One Good Turn Deserves Another!

Yesterday was a really exciting day!  I reached two blogging milestones simultaneously.  I now have over 100 people who like Rub Some Dirt On It's Facebook page (102) and over 100 Twitter followers (105)!  It seemed somehow significant that these two things should happen on the same day, and so I decided it was the Blogging Gods' way of telling me that I had to acknowledge these accomplishments and somehow give back to all you loyal and wonderful readers!  And thus, my first giveaway!

The problem then became, what to give away?  I don't have any sponsors on Etsy (yet) or even access to many stores to go get something worth raffling.  But the Blogging Gods didn't find that to be a valid excuse, so I had to come up with something else.  What do I have, or what can I do, of value?  And since two friends this week have emailed me photos and asked me to edit them in Lightroom, I figured, that skill might be something worth sharing!

And so I give you...

One Good Turn Deserves Another!

As a way to thank you all for your loyalty and readership, I am offering to edit 25 of your photos in my Adobe Lightroom Software!  That may not sound like much, but I will up the ante by saying that I will edit each photo twice, equaling 50 photos.  For the first edit, I will merely improve upon the photo as is, and for the second, I will do something different and daring like convert it to black and white (oooooh...) or sepia (ahhhhhhh...) or probably one of my favorite presets like aged photo, yesteryear, or old polar.

Here are some examples, from my dear friend Dawn who writes a stellar beauty blog called At First Blush.  Her son Connor is turning two this month and she wanted me to spruce up a couple of her photos as his two-year-old portraits.  She took them with her regular old digital camera and sent me the files.  Here's how they came out:

In this one I minimized the shadows across his face and made the tone more even.  In the third, I used a fun preset to brighten the shot.

In this one I converted it to black and white, minimized the shadows, and upped the luminance to minimize the graininess that came with a lower resolution photo.

This one is a preset as well (either direct positive or old polar, not sure), which brightened the shot and brought attention to his eyes and expression.  I also cropped it to add more negative space, although you can't see that here.

This is also a preset that did the same as the photo before.  I straightened it more so that the leading lines of the bricks drew your eyes to his handsome face.

In addition, another friend of mine sent me photos of some nature shots that she wanted me to boost up a bit for her.  These were more difficult because they were just copied and pasted rather than uploaded, so they are very low resolution. 

For this I tried to fix the lighting, crop more to the rule of thirds (although it's hard to tell in the collage), and boost the color, contrast, and clarity.

For this shot, I tried to add dimension using lighting and contrast, recover some of the details in the bright sky, and increase the clarity to improve the details.

As you can see, I'm not an expert and for some of you, you may be scoffing at these so-called edits.  I do not have Photoshop so I don't do textures and I am still a student in this entire photography process.  You may very well be better than me at this, and if you don't think they're very good, then this giveaway isn't for you.  BUT if you're just a regular guy or gal and don't bother to edit your photos, and have some special ones lying around that could use a little extra love and a little brightening, color adjustment, or touch of fun, then this is exactly for you!  Even if you get just one photo out of it that you really love, then it will have been a success, because it didn't cost you anything other than the time it takes to enter and to email your photos!

Now that you're all really excited, here's how to enter!

You can get up to 4 entries.  You must submit a separate comment for each entry so that they count individually.

Entry #1:  Leave a comment and tell me which photos you think you would submit off the top of your head (Don't worry; I won't hold you to it!).

Entry #2:  Follow me on Google Friend Connect (right over there in the sidebar).  Just click "Follow" and then go from there.  If you already follow me, just leave a comment saying, "Already follow you on GFC!" or something like that.

Entry #3:  Like Rub Some Dirt On It's Facebook page.  Leave me a comment and let me know you did!

Entry #4:  Follow me on Twitter.  Leave a comment and let me know you did!

I will use random.org  to select the winner on Sunday, May 15th, at 9 pm.  That's plenty of time to enter!

Oh, and if you're wondering why I don't offer to do a photoshoot for you as my giveaway, I'm way ahead of you!  That's the plan for when I reach 500 followers, if you live near me, or if you want to pay my travel expenses!  Be on the lookout for that one!

Ready for this giveaway to begin?  On your mark, get set, go!