Lighting and a Background

Meghan
Originally uploaded by Let It Be Raw

Meghan was my lovely model for this photo. This photo composed itself because I was using a tripod and was trying to minimize it's appearance and was guessing at exposure time. I'm surprised that my photos even come out properly exposed because I guess so much.

Finally December

It feels great to have photos to share again. I've been waiting too long between rolls. The two above are mushrooms in macro. I tried to trace the events that involve identifying, but it was getting dark too quickly and the mushrooms were getting slimy. Macros give another view of the mushroom so that I study it much more than I would by just holding them in my hand. Drawing also helps in the identifying process because you begin to understand much more about fungus.
This blanket fabric is a very nostalgic picture for me. Something about soft, bunched fabric with shadows and texture is very comforting. I really enjoy the pictures Jessica H has taken of blankets and fabrics. They make me feel so warm and fuzzy inside.

More to come soon. I have many pictures with dark background that require me to use a better scanner. The scanner I use leaves far too many streaks and whitens my pictures. Scanners do that anyways, but having a scanner that is specifically used for pictures is a step up. I want them to look as great as they do in my hands.

As always, larger resolution files and more pictures can be found here.

flickr

I have had a flickr since 2007, I used it for a while and then forgot about it for about three years until a month ago. I have been uploading, rearranging and linking my photographs from other websites to flickr so that I have some sense of consolidation for all the different websites I use to share my photography. I wanted to share that link because it has everything. On other sites such as this and tumblr, I am more selective.

Besides that, I have almost finished two rolls of film and will actually be able to update soon.

Role Reverse

It does not please me much to have my photo taken. However, I met this photographer via craigslist who is creative and wonderful. She needed models for a long term project that involves her taking photos of strangers in their environment with herself in the frame. As the project continues, she will age and the strangers will seem static in time. I was totally blown away by the idea of strangeness in this project and was more than happy to be a part of it. In return, she took a few cute pictures of Nick and I. This one is my favorite one, copyright by Christina Riley Photography at http://www.christinarileyphoto.com/. Love her work!
Meanwhile, I am almost done with an experimental-hope-my-camera-works roll of film and am excited to get back into photography.

Where is the film

Good question. Something to do with money, or lack there of.
However, it is FALL. This is exciting because I get to go explore and forage in the forest for mushrooms. They're free fruits of the decaying ground and they are delicious. Look at these pretty pretty bad boys. These are the two that I want to find the most and make into a soup. King Bolete and a Chanterelle. The bolete looks and kind of tastes like freshly cooked bread and the chanterelle tastes like pumpkin/apricot yum yum.
This isn't me, but this is the dress I will be wearing soon when I make mushroom soup. I have too much fungus spirit.

fisheye camera

Tree 9 before the lowest limbs were cut. What a tragedy.
Also, my scanner is a tragedy. I need better technology for posting my film pictures online with higher quality. I clean the scanner glass all the time but there are still fuzzies. The light always washes out my photos. What I really would like is one of those fancy add-ons for scanners that can scan negatives in high resolution. That would be friggin' sweet.
Camera update: The shutter is a little sticky and definitely needs to be cleaned, but the camera does work. I just need to buy film and test out another role before I fork out money to have my camera checked out. pfft.

Camera Crisis

My camera may be broken. Something is wrong with the shutter. I'm hoping that a check-up at kamera korner by a professional will solve my problem.
Until then... here is something I did with some random digital editing program I found while stumbling that gives a tiltshift effect. I usually don't like to mess around with my images, but photoshop and other such editing programs can be a lot of fun and sometimes helpful in coming up with ideas for future photographic adventures.Also, I still have a roll of ridiculous fisheye negatives to develop. No tengo dinero.

Graveyard and flashlights

I couldn't be happier with this graveyard photo. This is the first example I have of what I imagined a photo would look like in my head at night before I took the picture and it worked. Neat!

Exposed

I could potentially destroy my camera so that I could do double exposures, or I could just simulate a double exposure with back lighting, a flashlight, night, and a 5 to 10 minute exposure. Experimentation with exposure has definitely forced me to be more resourceful and creative in developing ways in which to recreate an image in my mind onto a photograph. Practice is a large part of this process, but a lot of the time it's just a clever mistake.

