Photography

As you can probably tell, I've been attempting to get more into photography lately. Partially because I have a DSLR that I almost never use, and partially because I am truly amazed by some of the amazing photos I see (my friend Lauren takes these phenomenal pictures and she's my age. If she learned how to do it, I can learn how to do it). Anyway, Lauren came to visit us this past weekend and she gave me some valuable advice about taking pictures and cameras and how to learn how to take great photos. One site that she linked me to is CreativeLive, which has many different tutorials on photography and other subjects.

I found one video series called "Photography Starter Kit" by John Greengo, and so far it's been really helpful. The whole series is about 4 hours long, and it just lightly skims on how to work DSLR cameras, how to set shutter, aperture, and ISO and when to change the settings, etc. I've only watched one hour of it so far and I've really learned a lot.

Anyway, here are some test shots I decided to take with my camera on the manual settings the other day. The light comes into my room beautifully mid-afternoon (thank you, westward facing windows) and I thought I would share.

Daily Painting

created using watercolor (background) and pastel pencils

A few nights ago, I had a surge of inspiration. After declaring I was going to be in bed by 1am (I work in the morning and I always wake up exhausted after going to sleep at 3), I decided to read a bit from the Creative Thursday book and I had an idea to paint this. It was originally supposed to be an orange octopus, but sometimes things don't come out as planned. I really like how it came out, and even though I didn't go to sleep until two that night (I have to leave time for yoga before bed), the final product was worth it.

Book Review: Julie and Julia

 

I found Julie and Julia on a bargain shelf at Barnes and Nobles for only $4, and I decided to buy it because a) when do I ever not need more books to read? and b) come on, it's only $4. I had seen the movie a few years ago, so I knew roughly what to expect as far as plot went, but I was interested to see what differed between the book and the movie.

A few main differences:

1. In the book, Julie has a very fowl mouth (probably not appropriate for a movie, so I can see why that was mostly omitted)

2. The movie dramatized pretty much every event to the extreme - the thing with the eggs? not a big deal in the book, and Julie and her husband never had a gigantic fight to the point where he left for a few days.

3. The book placed a much larger emphasis on the food. Watching the movie, yes the food looked delicious but it went into almost no detail on what the food was like. The book described the food to the point where I was hungry every time I read.

4. Julia Child was not exactly a main character in the book. Yes, she was there as part of Julie's alternate personality, and there were some letters (which I think were fake?) that were written by Julia or Paul, but definitely not the long and elaborate flashbacks that occurred in the movie.

Of course, I understand why the differences were there. After all, Hollywood had to sell a movie that would appeal to masses, and honestly, a woman who is almost 30, cursing in her kitchen, and constantly mentioning how her fat is ever increasing is not exactly a blockbuster. It does, however, make for an excellent read. I was able to relate to Julie (even though I am 10 years younger than her persona in the book). I understood the struggles of feeling unmotivated and like my life is going nowhere, and it was interesting to see how her life dramatically shifted once she decided to stick with something for the first time in her life. It motivated me to stick with this blog, stick with creativity, and stick to my (overly) high levels of confidence.

Playing with Lighting/Focus

A few days ago, I decided to bring out my camera (I go through phases of wanting to be very creative with photography and then neglecting my camera for months at a time) and snap a few pictures in my bedroom. I had a few candles lit to create ambiance in my room for a yoga session, and the lighting looked really cool in my room. I played around a bit with the shutter speed (something I rarely ever do. If I'm using the camera, it's on the automatic settings. what a waste of a DSLR, right?), and some of the pictures I liked. I have a long way to go as far as professional photography goes, obviously, since most of the pictures are blurry, and most not on purpose (although I did put it on manual focus and play around with it - see the third picture). It was fun getting into different angles and playing with my camera. I just installed a version of Photoshop on my computer (my mom bought Adobe Elements years ago for me and I've never really gotten around to learning how to use it), so hopefully I won't be lazy and I'll get back into taking pictures for fun. As I grow and learn more, I'll post my progress here and share tips that I find.

Daily Painting

I made this lovely lady today using watercolor pencils (borrowed from my mom) and painted the background with watercolor. I had a surge of inspiration from the Creative Thursday book Everyday Inspiration to Grow Your Creative Practice and I decided to act upon it.

In the book, the author, Marisa Anne, discussed how she makes "daily paintings," small works that only take between 1-3 hours to finish. The goal is to feel a sense of accomplishment for finishing something, and to accept that the work is not going to be perfect because there is no way that a painting made in a day will be perfect. I think that's the reason why I have never really tried painting or drawing before, because I feel as though I'm not very good at it and I want everything I make to be perfect.

I'm really pleased with the way my mermaid came out, and I'm glad I took the advice of Marisa Anne's book to just sit down and make something.

A New Beginning

Tour d'Eiffel à nuit (Eiffel Tower at night)

For the past two weeks, I've had a lot of time to think. I just returned from a busy life in Paris, taking classes, speaking French, and going out almost every night with friends; and I've come back to a pretty monotonous setting. Instead of rushing about every day, worrying about getting places on time and looking fashionable in the metro, I spend my days lazing around my parents' house (can't move into my apartment until mid-August), working no more than 15 hours a week and occasionally going to the gym.

All of the thinking that I've done has made me realize that I have let my priorities go astray the past few years, whether it was because of intense schoolwork (hello, freshman year of college), or because I felt that socializing was more important than staying true to my interests. I would like to change that, and I'm starting this blog to hold myself accountable for the changes I want to implement on my life. I want to create more often, do yoga and exercise frequently, cook delicious meals, read as fast as I used to when I was in middle school, keep myself organized, and most of all, I want to be kind to others - I've seen that in my daily life, I am very sarcastic, and oftentimes rude to others unintentionally.

I will use this blog to document my journey towards accomplishing these goals, and hopefully to inspire others to do the same.