a few photos from the past week
June 5, 2013
It has been an intense week, as they all will be in June. I run a few summer programs and this year many of my trusted instructors have left this transient college town to pursue graduate degrees or for real jobs.
So there have been many evening and weekend meetings and trainings, and more responsibilities that others used to take on. I can’t sleep because I keep running through my head everything I have to do the next day. So, so, so, so many balls in the air. So many moving pieces. I have an excel spreadsheet of everything that needs to be done and for everything that I cross off the list, 3 more things are added.
Some days I feel tired of being at work, and just plain tired, and I want a different job. Some days I feel really excited and proud of what I’m doing.
Here are a few random photos from the few random hours I have been home:
1) Finnegan lying in the sun where he likes to lie.
2) I made this lemon buttermilk bundt cake from shutterbean.com. I don’t have a bundt pan, but I do have a rose cake pan. Delish! This was gone in 24 hours. My family of 4 did not share it with anyone. It was dessert, breakfast, snack and gone.
3) Can you see the spider on the edge of the glass? He was in our dining room. We don’t like to kill spiders in our house. It could have something, or everything, to do with E.B. White’s, “Charlotte’s Web”.
4) A long overdue thank you note to my friend Cathy for the Catherineholm fondu pot and vintage red purse she sent me for my birthday.
My daughter and I may go “up north” this weekend to my husband’s family’s cottage. Sandy beaches, no internet, blue water for as far as you can see, woods…I am both looking forward to it, and also feeling a stomach-churning anxiety about not being here to get more work done. I am trying to ignore my anxiety because my daughter really wants to go. She may not have another opportunity to go for awhile as her summer job starts a week from this Friday and she is taking a stats class. My son’s final exams are next week, so he and my husband are staying home. They will have more opportunities to go up north after this weekend.
I hope that if you also are experiencing stress in your life, that you are able to set aside some time for yourself and your family and that you are also feeling proud of the good work you are doing.
photos:
1) toys on my office windowsill
2) my old typewriter, I need to get a ribbon for it
3) wooden bunnies, i love they way the two pieces fit together, so simple, i also love the shadows, this was taken for a hard shadow assignment, but it also demonstrates shallow depth of field.
I took my camera outside at lunchtime last week to shoot this beautiful campus in its springtime glory. It took me more than a minute to remember all of the photography skills I had just learned in my photography class, which only ended a couple of weeks ago. Use it or lose it, I guess. So I will continue to review my photo 111 lessons here, with you, my unwilling pupil.
Shallow depth of field was an early assignment, which I felt like I had some success with. (I ended a sentence with a preposition right there. I know.) Shallow depth of field is used when you want an image where only a small part of the photo is in focus. See above.
The aperture is wide open for these shots, which is really counter intuitive isn’t it? You would think that opening up your lens means more light (yes) and more of the image in focus (no).
What I really like with shallow depth of field is that you can still get a good shot on a gray day without a flash or strobe or tripod, because your lens is wide open. Plus I like the way it can emphasize what you want to emphasize in a shot, and leave a little part of the story to unfold as the viewer makes it out.
One girl in my class took a beautiful close up shot of a blond Barbie doll’s face, chin titled sideways and slightly forward, blond pony tail high and sassy, not a hair out of place, lips slightly parted, a cheerful, vacuous look on her flawless face as her brilliant blue eyes stare off into space. The contrast of the blond barbie on the black background was really lovely…but then…there is something in the nearly black background… another Barbie…is she lying down? no wait! She is naked…and her hands and feet bound! What?! Naughty blond Barbie! Maybe that pretty little head is not filled with thoughts of shopping, the dream house and Ken after all. (Wait! I just realized those are the thoughts that fill MY head…well not Ken.)
photos:
1. paris apartment, http://www.dailymail.co.uk/ (complete url below)
2. susan b. anthony, and likeness, http://www.jaimemoorephotography.com (complete url below)
3. beauty in sunglasses, reposted from MasonBentleyStyle.com (complete url below)
1. Spring and Summer have arrived in Michigan! The trees are in bloom. It has been in the 80s (26/27C?) with a gentle breeze. We have the windows open at night and I sometimes get to fall asleep listening to Tiger’s baseball on the radio. I want time to stand still right now.
2. Speaking of time standing still…get happy looking at the photos of a Paris apartment that has been locked since the owner fled Paris during the Nazi occupation. She lived out her life elsewhere, never returning to this apartment. The apartment was opened and photographed after her death this year. Everything in it is precious.
3. These portraits and this post did make me happy…(scroll down past the wedding photography):
http://www.jaimemoorephotography.com/2013/05/09/not-just-a-girl/
…but after thinking about it, it would make me happier if we just didn’t dress up our girls in costumes for photos, and just took their pictures as they are…
4. Speaking of portraits, I love this post (and all of her posts) and these photos posted on the MasonBentleyStyle.com blog which features advertisement photos for, “Karen Walker’s sunglasses based on the inspirational ladies from Ari Seth’s Advanced Style Blog.”
http://masonbentleystyle.com/2013/05/17/what-do-you-see-2/
5. I have seen more and more cartoons poking fun of the little stick figure family decals on the backs of cars (and when I say car, you know I mean minivan). This was the best one I’ve seen:
http://xkcd.com/946/
6. Finally, the dear lady at The Vintage Postcard Blog nominated me for a Pirate’s Admiration Award, which I will properly acknowledge this weekend. Like her, I knew nothing about the award. I cannot find any history or origin of the award on Google, but it seems to be an award, motivated by kindness, to acknowledge and support bloggers. You get nominated, you feel the glow, you play it forward. While the award does not include a trip around the world, or a contract with, well, anyone…to know that someone, even one person, out there reads and likes my blog— makes me happy.
Happy weekend! I hope you have blue skies and sunshine wherever you are.
photo 111: assignment 2, stop motion
April 26, 2013
Another installment from my photography class. I only have 3 more classes and one more assignment, “Love”. Tricky.
I wasn’t so fond of my results on this Stop Motion assignment. Not for lack of a beautiful and cooperative subject…It was me, and very dark, grey winter days. (These were taken in January.)
The top one, the hair photo, was the one I turned in. You can see my dear niece was so willing to try anything in the cold snow! She’s 11 and has such a great spirit. Can you tell by her outfit? Neon, glitter Uggs, monster hat. In retrospect I’m wondering if eliminating one of the brightest colors would have improved the shots. It would have been something to try.
I also tried tossing some flowers up in the air…but I just couldn’t get the focus. And now I see I need to correct the color in the tree branches, which I now know how to do in Lightroom using the Lens Correction: Remove Chromatic Abberation tool.
One of the photos I liked the best from my classmates was a shot taken of a young woman in a swing…the shot was taken from the ground so she was framed against a blue sky (he went out on the right day). Her swing was twisting, she was laughing, her curly hair was flying…and he had specifically asked her to wear a red jacket. The red jacket against a bright blue sky was perfect. Hmmm. Another lesson from a classmate: If you’re going to direct a shot, then direct the shot!
Our next assignment was panning motion which was a giant fail for me. Maybe I’ll try to take more of those before posting.
photo 111: assignment 1, he is the eggman
April 18, 2013
photos
1) this is the one I matted and turned in: eggs in a tubtrugs bucket with old green onions peeled from the bottom of the vegetable drawer, winter, sunday morning light
2) outtake: egg on “radioactive: marie & pierre curie: a tale of love and fallout” by lauren redniss. redniss is a “graphic biolgrapher” and if you have not seen her books, you should. gorgeous.
3) outtake: eggs in bowl my sister-in-law made. do you think our windows need a little work…ugh.
In January I signed up for an introductory photography class at our local community college. Blogging was a motivator, but also, I was looking for something that would interest my teenage son, something that would get him off of his computer. He was interested, so we signed up together. Since he is only 15, and dyslexic, I wanted to take the class with him to make sure he wasn’t in over his head. Turns out he helps me more than I help him. (Turns out we also have to keep one empty seat between us in class so we don’t argue.)
