Sunday, October 21, 2007
Photo Contest Entry
the grand prizes are $1,000 grant plus a Nikon D80 digital SLR camera and lens system.
there will be one grand prize awarded for best color and one for best black&white. there are progressive awards according to 2nd place, 3rd place, 4th place and of course honorable mention. there will be 100 honorable mentions.
i had done this particular photo using available outside light, and had decided i wanted to experiment with over exposure and converting it to black & white hopefully picking up rich variances in the gradients from all the blacks to white.
one of my great challenges was to disassociate myself from the natural connection you feel with your children when photographing them. not just any snap shot would do. i had to find a way to tell a story with my photography, and my son happened to be the available model.
we went to the local walking paths of our park area and i looked for the ways the light was showing on different surfaces and areas. i found this lighting shining on the old stone walls of a historical lock for canal boats and fell in love with the way the vines were clinging in the cracks and the way the shadows were going into a dark gradient where the light wasn't reaching. the leaves around on the ground i decided would add a great texture of gradients. so i just happened to be carrying a white bucket with us (chuckle always be prepared)...and i set it upside down on the ground by the wall...
i then had xavier sit on the bucket and i positioned him the way i wanted him to be kind of in a wondering or thinking pose for a kid by himself on a bucket. i wanted him barefoot to reach a deeper feeling in the photo.
this was a one shot deal i didn't take any other shots of this pose like i do others. i did one and just knew that was it.
when i presented it in my photography class my fellow classmates were very impressed and my instructor liked it so much that she told me she wanted a print of this particualr piece.
i was amazed that it got such a response because my fellow classmates are amazing photographers, and their work just blows me away when i see them.
one girl in my class said that it looks like art that you would see on anyones wall, not just on your wall because it is family.
i was also told that it is very moving. so with all of the individual responses that this photo got i knew i had captured something that can move anybody and not look like just a photo of someones kid.
my instructor told me that i had definitely achieved one of the hardest things of disassociating myself from the subject emotionally in my photography and that i was also successful in my creation using over exposure.
so hopefully if i can earn an honorable mention in the contest, i think i would just cry with
a humble heart .
Saturday, October 20, 2007
"Boots and Fish"
two young fellows on the slide and one of them happened to have one of those inevitable moments that just seem to happen with boys. can you guess which one had the nut-crunching experience?...lol.
ahhhh, yes why is it we find humor in the pain of others? probably because it is friggin' funny when we see it happen...lol...
now on another note of mention i would like you to take notice of the young boy in the blue and white striped shirt laughing his azzzz off as i tell you the next portion of this post.
this boy is laughing most of the time. he will burst out in laughter at just about anything he sees or hears. he finds his cousins ( the mini-crew) absolutely hilarious in their everyday normal routine antics around the house and in our family. i haven't heard this fellow be very serious about anything . and that is where i was taken off gaurd by something he said that he was very serious about in a conversation with raine.
as we were traveling in the van (as usual)... i have to add something else here, it seems the kids have lots to say while we are bopping about from one place to another, probably because they are in an enclosed area and have no other distractions thus they are forced to converse with eachother (chuckle)
on to the story...
Reinn was telling me about how he got to go fishing every morning for 3 weeks, 7 days a week in those 3 weeks. and Raine got in on the conversation so it switched to the two of them while i listened. he told her he got to go at 6:00 a.m. every morning for 3 weeks 7 days a week and how he caught a fish. well Raine said "that's stupid". Reinn didn't realize that Raine thought it was stupid at how early he got up and how long he went before he caught a fish. very seriously Reinn replied " no, you can really catch things, a boot or a fish."
that was my turn to have a moment of laughter.
Thursday, October 18, 2007
"How in the H-n-F did you get in there?!"
well let's see here, the usual circus around this part of the world with my mini-crew. a couple of weeks ago i was doing a photo shoot with the crew as my guinea pigs. raine and sage were great posing for me, but shade is so antsy most of the time it is very difficult to get him to sit still for me when i need to get him just how i want him.
soooo, i put him in charge of my lighting bounce board as my assistant. of course even that particular high position of responsibility caused him to also lose interest and he decided to explore other avenues of interest while i continued with total engrossment of my shoot with sage and raine.
although i was able to get shade to sit for me a little bit before i started with raine and sage, and it was easier then because i told them to just talk to eachother after i positioned them the way i wanted them..... now that actually worked better instead of trying to have him sit completely still and quiet.
now on to our story that took place after this particular photo. i was doing my shoots with raine and sage, just loving what i was getting. i didn't feel it pertinent to keep my "third eye" tuned in on shade since he is 10 now, and a big enough fellow to not just wander off to destinations unknown...lol.
well now... or so i thought.
as i remove my camera from my tripod and raine and sage climb down from the stone structure i had them posing on, i realize that shade isn't around anywhere for me to even catch a glimpse of, so i say in the way that mothers seem to do out loud but actually in thought to themselves, "Where's Shade?"
sage and raine answer in unison " he's in the tree!"
i am thinking oh crap! how in the hell did he climb one of those trees? they are huge and the branches are at least 15 feet above the ground. so i am looking up in the trees to see where my big enough 10 year old fellow could possibly be precariously perched.
then sage and raine say one after the other " No Mom...He's In The Tree!..."
i am thinking what the hell? and then i SAW HIM... IN THE TREE!
"holy shyte!" instantaneous thughts ran through my mind in the matter of a split second... oh my gawd! the fire department will have to cut down the tree to get him out!... but i simply asked "how the H-n-F did you get in there?"shade's soft spoken reply, " i don't know."
(( no worries mom's, he climbed right out with no problem ))