Monday, January 25, 2010

Weird Gradient Map that I thought was interesting.

This picture was supposed to be a cool shot with neon signs behind the bike. I planned to make the neon really jump out, but the lighting really sucked on this one. Once again the beauty of Photoshop showed up and let me screw around with a crappy photo until it was at least interesting if not good ;-)

The Old West Near Bessemer, Alabama


I guess this used to be some kind of store sometime ago, but is just an abandoned building now. I like it because it looks like one of those old buildings from the old western movies. If you look close you might be able to tell where I edited out the for sale sign, but I tried to make it not too noticeable. A tree has fallen on the porch since I took this shot so it doesn't look as cool now, but it could be repaired. It's out in the middle of nowhere on one of the windy back roads I like to ride so I can understand why it didn't stay in business, but maybe someone can revive it.

Where it all began!

This pic is from the corner looking at the building where Sun Studios is located. This door goes into the waiting area for tours, it used to be a cool diner and still has the booths and counter top, really cool place and leads to the gift shop upstairs. The actual studio is down the sidewalk and is really just a couple of rooms in this old building, but for just being a room, the place has a REALLY cool vibe. You can feel a strange energy in there. The studio is so cool that bands STILL record stuff there although all the old equipment has been replaced with digital stuff now. U2 even recorded "Rattle and Hum" here as well as some other great modern artists. Why wouldn't you want to record in the same studio where Elvis, Johnny Cash, Carl Perkins and many other greats got started. This is holy ground my friends! http://www.sunstudio.com/

Monday, January 11, 2010

Now you see her, Now you don't



Here is the other side of Blaine's '69 Sporty I promised earlier. However I didn't want his ex-wife in the pic so I took her out (if only real life was that easy). In this pic you can see how he used the old 50's style microphone as a tail light, he also custom made the sissy bar. Blaine was one creative SOB (R.I.P.). For this pic I used a combination or area selection, layers, eraser and clone tool to take her and her friend out of the picture. Some pics you can do this too, some are just not compatible with this kind of stuff and you can always tell when those pictures have been modified. I'm sure if you look hard enough you'll see artifacts of what I did, but I think I did a pretty good job on this one. I posted the original so you can see what I did. Post a comment and let me know what you think and don't forget you can click on the pic for the larger view.

My '70 Triumph

Just a picture I dig. I like how the extreme background washed out, but the bike stayed sharp and colorful. Too bad my bike doesn't look like this anymore. I loved the look of this springer, but it was too short and had to go. Hopefully I can get another one of the correct length one day. For now, I'll just use that old Sportster front end I have laying around.

Friday, January 1, 2010

With the new tripod

This is a pic using the new tripod my Brother gave me. The lighting was bad so I couldn't get far enough away to do what I wanted, but I can see a little difference using the tripod and zoom. The lighting was really bad so I lightened up the picture until the bike looked pretty good, but by then the background was getting pretty ugly. At that point I decided to use the old trick of turning it black & white and make it look sepia toned. I think it worked pretty well. By the way, this is my current main ride, it's a 1995 HD Springer Softail "Bad Boy". They only made them for 3 years and less than 4,000 were made in this color in '95. I'll add more to the collection of bikes, but I'm not going to let this one get away, I wanted it for 14 years before money and opportunity came together for me to get one.

Another close up

Another picture of of me playing with close up and weird angles. This is the from cylinder and carburetor of my '77 Sporty. No effects, just close in.

The BatCycle


Here's a couple if pictures of the gas tank of my Honda Shadow. It was solid black when I got it and decided to add some fun to it. I decided to add the bats from the doors of the 1966 TV show Batmobile. The small bat was a carb cover a friend made for me. Both of these pictures are basically me just playing with close up weird angle shots. Nothing fancy, but I kinda like both of them.