Shutter Sisters

Handmade For the Holidays

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Fabric handmade by Pippi Joe.  Shooting bag custom-made by Tracy Joy.

One of the great things about the holiday season is that I get to partake of one of my favorite guilty pleasures–without the usual amount of guilt.  I’m not referring to mere shopping (which I’m not really fond of).  I’m talking about shopping on Etsy.  I could probably spend every moment of my natural waking life browsing through all the amazing Etsy artists and never get bored.  For me, the appeal is not just the seemingly endless supply of beautiful handmade items or the idea of supporting the DIY ethos.  What really gets me excited is the ever-increasing number of people creating and sharing their art and handiwork.  I take this as a sign of hope for the future of humanity.

I’ve often marveled at the multi-faceted talent beyond photography that abounds amongst our Shutter Sisters community. Whether it’s wordsmithing, or whipping up whimsy, or brewing beauty that’s functional (or not), or making music, it’s impossible NOT to be inspired when you’re surrounded by so much creativity. I dare say that keeping such company lends itself to embarking on artistic endeavors you’ve never attempted before. And again, I take this as a sign of hope for the future of humanity

For today’s giveaway, Tracy Joy–mom/wife/photographer/entrepreneur/bag-designer-extraordinaire–is offering up a Kristine Shooting and/or Diaper Bag in the winner’s choice of color and flap design.  Tracy’s bags are made with interchangeable flaps so you can change the design without changing the entire bag.  Perfect for the budget-minded accesorizer!  Be sure to comment on this post to be entered in the drawing.

Congratulations to Wayfaring Wanderer for being the winner of the Superhero Joy necklace. Sweet stuff!

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Edited to add: Please note that this giveaway is for a shooting bag (lightly padded for easy access to gear while on a shoot without a heavy bag).  Tracy Joy’s fully padded camera bag is the Reese bag.

Also, Tracy is offering a discount to the Shutter Sisters community through December 31st.  Get 10% off your entire purchase by using the code SHUTTER.  With free shipping to U.S. addresses for December, it’s a good deal!

What To Do At Home

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November is usually the month of sickness in our family, and this year is no different.  All three of us are currently at different stages of the cold or the flu.  What this means is that we’ve been spending lots of time at home–in bed, on the couch, and on Facebook.  And now that Cadence is in preschool, I’m pretty sure that this will be a recurring theme until all our immune systems have made the proper adjustments.

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So what do you do to keep from going stir crazy when you’re all homebound and feeling under the weather?  I suppose we could bake a pie, but our oven’s broken.  Maybe I could just commission some of these carrot cupcakes.  I’ve definitely been filling up on hot tea.  I should probably get through one of the books I’ve started but never finished.  I suppose if we get really bored, we could always start jumping on the bed.  It’s times like these I really wish I knew how to knit. 

Share with us your favorite things that make extended indoor time at home fun and cozy or just bearable–crafts, games, books, movies, comfort foods/drinks, you name it.  And if you have links to images of you and your families doing these things, that’s even better.

Don’t forget to leave a comment here today for a chance to win your own copy of America at Home with your very own custom cover. It’s the third post of our Sundays at Home series for November.

november giveaways: more sundays at home

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Today marks the end of Daylight Savings Time for 2008, which in these Midwestern parts signals the inevital gloom of a dark, cold winter.  Yes, I know that calendarwise, we’re only in the middle of autumn, but here in Chicago, autumn usually last six weeks while winter lasts six months.  And believe me, I definitely felt a chill in my bones today.  The end of DST also means we natural-light junkie shutterbugs suddenly lose an hour of shooting time each day.  For a working gal like myself who gets on the train before 7am, spends an entire day in a windowless office and doesn’t return home until close to 5:30 in the evening, it means I can say goodbye to the sun until spring.  Anyone else feel my pain?

Before I depress myself TOO much, I guess I can look on the bright side of the imminent darkness and chill of winter.  Here are some things I’m looking forward to: getting cozy in the warmth of home, sipping hot tea with a book and nowhere to go, making popcorn and watching movies as a family, turning inward and reflecting on the past year, spending time with loved ones and catching up on our busy lives during the holidays.

