366: Day 31

It's a been a whole month. One month of 2012 - poof - gone. It's been an awful month. And an amazing month. All at the same time, how can that be? I guess that's life.

Three good things: business taxes are done, school meeting is done, and... I think... just maybe... the kid is starting to feel a little better. I sure hope I'm right about that.

Texture Tuesday

I have two for Texture Tuesday. Both use Kim Klassen's "Simplicity" texture, plus others.

366: Day 30

Three good things: finding out that the kid does not in fact, have mono.... a new stronger type of antibiotics to try, and... one more day to get state taxes completed.






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366: Day 29

Three good things: a win for my son's soccer team (they are number 8 in the state in the second round of state cup), discovering how great the french press is when the coffee is ground just right, and laughing at the silly chickens.

366: Day 28

Three good things: finding the only flowers in the yard, checking things off my list, and gluten-free takeout pizza. 

More Texture Play

This first picture is one of my sister's, she takes amazing people pictures, and has a real gift with lighting. I don't know how she does it. This is Ashley, my little niece. I added a few layers of texture to it, to make it feel old and treasured. 

and this is an old dandelion photo, it looks better big - go ahead, click on it!

366: Day 27

Three good things: antibiotics from the doctor, tulips from the grocery store, and sunshine streaming from the sky.

Beyond Layers: Week 2 Part 2

I made this using a combination of these two photos of mine, one from a lake in Oregon, the other, a bird in Florida. Plus, Kim's Plaster Squared texture, and a Flypaper texture.

 

366: Day 26

Three good things: a dentist appointment that is 6 months out, a fixed blog, and a boy who is feeling a little better.



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366: Day 25

Three good things: if you ruin your blog, you can always try to fix it tomorrow, Theo's chocolate with cherries and almonds, a boy who went to bed feeling a little better than when he got up.



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Beyond Layers, Week Two Part 1

Six Word Memoir (Story of My Life):

It looked better in my head.

What's yours?

Beyond Layers, Week One

I signed up for Kim Klassen's Beyond Layers class this morning. I was so excited... it's a year long class all about photography and PhotoShop and creativity... should be fun. But first I had to catch up, I'm about a week and a half behind, I guess. Do-able.

The first assignment was to write your creative story, which as it turns out, I kind of did yesterday... at least my creative story as far as photography goes. So, check!

Next up was a creative assignment to "keep it simple" - we were given a background texture and told that "less is more". Well, if you know me, less is never more. So. I started getting grumpy. I mean, really. White is not a color! I had just gotten through complaining about the latest "Country Living" magazine that is all about neutrals. The whole issue is WHITE. What fun is that? Give me color, give me texture and I'm happy happy happy. You can only imagine how hard this was going to be for me now, right? Keep it simple, less is more, lighten up. Gah! <-- that's me pulling my hair out!

Sigh. (See, this is what I was afraid of when I signed up for the class... Kim's pictures are all soft and pale and pretty and delicate and romantic and so different from... well, everything *I* make. I was hoping it wasn't going to turn out to be a class learning how to make our photos look like hers... and I'm still pretty sure it's not going to be that... because she has skills! Mad skills.... skills I might learn from and use in my own way, that is actually one of the things that excited me - she doesn't have a style that I'm at all tempted to copy - not that her photos aren't drool-worthy - but they aren't *me*. If I can figure out how to take those skills and do things my way... then.... it will be ok...)

So. I went through my old photo files. I looked at some of the creations I'd made in the past few days and thought, huh, I guess this might be what she means by over-done. I could try again and do less.... I guess. Or, not. I grabbed a few items from around the house and went and shot a few photos in my lightbox (which felt like work and made me even grumpier.) I went back to my old photo files. I moaned and groaned. And finally, I went outside to see what the yard had to offer. That was much better. The bird feeders needed filling, the chickens all came around and chatted at me like they hadn't seen me in days... it wasn't raining... it wasn't white! A lot of brown though. And green. But, not much interesting. I walked around... I snapped a few photos. I came back in and made myself a smoothie... and then I sat down and said, ok, keep it simple, Pam.

And this is what I made. (You can click on the photos to see them enlarged.)

First up, an old photo, a very old photo... a magnolia blossom. Kim's "Awaken" texture, at 50% opacity, overlay.



and the original file:



(OK, so that didn't hurt... but it's not very exciting.)

