Marina_sorr lives as much as possible outdoors during weekends, enjoying nature. When she doesn’t manage to get away from the city where she lives, she can be often found in its parks, capturing images that make her smile and relaxing under trees in bloom.
She shares her images on flickr as mar_s,and on instagram as @marina_sorr.
Where are you spending your time this weekend?
Share your weekeneding images today and if you want a chance to be featured here, email us!
Magpies are European birds that have a reputation to steal shiny things. I sometimes think I have a “Magpie eye” as I’m often attracted to photograph anything shiny, sparkly, silver or gold.
Whether its a piece of jewellery or sequins on a scarf or glitter or sparkles on the water; I’m all over it with my lens. These golden stairs and handrail caught my attention, as I walked into the tube the other day.
What do you notice today that is gold or silver and sparkles & shines? Please share what your “Magpie eye” sees.
I made to-do lists and ordered cakes, balloons and plates for his farmyard party. I cleaned, cooked and prepared for out-of-town guests. But as I planned his first birthday party, I truly wasn’t concerned with spending a lot of money or making it “perfect”. I just wanted it to be special for him and for his family that loves him so much. The decorations and presents are fun. But when his cousin walked in and showed me the origami farm animals he created for the party, I melted. I couldn’t wait to take a picture of these adorable little animals to someday show my little guy what his cousin did for him on his first birthday.
It’s a big milestone, although I know there are so many more to come. But we feel so incredibly lucky to have him in our lives.
Every once in awhile we are gifted one of those moments, those moments when something so obvious finally clicks in our head. “LIGHT BULB!” (said in my best Gru voice) This past weekend, while cleaning out my basement, I realized that I had box, upon box, upon box of family photos. Albums stuffed full of family portraits and snapshots. Not posed photos, just shots of regular ordinary days and moments. Maybe a bigger life event thrown in here or there, like a birthday or a new baby, but mostly just life. Funny thing about all those shots, no one edited them or photoshopped them, or deleted them before they had a chance to be seen. Photo upon photo of me as a child, my mom at the age I am now, all of my family members sitting there in those boxes looking back at me from the beauty of film. They are not hiding from the camera, or stretching out their neck to avoid the sagging neck skin, no, just smiles and real expressions. Then I started to think about the shots of me the past 5 years. There aren’t many. Why? Mostly because I am the one holding the camera. I am in control of not only what gets shot, but what remains and what is uploaded. Even if there is a shot taken of me, I have the option to hit that ever tempting delete button at all times. