31 Days of July – Photography Challenge – Day 3

July 3, 2025 / Donna Robinson Photography / 3 Comments

Day 3 – Shout out to our small-town and home-grown patriotism. I always love seeing this big, beautiful flag flying.

Field Notes: Focal Length – 65mm; Exposure 1/2000 sec; f 6/3; ISO 500

Until next time!

~donna

31 Days of July – Photography Challenge Day 2

July 2, 2025 / Donna Robinson Photography / 3 Comments

Day 2, meet Thomas. He’s not our cat but shows up every day around 6:30a.m. and oftentimes lingers throughout the day. He perches himself on this table and quietly guards the bird feeders. Believe it or not, the birds are no longer disturbed by him and quietly feed while he watches and sleeps.

He’s a protector of the feeders and our back porch. His only request is a pet of his belly and a few scratches behind his ears.

Field Notes: Focal Length 105mm; Exposure 1/30; f5/6; ISO 640; Time of Day: 12:40p.m. EST.

Until next time,

~donna

31 Days of July – Photography Challenge – Day 1

July 1, 2025 / Donna Robinson Photography / 4 Comments

I’ve been feeling a void in taking pictures lately. I don’t know why, but somehow, I haven’t felt very inspired. My camera has sat in the cabinet for over a month and the only pictures I have taken have been with my cell phone. It’s “ok” but I knew I needed to push myself and pull out the “real” camera. So, what better way to challenge myself than to start a 30-Day Photography Challenge. Since July has 31 days, let’s just call it a 31-Day Photography Challenge. 😉

Here’s to Day 1, a Gray House Finch hanging out on the bird feeder.

Wish me luck.

~donna

Macro Monday – Reflections of a Limelight Hydrangea

June 9, 2025June 7, 2025 / Donna Robinson Photography / 4 Comments

“Adopt the pace of nature. Her secret is patience.”

~Ralph Waldo Emerson

Lens Artist Challenge #350 – Zooming

May 30, 2025May 29, 2025 / Donna Robinson Photography / 8 Comments

Anne challenges us this week with one of my all-time ICM (Intentional Camera Movement) techniques……Zooming. It’s fun, challenging and the results can be quite spectacular. You can learn more about the specific technique in Anne’s post.

It’s been a while since I played around with zooming, so when Anne’s challenge came out, I took the opportunity to take some new images. It took me a couple of shots to get the hang of it again, but I really like how these Lilypad images turned out.

In the first image below, I like how a single leaf is in focus and the rest of the leaves show increasing movement from there.

Creatively cropping your images can also give you some added depth and movement. The image below reminds me of a kaleidoscope.

There are so many fun things you can do when editing your zooming images. In the photo below, I applied the “Orton Effect” and also added a little more blur. I like the brighter, dreamy look to the image on the right.

For my last image, I have cropped it a little differently and applied a “watercolor” texture. I feel like I’m in the middle of a wheat filed with the one on the right.

Thank you, Anne for the reminder of this fun technique. I can’t wait to keep applying it to other photos.

Ritva leads next week so be sure you’re subscribed to her site The World as I See It when she posts the challenge Saturday, noon EST.

Until next time,

~donna

Cellpic Sunday – Turtle at Flat Creek

May 25, 2025May 25, 2025 / Donna Robinson Photography / 9 Comments

I may have mentioned that I rarely take my camera with me on our daily walks. They’re long and the camera gets to be a little much to carry at times, especially when it’s hot. Thankfully, I always have my cell phone to capture our encounters with Mother Nature.

One day, a couple of weeks ago as we were heading back to the car, I heard a rustling noise. I knew it wasn’t a squirrel or bird because it was more of a slow-moving rustling and sounded like something crawling over and through the brush. I looked to my right and saw a huge turtle. The huge kind of turtle you approach cautiously. I pulled out my phone and snapped off a couple of photos. He just sat there, patiently not moving.

“Take a walk with a turtle and behold the world in pause.”

~Bruce Feiler

The original photos were fine, but I knew I could make them a little better in Photoshop Elements.

With both photos I first cropped them and then removed the haze. This made them a little sharper and gave them each more defined/richer colors. I then used the Depth of Field Tool, the Orton Tool, the Vignette Tool, added a few color corrections and eliminated some brush that was a distraction to the eye (I’ve used the “compare slider” to help you see the before and after).

I really like how these turned out as the turtle has a “fairy tale” look about him. What do you think?

Posted for Journeys with John Cell Pic Sunday.

Until next time,

~donna

Lens Artist Challenge #349 – The First Thing I Thought Of…

May 20, 2025May 20, 2025 / Donna Robinson Photography / 21 Comments

“There is nothing in the world so irresistibly contagious

as laughter and good humor.” ~Charles Dickens

Tina leads this week and invites us to share some humor with our photos, by providing our first reaction. Many times, when I capture photos of birds or animals, I already have some catchy caption in mind. Follow along and you’ll see what I mean.

