If you come from anywhere in the South, especially someplace in or around Louisiana, then you probably know what the Cajun Cooking Trinity is all about--Celery, Onions, and Bell Pepper. Yum-Yum.
I hail from south Arkansas, not 30 minutes from the Louisiana state line, so this vegetable trinity has been a constant throughout my life. I don't use many of the meat ingredients common to Cajun cuisine (shrimp, crawdads, blood sausage, etc...) but I do use the Trinity in a large number of the dishes I prepare. As far as I'm concerned, some things, soups and stews, for instance, just aren't done right unless these ingredients are in there. And if I don't I have them fresh, then I'm not afraid to use them dried. Doesn't matter, really, as long as they are in there.
Today's post, however, isn't really about cooking with the beloved vegetable Trinity of Southern Louisiana, it's about my own Digital Image Processing Trinity--Composition, Color/Tone, and Sharpness.
I fell into using this triplet before I was even shooting digital, because this was the method I used for tweaking scans from slide film. Digital just made it easier, not to mention more fun.
Over the past 10 years or so (it was about that long ago when I began working with digital scans) I have developed a good many techniques for image processing that not only suit my style, but please my senses as well. And if I'm not happy with an image, then no one else is ever gonna see it.
Starting next week I'll begin, in some detail, to break down the processes I go through with image making. Not that I feel I have anything new or better to say than anyone else, but just because it seems like a fun thing to do.
As for todays image, it's a real oldie. In fact, this was the shot that ended my use of film forever. back then I didn't know a thing about printing from a "pure" digital image. I was used to seeing at least some film grain, even in my smallest prints, but this image, born of a tiny digicam and printed from an aging HP printer changed all that. From 3.2mp the resulting 8x10 was amazing. Not that the image was that great, it's not, but the print was so colorful, so pure, so EASY. I had done it all by myself, and it was unlike anything I had ever created before. No more film for me.
3 comments:
Oh, it IS beautiful. Quiet and beautiful.
I never really shot film. I mean, I did on holidays, but I did neither develpoment nor prints myself, thus it was always upon the mercy of the lab, and most labs are NOT merciful :)
Whyizzit that the folks around you and the folks around me invent cookin' that grabs the tongue and strokes it like a politician working the crowd? Meantime folks in New England, the Mid/Far West got nothin'. Aside from Lobster, and maybe chowder - name a New England dish that real folks would eat into the night without snooting about. Sure they've got great European dishes... but none are indigenous. While yours and my food are aggressive as Angelina Jolie's lips, their's are flat as say Dame Judi Dench's.
Now wait, you say... what're your claims to culinary cuteness, Ted?
Howzabout Sticky buns? Blue Point Crabs? Funnel cake? Hoagies? Soft Pretzels? And scrapple? Ever tried a Philly Cheezesteak smothered in peppers? Yum!
I guess it's because most of the New England settlers were from England, Ireland, and Scotland, places with no national cuisine?
At any rate the South and the East Central part of America seem to have contributed more to prol food (um... as in proletarian cuisine) than the rest of the country. And I guess you've also noticed how much of our cookin' is best accompanied by a vintage bottle of beer?
Look, I like a fine French, Asian, Italian, vittles. They rock. But... the only stuff in America that rivals them are made in your part of the country and mine. Hmmmm... Wonder why that is?
film what is that!!! Hard to believe most of us used film at one point all the time. I recall taking a photography course in college using a half frame camera which resulted in very noisy image and it was a huge struggle moved to canon then when my husband got me my first Olympus Digital I was like I will NEVER use that thing. I was wrong so then he gave me my Nikon and I LOVEEEEEEEEEE it. It would be a close second if I had to drag stuff out due to a fire. My pets would be first! Kids would too lol..grins
I love how you always think out what your going to do next. I never know .... my life is pretty much spur of the moment stuff. LOL
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