With most travel on hold for the foreseeable future, I’m doing my best to stay engaged with my own photography and not let my creativity come to a halt. Making new photos is not only essential to creating tutorials, stories, and eBooks, the process is also one that gives me a lot of happiness and keeps me motivated. While we are not completely incapable of creating new content, there are limitations and it’s been difficult to create at the same level I’m used to.
To keep my creative brain active, I’ve been going through many of my older photographs and finding some of the hidden gems I glossed over soon after I created them. It’s fun going back with fresh eyes, and another benefit is that I am always growing as a photographer which means I now see things a little bit differently. Photos I once thought were boring or had no potential may now seem compelling and beautiful.
Below are the before and after images of some of the images I have been working on. All of these images were processed using both Adobe Lightroom and Luminar. If you would like to see more of my photographs, please visit my Instagram account (@nicolesy).
I live so close to Mount Rainier National Park, yet the last time I visited was in 2015. I didn’t have much luck with this image at sunset, so I used Luminar 4 to add one of my other sunset skies to the scene. (Processed using Lightroom and Luminar 4.)
This is a photograph from the Big Island, Hawaii, photographed in 2013. I have so many beautiful sunset images from my trips to Hawaii that I never took the time to process. It feels good looking back and reminiscing on the beautiful landscape I witnessed in this location. (HDR processed in Lightroom, with final touches added using Luminar 4.)
Another photograph from Mount Rainier. This was from a hike I did and the sun started created a light beam that poured over the sky. I replaced the sky with something more interesting using Luminar 4. (Processed in Adobe Lightroom and Luminar 4.)
An image from the Oregon Coast, photographed in 2018. (Processed in Adobe Lightroom, sky added using Luminar 4.)
A waterfall in the Pacific Northwest, photographed in 2014. (Processed in Adobe Lightroom and Luminar 4.)
A photograph from the last time I had the opportunity to travel, back in 2018. (Processed in Adobe Lightroom and Luminar 4.)
With most travel on hold for the foreseeable future, I’m doing my best to stay engaged with my own photography and not let my creativity come to a halt. Making new photos is not only essential to creating tutorials, stories, and eBooks, the process is also one that gives me a lot of happiness and keeps me motivated. While we are not completely incapable of creating new content, there are limitations and it’s been difficult to create at the same level I’m used to.
To keep my creative brain active, I’ve been going through many of my older photographs and finding some of the hidden gems I glossed over soon after I created them. It’s fun going back with fresh eyes, and another benefit is that I am always growing as a photographer which means I now see things a little bit differently. Photos I once thought were boring or had no potential may now seem compelling and beautiful.
Below are the before and after images of some of the images I have been working on. All of these images were processed using both Adobe Lightroom and Luminar. If you would like to see more of my photographs, please visit my Instagram account (@nicolesy).
I live so close to Mount Rainier National Park, yet the last time I visited was in 2015. I didn’t have much luck with this image at sunset, so I used Luminar 4 to add one of my other sunset skies to the scene. (Processed using Lightroom and Luminar 4.)
This is a photograph from the Big Island, Hawaii, photographed in 2013. I have so many beautiful sunset images from my trips to Hawaii that I never took the time to process. It feels good looking back and reminiscing on the beautiful landscape I witnessed in this location. (HDR processed in Lightroom, with final touches added using Luminar 4.)
Another photograph from Mount Rainier. This was from a hike I did and the sun started created a light beam that poured over the sky. I replaced the sky with something more interesting using Luminar 4. (Processed in Adobe Lightroom and Luminar 4.)
An image from the Oregon Coast, photographed in 2018. (Processed in Adobe Lightroom, sky added using Luminar 4.)
A waterfall in the Pacific Northwest, photographed in 2014. (Processed in Adobe Lightroom and Luminar 4.)
A photograph from the last time I had the opportunity to travel, back in 2018. (Processed in Adobe Lightroom and Luminar 4.)
Nicole is a photographer, published author, and educator specializing in Lightroom, Photoshop, and photography. She is best known for her books on food photography but is widely versed in various photographic genres, including landscape, nature, stock, travel, and experimental imagery.
Beautiful photographs, Nicole! I really like how you developed them with Luminar (as well as LR). With the newer editions of software coming out such as Luminar and On1, it is so much fun to see how to turn a ‘blah’ photo into a ‘wow’ photo. So glad you showed the possibilities.
Wonderful! I’m going to start going through my old shots and use Luminar to see what it may reveal! A perfect project for these slow COVID summer months…
Thanks Nicole!
BTW, how did your move work out?
Michael
The move went well … I’m in a tiny apartment—temporarily—until I can find a suitable house to buy. I’m hoping to move out to the Oregon countryside (to have more privacy, nature, plus space for all of my hobbies), so it’s taking a bit longer to find the perfect place. :)
Hi Nicole,
I think a lot of have been spending time sorting through images from the past and experimenting with new software like Luminar. I spent a few weeks just looking at folders of images in Lightroom and adding and updating keywords, I was surprised at how many I had missed. It also gave me the opportunity to add images to new collections I created that should also help me find shots when I can’t remember where or when I took them.
Stay well! Oh and by the way, I’ve been following you since the early days of Google+, I just don’t comment very often.