Everything in Bob Ross’s world was happy. There were no mistakes, only “happy accidents.” The sky would be filled with “happy little clouds,” and he absolutely loved his “happy little trees.” When I was growing up, I enjoyed watching his PBS television show The Joy of Painting. I would watch it every Saturday morning, and, in fact, I still do.
I recently took a trip to Blanchard Springs looking for some autumn leaves. I hoped that the cooler weather would entice the leaves to change. Of course, it didn’t work out quite like I had expected. As I was walking around in search of my elusive quarry, I came across this location. It immediately triggered my inner Bob Ross because the very first thing that went through my mind was “happy little trees.”
One of my worst photographic habits is to see something I want to photograph and photograph it without taking my time to pay attention to the details. Then, when I get home and review the files, I will find distracting branches that cut across the frame, a background that is junky, or some other nuisance.
Sometimes, I can fix the problem in Photoshop, but it would have been so much better if I had slowed down and taken the time to make sure everything was exactly as I wanted before I pressed the shutter button.
When I saw this scene, I had a very clear idea of what I wanted to capture, and I set up my camera and tripod. But, this time, I remembered to slow down and look at what I had actually framed. That’s when I noticed a dark branch that ran across the composition. While it was a small branch, it’s dark color made it very prominent and distracting.
I adjusted my location several times in order to frame the scene the way I wanted without the distracting branch. It took several minutes before I finally found the one spot where I could get a shot that was free of any distracting elements. Then, I pressed the shutter button.
When I captured the scene, I already had a clear idea that I wanted the final image to remind me of a painting, something that Bob Ross might have done. To achieve the look I was aiming for, I lightened the picture as much as possible without overexposing the highlights and brightened and saturated the colors of the leaves. I reduced the overall texture and clarity which softened the image and gave it look of a painting. Finally, I cropped the image into a 1:1 square to convey the impression of a canvas.