This next photo got an "oh, yeah" from me when I was surveying my memory card haul. So... why not. It's not light or bright, but if you think about it, less is more here... it's still beautiful, even as it fades and decays. Right? My interpretation.

Texture layer at 60% overlay.



And the original:



So far so good. But in the back of my mind, I kept hearing a little nagging voice (complaining?) that Kim had used her texture file at 100% opacity. How did she do that? My photos kept getting crazy bright and ugly when I tried that. But... I wasn't going to give up... I was going to figure this out. And on this photo, I made it work.

100% Opacity; Soft Light. Yes! To me, this one needs... something more, I don't love the composition, though I do like the subject. And I like what the texture at 100% did for it. So, I'm stopping, because less is more. Maybe. Maybe... sometimes.



and the original:

366: Day 24

Three things: the Northern Lights (if only there were no clouds tonight), help baby sea turtles get to the sea, climb Machu Picchu.



That is a manipulated image on my iphone of one of my old paintings, and this, is an even more manipulated one from my computer using Photoshop.

Texture Tuesdays

(Edited to add: I just started Kim Klassen's Beyond Layers e-class - a week or so late - and the first assignment is to write our creative story. I think this can be mine... there's more to it of course. Glass bead making, jewelry making, fits and starts with painting... trying different things at different times. Waiting for time and freedom to create until I about burst and just do it. Lots of that. Lots of waiting. Too many projects started and never finished... supplies, supplies, supplies. And of course mixed in with all of that is parenthood, and healing from illness, and life. It's probably not that much different than anyone else's story.)

The story:

Once upon a time, there was a girl who took lots and lots of pictures. First she filled shoe boxes up with prints and negatives... and as time went on she filled her computer up with them and plastered the internet with them, and she was happy. Then she started taking pictures of her beads, in order to sell them online, and photography became "work"... and she stopped taking pleasure in it and started only using her nice camera for that. Everything else was shot with the iPhone.

One day she saw that a bunch of her blogging friends were doing a year long iPhone photo challenge - one a day - and she thought "Oh, cool, I can do that!" but a few days into that she got bored. So she downloaded some fun photo editing apps and went to town. But then she thought, "how much better would it be if I had more control over this process?" and so she bought a book, which is what she always does when she wants to learn something new. The book was beautiful and amazing and turned her on to layers and textures.

One Tuesday, this Tuesday, she saw that Jen Worden posted about Kim Klassen's Texture Tuesdays. That sparked an interest! So, she got busy, downloading textures. Playing around. And made something.

This is really only the beginning of the story, because the girl is in love with photography again.

The End.


The original photo, a mermaid from Friday Harbor:



The textured photo, using Kim's 'Simplicity' and 'music lovin' textures:



A few more things I've been working on over the past couple of days:

Thanks for looking :)

366: Day 23

Three good things: it's not strep, the sun is shining (even if we spent 2.5 hours of it in a windowless doctor's office), and the kid can still crack himself up (even when he's sick).






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366: Day 22

Three good things: organizing my work space, trying out new tools, and melting glass, even if there is nothing good in the kiln.










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Messin' Around

It's only 21 days into this 366, but can I tell you something? I'm loving playing with photos again. How did I forget this part of me? Every day I learn something new, just messing around. What will day 366 look like?

366: Day 22

Three good things: getting out and about after being home 8 days straight, green grass, and happy free ranging chickens.




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366: Day 20

Three good things: taking a picture of a painting you like before you ruin it; new metallic pencils; rain, washing away the ice storm.





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Soccer Boy

It doesn't happen often, but Luke's next game was postponed due to weather. I'm actually pretty happy about this! I mean, really, it's almost February!

Here are some photos from the previous game - so far they are 2 wins out of 2 games in the state cup.

366: Day 19

Three good things: electricity, a warm house, plenty of food, and of course, not having to go anywhere in this weather mess. I guess that's four good things. Plus, smooshing paint around. Five.



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Snow Day

Enough of the black, today was all white - plenty of snow for snowmen and snowballs and snow angels. The birds were busy with the bird feeders though the chickens were bummed about no free-range time. Poor things. The dog was jumping around like a puppy, and the boy was wishing he felt better so he could go find a good hill to sled on. Poor thing.

But it was a good day, a white day. I got my snowman made, and pretty photos snapped, and some new canvases started with some plaster of paris. And that SOPA thing - looks like they are going back to the drawing table with that. Good!