Memory Montage Lightroom Class

You all know that I got a new camera this year, a pretty sweet DSLR that I LOVE.  I think the level of my pictures has really gone up thanks to the f/1.8 lens for those close up shots and the 18-55 mm lens did a great job on my trip to London and most recently to the beach.  Yes, we went to the beach after all this summer.  Well, it was October but it felt like August!  The weekend was sunny and the skies were clear (without the usual fog that accompanies clear skies at the beach)!  We were able to watch the sun set over the water and saw the green flash both times!  We also walked down to Sea Level Bakery + Coffee every morning for cappuccinos and the most amazing Maple Bourbon Pecan Cinnamon rolls you have ever eaten.  The coffee was so pretty on the top and I NEVER took a single picture!  Arrghhh!  What is wrong with me?!  The mantra of all lifestyle bloggers is:  Photograph your food before you eat it!  The weekend was just really fantastic and all because Surfsand Resort was having a deal on limited view rooms.  Even though we weren't in our favorite oceanfront room it was an amazing weekend (and the fact that we only paid what we usually pay for 1 night oceanfront and got 3 nights in return really helped).  The dogs were happy to get a weekend of our undivided attention and we were happy to walk the beach and smell the salty air.

Right before we left I had found out that a local photography studio was having a weekend "Photography Essentials" class.  Memory Montage Photography hosts these classes a few times a year and in the spring I'd missed it.  Well it turns out I was going to have to miss this one too because it was on a Saturday I worked (the one of the 12 hour shift as it turns out).  They also had a "Lightroom Class" on a Tuesday that I would be able to make.  I really do want to learn how to get myself off of Auto mode on my camera and now I know I really need to start shooting in RAW, but mostly my photos are okay.  There had been some thought to just starting with some editing to make them better and I wasn't sure which software to use.  The Lightroom software was big on the Pinterest boards and I'd heard good things from my Uncle Fred (the sounding board for all things tech related to make sure I'm not choosing poorly) so I went ahead and bought it.  Yesterday was my class and it was awesome!  The things you can do to make a good picture a great picture with this software is incredible.  And the class helped me be able to jump right in and get editing without having to read a boring manual (of which none was provided with the software).  I've forgotten how fun it is to learn something you are interested in and how eager you can feel about something.  All day today I wanted to get home and start editing!  If anyone wants to learn more about Lightroom I highly recommend their class.  And now without further ado, some photos I edited from my recent trip to the beach, along with their unedited counterparts underneath.  They were all from a sunset walk and I wanted to capture the feeling of the intense low angle sunlight.