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Here’s something else to cheer us up: we are designating another month of Sunday Giveaways on Shutter Sisters!  Remember how we partnered with the folks behind the book America At Home during the month of June to give away FIVE of these amazing books with CUSTOM covers?  Well, we’re giving away FIVE MORE this month, one on each Sunday in November!  If you haven’t already taken advantage of the 25% discount offered by Rick Smolan to get this treasure of a book, here’s your chance to win one.

So as the days get shorter and colder, start capturing the warmth and simple pleasures of your hearth and home.  Even if you live down below the equator and can’t imagine a cold, dark November, show some empathy for those of us in the extreme North by sharing your photos At Home as well.  To be included in the random drawing, just leave a comment below with a link to your photo of hearth and home between now and Monday at midnight EST.  For inspiration, be sure to check out these great photos At Home by jodyangel, pumpkinoodle, and simple sparrow.

And speaking of great photos of hearth and home, Sheri at CafeMom’s Home & Garden Buzz is celebrating the simple moments at home as well.  Share your photos of home on her Show & Tell post by November 30, and your home could be featured in a “Show & Tell” Home Tour on CafeMom like the one she did with SouleMama.  Totally cool.

 

The Art of Documenting the Beautifully Mundane

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Recently, I shared with another photographer my hesitation to identify myself as an “artist.”  I don’t have any formal training in photography or fine art or even mediocre art.  I’m not the type of person to spend serious time in art museums, and I am more than a little bit embarrassed at my lack of knowledge of famous photographers.  You see, when I take photos, I consider my camera a documentary tool.  My first thought is not about making art but about capturing the humdrum moments that comprise our lives.

So when I read Jen’s beautiful post this week about the courage to let it click, I realized that I don’t need better credentials to embrace my inner artist; I need courage.  And by courage, I love how our lovely sister Brené Brown points to the original definition of courage as being “to speak one’s mind by telling all one’s heart.”  If you’ve never heard this definition of courage before, let it sink in for a while.  It’s something all of us in these fear mongering days need to soak into the core of our beings.

Well, I think that one way for me to “tell all my heart” or my own story is through my photos of the mundane and yet fleeting and often beautiful moments of my life as a mom, wife, daughter, sister, and friend.  These are the stories I have a compulsion to document, and this is my inner artist that I have the courage to finally recognize. 

“Hi.  My name is Sarah-Ji, and I am an artist of documenting the beautifully mundane.”  There.  I said it.  Now to go about life embracing it…

How about you?  What is the story of your inner artist?  Feel free to share links to images that tell your story–ordinary, mundane, profound, beautiful or all of the above.

 

Sunday School: Pick A Color

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It’s no secret that I love the color red.  When I first started dating my husband, his codename on my blog was RT for Red Ted.  Some of my favorite photos of my daughter are of her in a vintage red dress.  I often take photos of red objects.  When we painted our condo, I insisted on having one room that was a shade of red.

So it shouldn’t come as a big surprise that when we ended up on Ruby Beach in Olympic National Park on a very grey and somewhat misty day in mid-September, I chose to grab Cadence’s ruby slippers that her dad had found a couple days prior at a thrift store in Portland.  I knew that the colors would be pretty muted on the beach, and I wanted to throw in just a little splash of a single color to add a bit of drama to the photos I wanted to take.  Of course I picked red–ruby slippers on Ruby Beach; how could I resist?  And as tiny as those little red shoes were on that magnificent stretch of black and grey stones and giant bone-like driftwood and marvelous sea stacks, I think that bit of color was just what my camera was looking for.

The next time you find yourself in a grey-tone world, find something in the environment (or put one there) that’s got an eye-catching color and work that into your photo somehow.  You can make it the focal point, or just a blurry bokeh of color in the background. Maybe you have a favorite brightly hued object that you can carry around with you, and whenever you feel like your surroundings are too dull to photograph, you can add your little bit of color and capture the contrast that creates. 

How about you?  Do you have a favorite color that often shows up in your photos?  Or do you have an image where a little bit of color goes a long way?  Please share your comments and links to images!

