Project 52: Week 10 - Disguised

These photo themes on the BBC News site are getting a bit challenging for me now. This week's was disguised which probably would've been okay had it come towards the end of October, but during the first full week of March meant it was tough to find something to actually photograph.

Perhaps I could have postponed my hair cut by a week to make it a self-portrait, showing me with my new hair style (and therefore in disguise), hehe. I don't really have any fancy dress costumes I could pull out and the weather's been a bit wet so I couldn't get out and about to look out for things in nature which could be classed as disguised.

A deer or bird hiding amongst foliage or trees was really my first choice, but on our regular Saturday walk it was spotting with rain so I didn't take my camera with me. We did see a deer but it didn't hang around very long so I probably wouldn't have gotten a photo of it even if I did have my camera.

In the end, I went with one of Mr Click's ideas. He picked up a balaclava for when he walks Tara along the seafront in cold wintery weather. I've warned him a couple of times that he'll have to watch out if he forgets to take if off before going into a shop because they'll mistake him for a robber... in disguise! Uh, yeah, I know, it's a bit of a tenuous link.

Week 10: Disguised

I wanted to go for something that looked a little bit like a mug shot. Mr Click wanted to take his glasses off but I though it looked kind of funny with the balaclava and the glasses so made him keep them on.

This looks quite good post-editing. I wanted a plain background so had Mr Click stand up against the kitchen door (which is plain white). I'd hoped I could avoid using the flash but that side of the room doesn't get the light as well as the other half so I increased the contrast slightly and reduced the highlight from the flash. I also reduced the saturation to make it a little paler.

This is how it looks straight out of camera:

I usually do a little bit of editing on my photos, not too much, because I'm lazy. I shoot everything in RAW format when I can so I can fiddle with the white balance. The main bits I'll change are contrast, highlight and saturation. Plus I might do a bit of cropping and then I'll usually reduce the size for on here and obviously convert it to JPG. I don't often go back and look at the original once I've got something I like but I think it's quite interesting to compare the difference like this.

Anyway, next week is Mozambique. I have no idea what I'm going to do for that. Suggestions on a postcard please!