"Macro" - My Eye

I am enjoying a half-day today because of another snow storm. Actually, this one was more of an ice event, which means tricky driving so I was sent home from work early.

I had planned to go outside and take some nice nature shots, but well, it's cold out there. And icy. And the light is very flat. And it's cold.

Instead I decided to set up the living room to take some pictures of my eye. Without a tripod I made a truly comical assembly of tables, children's toys, and mirrors so that I could keep the camera steady and see what was happening on the other side of the camera.

If I hadn't been alone in the house I would have documented it as part of the process.

I took several photos, but had trouble getting the camera to focus on my iris. The closest I came was this one, so I decided to work with it.

Please try to ignore the massive dark circle under my eye, wrinkles, and permanent sun damage. I swear, I didn't spend my youth worshiping the sun. I'm just a ginger.

In order to make the photo more dramatic and interesting in terms of this assignment I decided to essentially crop myself out of it.

So this is the base photo I used to play with.

I like it, if for no other reason than that I effectively took away the tired smudge from below my eye.

Look at me! I suddenly got about 4 more hours of sleep last night!

The first thing I did was try a few basic edits to make the photo prettier.

I made the whole photo a little brighter, increased the contrast, and sharpened it a bit.

Not surprisingly, I like this one a whole lot better. I think that I might have taken a few years off of my eye.

Works for me.

But then again, I'm nothing if not dedicated to realism, so I went back to the original and tried to make it dark and...unpleasant.

I added a lot of sharpness to the lines and edges, made the colors darker, and then I added a whole lot of graininess to it.

I really love this one. Edgy.

Last, I went back to the original again and tried a B&W version of me.

I started with a basic B&W application, then I ran it through a filter, which helped to brighten the eye a bit. A little fiddling with the highlight and shadow, and here's what I had:

I just love the drama of B&W. Everything looks cooler and the contrasts are more pronounced.

In the end, I really like all three edits. I'll be sad when this week is over. Macro shots are my favorite.