Light and Dark

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One of the greatest challenges (and joys) of photography is using light to create the image that you want to capture.  Usually, you would think that you would use light to illuminate the main subject that you are photographing.  There are times, however, when you want to keep your subject in the dark for a dramatic silhouette or shadow shot.

Now, another photographer may have looked at this view and chosen to keep the vine of hearts in the light, resulting in a significantly different image.  In fact, I came back to this very scene the next night and took an entirely different photo.  That’s the beauty of photography.  There’s no right or wrong way to see things.  You can be as purposeful or as aimless as you want.  You can choose light or you can choose dark.  Thank goodness for that because otherwise, I’d get really bored.

How about you?  Do you have an image to share in which you chose dark over light or vice versa?  Or maybe an image you captured one way on a certain day and a totally different way on another day.

 

Sunday School: Shifting Focus

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There’s a lot going on right now in my life.  From work projects to a family vacation in our beloved Pacific NW to Cadence starting preschool at the end of the month, among other things.  Busy stuff, hard stuff, good stuff, fun stuff.  I’ve never been all that good at multi-tasking, so I’m having a hard time finding my focus these days.  In fact, stringing words together into a coherent post is kind of beyond my grasp right now.

Which brings me to the point of this week’s Sunday School.  I’ve discovered that when you’re on a shoot, and there’s a lot going on and you just don’t know what image to capture first, you can often get an interesting photo by shifting your camera’s focus onto something that’s not the actual focus of attention and letting everything else blur into the background (or foreground).  Doing a few shots like this may give you a clearer vision of how you want to document what’s going on.  You may even find that what you’re really interested in capturing is not what’s actually the center of everyone else’s attention.

Hmm…Maybe I can apply this little tidbit to my life right now.  Maybe what I need is to focus on something less obvious or even nothing at all for a while.  One of the things I actually like about the photo above is that when I stare at it, I feel like I’m zoning out, but in a really meditative way.   It’s actually quite soothing.

Check out this uniquely focused and meditative photo by Amy Sahba, or this one by jennyhud and this one by Danisoul.  How about you?  Have you shifted focus lately?  Please share your images and/or stories.

sunday school: double take

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Truth be told, I’m not much of an abstract image kind of gal.  I consider myself more of a documentarian than an artist.   Recently however, when I was in the mood for  Breaking the Rules, I accidentally discovered a technique that creates abstract images that I find quite beautiful.  It’s basically the equivalent of doing a double exposure (exposing the same piece of film twice resulting in superimposed images).  Now, I’m perfectly aware that in this digital age, you can accomplish this easily with two different photos using layers or what-nots in Photoshop, but don’t forget that I’m a Photoshop flunkie.

There are a number of ways that you can do a digital double exposure.  I wouldn’t be surprised if some cameras have a double exposure feature.  The simplest way to do it is to shoot in manual mode with a long enough exposure so that you can quickly reposition the camera in the middle of the exposure.  Repositioning can be as simple as turning around and facing the camera in the other direction.  Since I like to challenge myself, however, I’ve come up with a more complicated step-by-step approach. 

  • First, put the camera on manual mode and set the aperture pretty narrow so that you can do a long exposure (i.e., f/16 or f/22). 
  • Second, determine how many seconds you need to set the shutter speed at for proper exposure.
  • Third, double the amount from Step Two and then add 5-10 seconds to allow for repositioning the camera for the 2nd exposure.  So if the light meter says you need 5 seconds, set it for 15-20 seconds, depending on how fast you are at repositioning the camera.  I personally like the 30 second exposure because I’m slow and clumsy.
  • Once the exposure settings have been programmed, set the camera on a steady surface (tripod, table, ground, etc.), focus on your first subject, frame the shot and shoot (you can use the timer or a remote to minimize camera shake).
  • As soon as the shutter clicks, count off the number of seconds for the first exposure.
  • After the first exposure is done, immediately put the lens cap on the lens to block out light.  This will prevent light streaks in the final image from repositioning the camera, and your image won’t be affected by camera shake while the lens cap is on.
  • Reposition the camera on a steady surface again so that the second subject you want is in the viewfinder, and as fast as you can, remove the lens cap while trying to keep the camera steady.
  • Hopefully, you will have timed it just right so that you expose the 2nd image properly.
  • Play around with the exposure settings until you get the results you want.