Let’s talk about horses. Those wonderful, graceful creatures that have deep souls and sometimes quirky personalities:

**“I sure do wish the judges would hurry up! I’m sleepy.”**

Who says birds have to be “of a feather” to flock together?

Perhaps they’re also a little on the shy side and like hanging out by themselves, especially during bathtime.

“If we couldn’t laugh we would all go insane.”

~ Robert Frost

Let’s not forget the chipmunks. We could sit for hours watching them scurry around the yard gathering food.

Dogs do the darndest things, too!

Thank you, Tina for encouraging us to find the humor in our images.

If you’d like to participate in this week’s challenge, be sure to link back to Tina’s original post and use the Lens-Artist Tag.

Anne from Slow Shutter Speed leads next week challenge.

Until next time,

~donna

Lens Artist Challenge #347 – Break the Rules

May 7, 2025May 7, 2025 / Donna Robinson Photography / 19 Comments

Did someone say, “break the rules?” Why, YES! Yes, they did! Ritva leads this week, and she is challenging us to break the rules of photography! As Ritva goes on to say in her challenge, “Photography is as much about emotion and instinct to me as it is about technical skill. In those moments when we abandon the constraints of traditional guidelines, we open ourselves up to unexpected and beautiful outcomes in my case many times by mistake.”

So, what rules have I broken?

Perfect Patterns: This little seagull greeted us one morning when we were in Malibu many years ago. He was so cute, and I couldn’t resist taking the photo before he flew away. Goodness knows I wasn’t even thinking about the rules I was breaking (look at all the squares, lines, rectangles and diamonds). I just wanted the shot.

Rule of Thirds: Next up, a macro shot gone bad. During a visit to the Atlanta Botanical Gardens, I was experimenting with my new macro lens. I don’t remember what type of plant this was, I just saw an opportunity to practice shooting macro from a top-down view of the bud. The end result looks a little bit like something floating in outer space. I still thought it was a pretty cool shot, so I kept it.

Don’t Shoot into the Sun: A very BIG rule was broken on the next image, but quite honestly it couldn’t be helped. When you’re lucky enough to have an airshow fly directly over your house you have no time to think and have to be very quick with your shot. Because they are flying directly above you, it’s almost impossible not to shoot into the sun. What really works about this image is the silhouette of the pilots.

Blurry Photos: My last image of broken rules was a poor attempt at catching a Mourning Dove bathing in the bird bath. Instead, he took off and I caught him in mid-flight. Yep, the image is blurry, but do you see what I see?

What photography rules have you broken lately where you opened yourself up to an unexpected and beautiful outcome?

Be sure to check-out Ritva’s original post to view her wonderful examples of broken rules. Next week, Edigio (Through Brazilian Eyes) leads.

If you want to know more about the Lens-Artists Challenge, please click here.

Until next time!

~donna

Wordless Wednesday

May 7, 2025May 3, 2025 / Donna Robinson Photography / Leave a comment

Deer in the Woods, Line Creek Nature Reserve, Peachtree City, GA

Lens Artist Challenge #346 – Cinematic

May 2, 2025May 2, 2025 / Donna Robinson Photography / 14 Comments

I have to admit, I don’t think I’ve ever consciously thought about shooting cinematic photos. But after reading Sofia’s challenge and pouring through my archives I found that sometimes my photos do have a “cinematic” feel to them. Sofia writes, “There are a few things that give a photo that cinematic feel: camera angles, bold and high-contrast colors, light, locations, just to name a few. The main objective is to take a shot that is part of a story, there’s mood and a sense of location; our image is but a snapshot of a much wider situation.” You can read Sofia’s challenge, here.

So, what did I uncover in my archives? Let’s take a look.

I’ve always loved this photo. It was taken during a sunrise over Atlanta, probably during the Fall season, because of the mist rising from the Chattahoochee River. I love the varied colors and how the sun gives them a slightly golden tone. This photo could easily be an opening or closing scene in a movie.

How about a shot of this beautiful East Lake Golf Club, Clubhouse. I remember taking this photo and thinking it would make a great post-card or large format photo. But as I look more closely, I could see this as an opening shot for the Tour Championship. Can’t you just hear the voice over of the announcers talking about the players and the upcoming events for the day?

Talk about lighting, mood and the image being a snapshot of a wider situation. This wedding image has always been one of my favorite shots from this particular ceremony. I wasn’t allowed to bring my camera into the sanctuary during the actual ceremony, so my assistant and I went up into the balcony. I’m so thankful we were banned from the sanctuary because I wouldn’t have been able to get this special shot. How many movies have you seen with “cathedral style” weddings?

My closing few shots takes us back to downtown Atlanta. Our views of the storms that rolled through the city were amazing. Anyone of these could have easily come from a movie where a storm was integral to the storyline; lightning strikes, rolling rain clouds, showers in the distance at dawn. Each offering up its own “ominous mood.”