Happy New Year

The end of another year is here. It was a great one too. We had a daughter get married. We gained a son in law. We had a son and a daughter get engaged. We had another daughter graduate high school, learn to drive and start college. We had a grand child learn to walk. We had another grand child learn to talk. We gained a new grand puppy. We had a great year of weddings and portraits. We have a lot to be thankful for. I hope everyone had as good a year as we did and I hope next year will be even better for you. I'd like to give out a special thank you to all our customers who support us and made this a great year too. Thank you and Happy New Year.

Caitlin & Isaac...their Storybook Wedding Album

Caitlin & Isaac | Make Your Own Book

Big SALE

For a limited time only. We are offering a super deal and great savings on wedding packages. See our main web site for details. Click here: The Portrait Gallery Niagara

Happy Holiday

We wish all our friends and family the very best. May you have a safe and happy holiday season filled with lots of love and joy. Merry Christmas everyone.

The Portrait Gallery Niagara: Special Offer

The Portrait Gallery Niagara: Special Offer

Special Offer

Get $5 off on your passport photos. Just mention you saw this ad on our blog and receive your discount today. Call for an appointment now. 716-297-3387

theportraitgalleryniagara.com

Beautiful Bokeh

This portrait of my daughter Christina was shot in our living room in front of the Christmas tree. I used a large aperture with an 85mm 1.8 lens to create this great out of focus background. The circles of light created from this technique are called bokeh. This helps give separation and makes Christina the focal point of the portrait. Click to enlarge.

Photoshop Lesson

Todays lesson is a quick non destructive way to dodge and burn to make your image pop. This method will give your images more modeling and add a 3D look to them. Import your image into Photoshop. Click Layers on the top menu tool bar. Click New > layer. In the pop up menu box set the mode to Overlay. Now check the box that says ( fill with overlay-neutral color 50% gray ). Go to your brushes palette and choose a soft brush. Start with a low opacity. Make sure your color tool bar is set to black and white. Now click the layer mask in your layers palette and paint your image. Remember black adds and white subtracts. Start with a low opacity and build your image up to the desired depth. As you can see in the sample images the top is a tad flat. By using this method you can non destructively add modeling to any image.