 

Since your camera is not re-focusing for the 2nd image, the clarity of the focus of the superimposed image may be out of whack depending on your aperture and the difference in distance of the subjects from the camera.  I personally don’t think that a sharp focus is key to getting an interesting image with this technique.

How about you?  What’s your favorite method of creating abstract photographic images?  For more inspiration, be sure to check out these images in our Flickr group pool by storygoil, Cyan Eyes, and Rachel Schell.

sunday school: fill-in-the-flash

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I know that many of us here are natural light shooters who adore super fast prime lenses like the magical 50mm f/1.8 (or f/1.4 if you’re lucky).  Let’s see the hands of those of us who have raised our noses ever so slightly whenever witnessing someone using their camera’s built in flash.  Now let’s see the hands of those of us who would much rather embrace the blur than use a flash.  Yeah, I thought so, and my hand is in the air along with many of you. 

Considering that our chosen symbol for the sisterhood is a beautiful big old flash bulb, I’ve decided to make friends with my flash and to apologize for all those years of neglect and contempt.  And you know what?  I’ve actually found that our flash (even the built-in camera one) IS our friend, and that if you take the time to figure out its capabilities, you can take better photos.

One situation in which a flash as simple as the one that came with your camera will come in quite handy is when you are shooting in bright glaring sunlight.  Unless you’re shooting exclusively in the shade, you will find that many of your shots have harsh shadows.  You can minimize this by using just enough flash to fill in the shadows especially if you are shooting into the sun.  This is a technique called fill flash.

I played around with my aperture, shutter speed and flash compensation to get the photo above with fill flash.  Without the flash, the photo would have looked something like this.  Pretty dull, huh?  For those of you who love shooting into the sun for that pretty sun flare, try using flash next time, especially if you have a person in the foreground with their back to the sun.  Most digital cameras these days have either a fill flash feature or flash compensation feature that allows you to control the brightness of your flash .  You’ll probably have to play around with your settings a bit before you get the result you want, but you’ll probably find it well worth the effort.  I know I did.

Finding photos taken with flash in the Shutter Sisters Flickr group pool is like pulling teeth, but I did find this one by Angela (angs*photos), this lovely portrait (with the flash stopped down -1.3) by Kathy (work2snap) and this adorable baby shot by Lawyer Mama [Steph].  How about the rest of you?  Have any flash pointers, or images you want to share in which the flash proved to be your friend?

Sunday School: Break the Rules

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I’ll be the first to admit that sometimes?  If I’m really honest?  I get tired of taking photos.  I get bored with the same old angles and depth of field and eye-popping color.  When this happens, it’s usually related to taking pictures of my daughter Cadence because Lord knows I’ve taken thousands of shots of her.

I’ve serendipitously found that the best thing to do when I hit the shutter block is to break the rules.  Now, now, I know we would mostly agree that there aren’t hard and fast rules in photography, but if we’re honest, we probably set up rules for ourselves in the way that we personally shoot on a day-to-day basis.   Sometimes they start out as habits or preferences, and then they subconsciously turn into rules.  Or some rules, we create because we’re afraid we’ll take bad photographs if we do things a certain way. 

You know what?  Those rules?  No one’s watching to see if you’re keeping them.  In fact, I bet if you start breaking some, it’ll inject new life and creativity into your art.  So go ahead.  Shoot into the sun.  Shake that camera during a long exposure. Shoot at an f/8.0 instead of wide open.  Crank up the ISO.  Get down low.  Embrace the blur.  Turn off the flash.  Turn ON the flash.  Whatever YOUR rules may be–you’ve gotta break ’em every now and then.  It’s one of the ways to improve and grow as a photographer.

What are some rules that you’ve consciously or subconsciously set up for yourself?  Which ones do you plan on breaking?  Please share, and don’t forget to include links to images if you’ve broken rules.