I’ve held my very favorite volunteer job going on two years now. It involved going to my local shelter and taking photos of the newly arrived critters so they can be posted on the “available” site, shown on Facebook and generally get some publicity as they search for their forever home. I’ve fallen in love multiple times and as a result now own two rescued dogs in addition to my rescued “studio cat” that’s been with us for almost 10 years!
I’m not sharing details on these images because they span the entire time I’ve been taking photos and, to the best of my knowledge, these cute critters have all found homes. If you’d like to see some of the wonderful animals in your area please visit the local shelter or it’s website. They are hard to resist, whether you’re a cat lover….
Or prefer the pooches….
It’s an awesome thing to share your heart & life with these babies that just want to be your friend. Furry love to you all,
Six months ago I travelled west and spent two weeks driving across, around and through Colorado, Wyoming, Montana and South Dakota. It’s probably my favorite destination, this was my fourth trip to that area of the States. I took a TON of photos as we drove and have been ever-so-slowly getting around to sorting through and editing them. I thought as I get batches of them done I will share them here.
During the two weeks we visited Glacier National Park, Yellowstone National Park, The Grand Tetons, Rocky Mountain National Park, Custer State Park and Mount Rushmore. To say it was a whirlwind would be an understatement – even after eliminating a few destinations from the itinerary! The landscapes were amazing, although all the wildfires did make for hazy skies. I think next time I’d like to visit in May, three of my four trips have been in the fall and one in the winter so Spring would be a nice change!
The last photo was repeated almost daily – we explored until there was no more light to explore in before calling it a night. I think this particular image was from a late evening in Yellowstone.
Just for fun I thought I’d share with you how I take photos of my artwork. (Disclaimer: The photos I’m sharing here were taken with my cell phone and would not be the ones I’d submit for shows, etc.!) Since I’ve set my website up to have all the images on a black background that is how I always photograph them. Occasionally I’ll do them on both black and white backgrounds if one just really needs the white to look good. I don’t keep my photography backdrops, stands, etc. set up in the studio so I pretty much drape the black cloth over whatever I can find. Depending on the size of the art I’m photographing some creativity might be needed to get it large enough to surround the artwork. Here’s ares pictures from this morning showing both the front & back of the set up.
As you can tell from the shot of the back this is one of those “creative” set ups since a few of the pieces were over three foot tall. As long as it works no one (normally) sees how it’s put together so who cares? I placed it up on the table so I wouldn’t be bending over so much to get the pics, plus there was more available light coming in through the windows & doors at that height. Unless it’s a late-night desperate situation I prefer to take these shots with natural window light instead of room lights or using a flash. Today was cloudy out so it was perfect conditions…not too dark but no hot spot of sun shining in to deal with. Â Here is a pic of a new art piece sitting in the photo area:
Doesn’t look too spectacular at this point but, as I said earlier, this was taken with my cell phone so I didn’t have a lot of control over the amount of light, etc. that was being captured.
One of the hardest parts of photographing square or rectangle images is to get the perspective correct so they actually look like squares or rectangles. Aiming your camera at the center of the piece and keeping it parallel with the artwork helps a lot, plus just being aware of that it’s not skewed when you shoot helps too. (Multiple shots up the odds as well!) If all else fails you can straighten while you’re making adjustments to the image with your computer, but that’s extra work so I try to get mine lined up correctly when shooting.
This final image was still on the cell phone but was taken closely to the art and then I also tweaked the lighting/color in photoshop before I uploaded it here. It’s an improvement over the previous image!
The one taken on my Nikon will be even better than this! Since this is a semi-flat (it hangs on the wall, anyhow!) piece of art with black borders on it I didn’t care that it blended right into the black background. With more dimensional pieces I try to place them with a space between them and background to help emphasis the depth and give them some separation.
So that’s that…
I’ll be sharing more new work as I get a chance, heck I’ve still got a couple of pieces from this summer I haven’t gotten on the blog yet.
A few more images to add from my recent photo play. This group was taken with backlight coming through the window and purposely over-exposed when I took them. Afterwards I did some digital adjustments to make them high-key, contrasty and soft.
I also did some macro, close-up images with a digital edit or two as well.
I’m patiently waiting to see what kind of flowers I’ll have to take pictures of next! In the meantime I’ll return to the up-cycled artwork next post – I promise! Lynne
Yes, there are supposed to be a couple more posts about the up cycled artwork but I couldn’t resist sharing some new images with you. I’ve not used my camera for “fun” for a while and have really gotten into it the last couple of weeks. Right now there is an abundance of blooming peony bushes in the yard so they’ve been an awesome subject. Here are a few of my favorite images:
Next time I’ll share some that I photographed & edited to be high-key, light & contrasty. More fun!