Street Light Portraits Failure Summer 2010

I knew immediately after shooting these portraits that they would be over exposed. I was stuck in the mode of holding on to the bulb for minutes from previous experiments and definitely held the exposure for too long in this set because of that. When I saw these pictures for the first time, I did not like them and was annoyed with my mistake. I haven't looked at them for three weeks until today. Today, I like them. I think they are fantastical, a little nightmare-ish, slightly unnerving, and intriguing. This has happened to me before, where I look back at photography from years or even days ago and appreciate them (or not), and completely change my opinion or find a new insight. I'm excited to try this lighting with portraits again knowing that a mistake or failure could actually bring something interesting that I didn't even imagine while photographing, which will also open up my field of experimentation. Failure can be artistic.

tripod tripod tripod

I will do everything I can think of with a tripod: low light portraits, ridiculously long exposures, moving lights, pretend double exposures, and anything else I can think of. Lighting is so important, even at night. A full moon, street lamp, or dark indoor lighting can completely change the mood by just seconds of exposure. I am still having difficulty in exposure time and in recreating the night as I see it.

Night Photography April 2010

I finally got a tripod. I have been waiting to experiment with night photography for so long! I'm still experimenting and it is great fun. Having a tripod makes life so much easier. The first night I got it, I went to the beach and took pictures of the full moon and the lights of the wharf in Santa Cruz. It's difficult to recreate a night scene in film. I am only just beginning with guessing at exposure times, recording results, and crossing my fingers.
Night photography is more than just recreating night scenes, but creating eerie scenes like the photo below. It's not daylight, but it is no longer the night. It is something unreal and confusing to look at.

Experiments in 2010

Two more experiments! The first two photos involve tilt-sifting, which involves taking the lens off the camera and tilting it in front of the body of the camera, guessing with the focus, then taking a picture. The point of this is to make it seem as if everything is miniature. My two attempts didn't work that well because it was hard finding a place where things would look interesting as miniature, and also because the focus is a huge guess and didn't work for me. I have not experimented much with that technique sense then. The second experiment involves longer shutter speeds to catch movement in water. It's difficult to do without a tripod, and I'm really surprised that the first photo actually came out. Neat. Actually, I don't even think the last photo was part of the experiment. I think it was really my attempt to capture water droplets in sunlight or maybe those annoying small bugs that hover in sun spots. Experimentation never really ends with photography. I keep thinking I've tried everything, then I discover something new. Also neat.

Uvas 2009

What type of film that is used can change the tones, temperature, and over all feel of pictures dramatically. Even though I took this set on a sunny day in Uvas, I was using a light temperature film, Kodak vivid color, and now these photographs looks like they were taken on a cloudy day or early morning. Kodak VC is meant more for portraits and gives more of a natural color and effect to photographs. I have also found that Kodak tends to be of a colder temperature than Fuji, and makes great use of blues, greens, purples, etc. Anyways, film should not be overlooked, and is one more thing for me to think about besides lighting, subject, time of day, aperture, shutter speed, color... The more I learn about photography, the longer it takes for me to take one picture.

Winter 2010 and a fabulous studio

I don't have a studio. That would be fucking awesome if I did. But, a counter on the kitchen with a standing floor lamp, a flashlight, a bowl, and a tripod made of books and a chair work for now. (At least now I have a real tripod). Low lit macros are really difficult to take without a tripod, which is why most of my pictures are a bit fuzzy. Not having a tripod or the best lighting has actually created a color scheme and light balance that wouldn't have occurred otherwise. Hurray for amateurism!

Winter 2009 - remembering winter in summer

These were taken on different dates throughout winter. The first two pairs on different occasions in Santa Cruz: on the UC campus during a forage and in the city at a park near my home. The last one in Uvas is of the feathers from a dead hawk. These photographs don't at all look like Santa Cruz or Uvas because they build on absence of place to create the feeling of winter through use of cold colors, rain, fungus, decay, and death. It's odd for me to be reminded of winter through feeling because I feel that I am now separated from that season/feeling, but somehow through looking at these photos, winter seems to be a place I can go visit in memory until the season comes around again.

Yellow shades - the new black and white

This was a very happy day for me. There is definitely a connection between the use of the yellow filter and my mood, especially for this set of photos which conveys the memory of the sun, the afternoon, and my best friend. I didn't take a picture of him. Everything is in the lighting, shade, shapes, and warmth. In a way, this seems corny, but I can feel friendship from these pictures. For everyone else without this background knowledge, they're nature or perspective photos. Usually when I see a photographers work, and there are no visible people in the photos, I assume that artist was alone. A lot is missed from outside the frame when the viewer is forced into a composed perception.