We have an assignment every week that we edit, print and mount on matte board in class on Monday night. On Wednesday nights in addition to a technical lecture on our camera, or Lightroom, we have a critique. Our work is displayed anonymously and we have to vote on which photos we like the best—with the idea that clusters of votes will help illuminate key elements to a good photograph.
The matted photos are pinned to a bulletinboard/wall and the instructor puts a push pins above each photo that gets votes, one push pin per vote. Then we go in order, from the most push pins to the least talking about our process and getting critiqued.
I have had many weeks with no pins (votes), but two weeks ago my son and I tied for most votes. He gets votes almost every week and frequently gets the most votes. Once I told him it is even more exciting for me, as a mom, when he gets votes, than if I do. His response was, “No! You don’t get to claim credit for my work! No!”
For our egg assignment, we had to take a photo of an egg with the goal of getting a well-exposed, sharp image. I liked my image and technically it was good. But it received no votes from my classmates. My son put his egg on our pool table and had it in the foreground sharply focused and all of the colored pool balls in the background out of focus. He received many votes. One girl broke an egg in the snow and had a small LED flashlight illuminate it from underneath. There was a layer of snow between the egg and the light. The whole critique was really eye opening to me. Think creatively, or, take the egg out of the kitchen.
We only have 3 more weeks left and both my son and I are sad it’s coming to an end. As much as missing the photography class, I will miss the time with my son. He will get his driver’s license at the end of the summer, and it’s clear to me he can handle the classwork on his own. He is planning to take another photography class in the fall, without his mom. Of course, as a mom, I am proud of his growth toward independence, and I will let him know this, at the risk of him accusing me of claiming credit.
Whats making me happy this week 04.05.13: boy shorts, dad guitars, and fluorescent adolescence
April 5, 2013
photos:
1. old dogs, as good as they get
2. cowboy songs
3. singer, from tom huffey’s “mirror” series
I sure would like to know what’s making you happy this week!
In the meantime, here’s what’s making me happy this week:
1. Mani/pedi AND I used a LivingSocial coupon. Happy!
2. NPRs Story Corps podcast. If you ever need your faith in humanity restored, listen. They are short, too short, but I am so moved by these I cry at…every…single…story. Does that make me happy? Yes, it does.
3. Body by Gap boy short undies that came in the mail this week. Yes indeed, new pretty underwear makes me happy! TMI? I know it makes other women happy. Does new underwear ever make men happy?
4. Cowboy songs by the Cactus Blossoms. I volunteered at the Ark this week and had no idea who the performers were. These fresh-faced brothers were the warm-up band. They had me at the first few notes of their sweet cowboy harmonies.
5. Not sure if Tom Hussey’s “Mirror” series makes me happy, but they make me something…introspective? This is how I see myself when I look in the mirror, so much younger than what the world sees. In my mirror, I’m still wearing braces.
6. My son reminded me of the Dad guitar scene from Flight of the Conchords. If you haven’t seen Flight of the Conchords, you will likely not find this funny…But you should get the FotC DVDs…really.
7. I’m finally reading George Saunders. Not “Tenth of December,” according to the New York Times, “the best book you’ll read this year” -which I think was last year. Instead I’m reading “Civilwarland in Bad Decline,” as recommended by Glen Weldon from Pop Culture Happy Hour. I’m happy that I am finally reading the celebrated Saunders. My name finally came up on the library wait list. Is the book making me happy? No. I do get why Saunders is so fêted, but his satire is so close to the edge in my mind, that to me, the stories are equal parts funny, smart and terrifying.
8. I watched Skyfall and Casino Royale with my boy (and wrote about it).
9. My boy and spouse are spending the week in DC and are having a great time! I’m smiling right now just thinking about it. And very soon I will be hitting the road to visit my dear daughter for the weekend, also making happy!
10. The Humans of New York FB feed always makes me happy, but it’s this poem by a student, Fluorescent Adolescence, I found on HONY this week that I thought was pretty fantastic. I wish I had the author’s name.
Sometimes youth is not wasted on the young.
flora margaret 