I gathered up over 2,500 images that I’ve taken the past few years and threw them into one file folder so I can pick them out as I please and create something new from them. The only “rule” I’ve given myself is that in each one I need to use at least one image of the clouds/sky. Not hard to do since it’s one of my favorite things to photograph!
The other parameter I’m currently working on is that the images are fairly large file in a very vertical format. Specifically 48″ tall by 18″ wide. Of course they can be printed smaller than that but I envision them as being large when I create them!
Here’s a sample of the images I used to create “Appairiation” that’s shown at the top of the page:
Obviously you don’t see each detail from every image but I promise they are all in there! As I continue with this series I will be posting updates…look for some again in the next few weeks!
I’ve been planning on creating a new series of photo/digital artwork but just haven’t seemed to make it happen. A couple of weeks ago I moved a step closer by collecting all the images that I might want to use in these creations. Just around 2,800 or so! Yikes! I think I’ve shot & collected enough, I need to get busy! During the process I ended up sort and cleaning my digital files, which seem to grow like unauthorized weeds in my computer while I’m not paying attention. It’s not exactly one of the glamorous and fun jobs of an artist but just one of those things that need to be done. Kind of like book keeping, applications and other paper-workish items. The only good part about the digital file cleaning is I always seem to find some long-lists images that I’d almost forgotten about. This time was no different – look!
All these were part of a series of photo/digital artwork in created back in 2004, they hung in one of the first real “gallery” shows that I participated in. Great memories and I still enjoy looking at them! Most people seemed to enjoy them although I discovered through the time I showed them that there are a few people that get really creeped out by eye images. But I got a reaction, one way or the other!
‘Tis the season for…well, some holiday inspired pics!
“jingle rails” photo, 2012, Lynne Medsker
I went with a friend to the Eiteljorg Museum to view a wonderful photo exhibit a few weeks ago. While we were there we also made a stop at their annual “Jingle Rails” exhibit. What fun!!
“Jingle rails” image, 2012, Lynne Medsker
The entire (large!) room was full of miniature buildings and different model train set ups.
“Jingle rails” image, 2012, Lynne Medsker
Since the museum focusing on the art of the western United States most of the lovely buildings were small replicas of lodges and other gorgeous sites from that region.
“Jingle rails” image, 2012, Lynne Medsker
“Jingle rails” image, 2012, Lynne Medsker
I hadn’t anticipated taking any photos on our excursion and was caught at a rare time I didn’t have one of my cameras on hand.
“Jingle rails” image, 2012, Lynne Medsker
Thank goodness for cell phones! I especially enjoy taking photos on it using some of the “alternate” cameras you can download so these all have some different effects or sizing to them to make them even more “magical”. 🙂
“Jingle rails” image, 2012, Lynne Medsker
Along with the wonderful western scenes they also had a section that represented Indianapolis. One section showed the state fair midway – which you don’t usually get to see in the wintertime!
“Jingle rails” image, 2012, Lynne Medsker
“Jingle rails” image, 2012, Lynne Medsker
It was fun to see our town in a small scale! There was a larger section featuring downtown buildings and landmarks.
“Jingle rails” image, 2012, Lynne Medsker
“Jingle rails” image, 2012, Lynne Medsker
They even had a small version of Lucas Oil Stadium, home of our Colt’s football team.
“Jingle rails” image, 2012, Lynne Medsker
I think my favorite had to be the miniature “Christmas Tree” that is constructed each year by stringing lights on the monument in the circular center of Indy.
“Jingle rails” image, 2012, Lynne Medsker
I hope you enjoyed this wintery tour of the exhibit and that you are enjoying the holiday season!
Last week I had the pleasure of introducing a fellow artist to digital art. We had a wonderful time and since then I’ve enjoyed seeing her continue to get creative with the medium. I thought I’d share with you a few of the images from our afternoon. I did introduce some techniques for creating digital art on a blank page (canvas, if you will) as well as introduced her to fractal artwork but the bulk of our time was spent with photo manipulations. This first one and we basically just played with the various filters in Photoshop on a single image to make it into something more artistic. This is what we came up with:
First digital project, Nov. 2012, instruction
The next creation we used three different images and layered, altered and blended them into something new:
Second creation, Nov. 2012, digital art instruction
Pretty cool! We were both pleased with how this one turned out!
At her request I had been “running” the computer and doing the work while she watched, took notes, asked questions and gave input on the creations. For the final photo manipulation of the day I put her in the “drivers seat” and watched/guided her through the process. She did an amazing job!
Student work, digital art lessons, Nov. 2012
How awesome is THAT!?!
I really enjoy sharing through teaching! You are always welcome to email or call me with a request for a class. There is also a calendar on my website that shows dates that I am available for instruction, as well as a page with the various topics that I am happy to share. Don’t see a date or topic you’re looking for on there? Just ask!
A Randomly Creative Blog 