Melissa teaches us how to digitally turn overcast skies blue, clean food from a baby's face, create a great group shot with everyone smiling, and remove red eye.
• BONUS Jen's Top 10 Ways to Use Images of Our Embroidery 

So even if you can't attend live, you can still take advantage of the workshop, watching the recordings over and over, as many times as needed to master the techniques.

You can learn more about the webinar on the Funk & Weber World blog.

How Webinars Work

A "webinar" is a seminar on the Web. It's a real-time event, like a live chat, and will be held at AnyMeeting.com. If you live on the east coast of the US, the time will be 8:00 p.m. on March 20th. If you'll be in Hawaii in the US, the time will be 3:00 p.m. on March 20th. If you're in Oslo, Norway, the time will be 1:00 a.m. on March 21.

You can use a time converter to determine your time for the live event. But, as I said, you don't have to attend live, though I hope you will.

All it takes to attend the live event is a link to the webinar site which you will receive when you register. You'll click that link just before the meeting time. Make sure the sound on your computer is turned on because we'll watch Melissa's computer screen as she works and hear her explain what she's doing.

If you watch and listen to videos on your computer, you should be fine.

We'll be able to type questions we have into a chat box, and Melissa and I will answer as many as we can. We'll follow up with written or recorded answers to any questions we can't answer in real time.

The Contest

Because I so enjoy and get such benefit from the photos on Stitchin' Fingers, I want to give someone here a ticket to this webinar, and so we're having a contest. To enter, simply reply to this discussion, and tell me what your biggest problem is with images of your embroidery. Though we're not covering photography in this webinar---just image editing---your biggest problem can be about anything.

You have until midnight, Alaska time, on March 16th to leave your reply. A winner will be chosen at random and posted here on March 17th.

If you have questions, please ask. I'll separate contest entries from general questions. Again, I'm posting more about this on my blog.

Thank you, all, for sharing your needlework, your creativity, and yourselves here.

[Elizabeth Braun]

I think my problem is focusing on more than one part of the piece at once.  I mean that, sometimes, I can't get a good photo of a whole piece with more than one real 'centre' as the camera will just pick out one and that can mean that other parts can blur.

Also, I use an older version of Elements, but I really only know the basic functions.=)

[Linda Stokes]

My biggest problem is getting the light even over the whole photo.

Thanks for the opportunity to enter & learn more.

[Susan McGowan]

My biggest "problem" is capturing the true color and texture of the piece. Is it light or focus.. I do not know ..I am a stitcher not a photographer.  I find some pieces  like some people may be very beautiful but are just not photogenic. So my biggest problem is to resist the urge to stitch for the camera.

[Sharon Riley]

This workshop sounds both exciting and extremely helpful... Like you, I prefer to take photos outside... something that can't always be accomplished as weather doesn't cooperate... especially this winter. The images are not as crisp as I'd like, and the colors never as true... Close ups of detail surface embellishment are never as clean as they should be... I have an older Cannon digital.... When the piece is small, what background is best?

Thank you  so much ... Sharon

[Sandra Arthur]

Capturing the correct coloring and getting clear, unblurred results are my worse problems.  Additionally, crystals, shiny threads, etc., interfere and don't always show up the way I would like.

[Heather]

Like several others, my problem is with light and colour.  My apartment doesn't get much natural light, especially this time of year but flash pictures don't work either.

[Carol Harper]

My biggest issue with photographing my stitcher is sharpness or definition --- no matter what I do, a lot of my photos look slightly out of focus.

[Linda Miller]

I would love to be able to take a close up of my work that is not fuzzy. 

[Melissa Shanhun]

Hi Sandy

I use to live in Kalgoorlie (2007-2010) - the webinar is at 8am our time so I guess you are off to work?

Nice to meet another sandgroper here :)

As for reflective surfaces - they are always challenging but there are a few adjustments you can make after you take the photos using levels :)

Melissa

Sandy N said:

I live in Western Australia.  With the time difference I will miss the live webinar and am more than happy for someone else to win.  :)  Go for it girls!  However I will share a problem I encounter when attempting to photograph my stumpwork embroidery.  Well any embroidery for that matter.  The flash reflects back from shiny fabrics such as satin and from metallic or shiny threads.  Resulting in poor quality pictures of my work.  Does anyone else encounter this?

I have even tried taking photos in daylight without the flash mode on the digital camera.  Any tips will be much appreciated.  Thanks.  Have a lovely week.

Love

Sandy, Kalgoorlie

In the goldfields

[Melissa Shanhun]

Hi Elizabeth

Most of techniques I'll be showing will work for any version of Photoshop Elements from 6 upwards - so I'm sure you'll get something out of them!

Elizabeth Braun said:

I think my problem is focusing on more than one part of the piece at once.  I mean that, sometimes, I can't get a good photo of a whole piece with more than one real 'centre' as the camera will just pick out one and that can mean that other parts can blur.

Also, I use an older version of Elements, but I really only know the basic functions.=)

[Melissa Shanhun]

Heba - one section of my demo will show how to correct colours - even when you don't shoot in natural light. :) 

Heba Barazi said:

The hardest part is getting natural light so that the color would appear correctly.

[Ellen Lai]

My biggest problem is the colours and shadow. It is not easy to get good light indoor. If I edit the brightness or adjust the colours with an editing program, the works may become too bright or too light. Then it will show up differently on different computers and again when printed out! Next is the orientation when I load it on blog or somewhere on the internet - landscape become portrait and vice versa. Simply frustrating.