Photo Challenge #16

After playing along with Erin's 30 Word Thursday weekly challenge on her Treasures Found Blog for the past year I have finally taken the plunge and started taking photography more seriously.  Starting with my iPhone, I soon found that the limitations of that device were getting to me.  Upgrading to a Canon Eos Digital Rebel SL1 camera, I've started experimenting more with technique.  I have also invested in Photoshop Elements 12 and most of my post-production on photos will be from that program.  As a way to force myself to try new things, I'm doing a weekly photo challenge--each week focusing on a different photography or editing technique.  Some of these may be simple and others more difficult.  I encourage any of my readers to take part in the challenge!

OK, I finally missed one week's challenge.  I blame illness that interfered with my photo taking, editing, and posting.  Oh well, I eventually got here!

JABlog Photo Challenge #16: Photo Journalism

This week's challenge was to document an activity, sport, job, or something else in photo form.  I thought this was a good one to do to get me back into actively taking pictures instead of just using old ones from last summer.  The trick to taking pictures like this is to convey meaning without words to describe what you are seeing.  The other challenge is that you are taking these pictures on the fly without the ability to control the surroundings and lighting as much as you would in some other types of photography.

I recently realized that I only had a few pictures of my homebrewing set-up, and none that have been taken recently.  All the shots I did have available were from my iPhone.  I took this as an opportunity to document my main hobby.  And yes, I will describe what things are for the novice!  The biggest trick to doing this was trying to take pictures and actually do the brewing--the most interesting active parts of the job, I was unable to document well since I only have so many hands!  It was also very cold and I had to do this in the dimly lit and steamy garage.  Oh well!

First step is to take the base grain (Wyerman Pilsner) and measure out how much I need for the full batch.

Next up is to grind that grain using a power drill (or by hand if you want a work-out!)

What makes up 90% of beer?  Water!

Add heated water to the mash tun equipped with a false bottom

Now we have warm gloppy cereal!  Let this sit for an hour and let those enzymes break down the sugars for us...

Drain the final product (wort) into the brew pot, get to a boil and add hops...

And collect the cooled wort into a carboy!  All that is left is adding yeast and oxygen and giving it time to ferment!

So there you go, the best I could do!

An InLinkz Link-up

Next week I want to try to emulate the solarization, or Sabatier Effect, where dark and light are reversed in a photo.  This makes for a strange effect, but should be fun to mess around with!