Photo Challenge: Pets

Time for a new Brenda Photo Challenge! The theme is Pets.

One of the delights of living out in the countryside is having horses as next door neighbors. My favorite equine is Cosmos, a lovely Appaloosa with a gentle disposition. She always comes over to the fence when she sees me. After a treat of carrots or apples and a little petting, she doesn’t mind posing for the camera.

Here is Cosmos grazing for her lunch, with the beautiful Cumberland Mountains in the distant background. The camera settings were f/8, 1/200 second, and ISO 200.

The modified image below is a surprise! I learned a new Photoshop technique recently and decided to showcase the results. I framed a portion of the image to highlight Cosmos and converted the rest as black and white.

About a month after my surgery, my sweet hubby helped me walk out into the yard a little ways toward the vegetable garden. The sunflowers were starting to bloom, and he wanted to help cheer me up. I was weak, tired, and holding on to my cane and him for dear life. I brought my camera and managed to take a few half-hearted pictures of the sunflowers.

As hubby was helping me walk back to the house, out popped a rabbit from the garden! When he saw that we were moving in extreme slow motion, he stopped and paused about 30 feet away from us. With the late afternoon sun providing perfect lighting, I was able to capture the moment below. Marty, the infamous rabbit, was the magic medicine I needed that day. I went back to the house very tired, but happy to have a rabbit patiently pose for me. The photo was taken at f/11, 1/100 second, and ISO 800.

And here is the special framing effect to highlight a rabbit resident at Grey Havens.