Chasing the Blues away with the Sprout! workshop

Right or wrong, "let sleeping dogs lie" is one of my mottos. Sometimes it works out because matters resolve itself through the passage of time. Sometimes the longer you ignore it, the more it perpetuates. Wise is the person who knows the difference when to take action (or inaction).

But surely, the attitude of "letting it be" wouldn't do justice to the team of people who made the Sprout! Workshop on Blogging and Photography so enriching for everyone that it left me so inspired to resurrect this blog.

At Sungei Buloh Welands reserve, participants got the chance to learn what the old days of pre-blogging was like as Mr Sivasothi set the Chek Jawa story as the context. Mr Kenneth Pinto then delved into how blogging can be used in more ways than just an online journal. These friendly people even shared with me more ways I can spice up and check up students' originality for my online assignments. Next Ms Ria shared the mammoth online resource for Singapore nature that is wildsingapore.

After lunch, Ms Colleen Goh and the Macromaniacs team shared some techniques of macrophotography and that blew me away too. Unfortunately, my point and shoot camera may not be able to achieve what she can, but at least the workshop taught me some helpful tips including one that I'll share here.

I have a repository of blur colour cast photos as I have little ideas about what white balance is, (until the Sprout! workshop that is!). So of course all my underwater photos turn out blue! I'll share a tip about how to correct it using GIMP, and would welcome any feedback on a better way to remove the blue colour cast.

Here's the original photo.

For Gimp users, go to Tools> Colour Tools > Levels.


Alternative #1

Drag the black triangle to where the start of the histogram is so that you are squeezing the range. And you are done after clicking "Ok".


Alternative #2

Or you could click on the black and white dropper, and click them on the picture where white and black are supposed to be, respectively, to give the picture a base point for what is supposed to be black and white.


The photo now with the blue colour cast removed. Not perfect, but a definite change.


I have not come across an explanation for "curves" command that I can understand adequately as a GIMP newbie, as I am still hazy about how to move the curve around and how much to move them (or even the rationale for it).

Can any GIMP user tell me a better way to do this? Or should I (sadly) let my photos lie undisturbed in my computer in its blue colour cast glory, and just bring a white slate the next time?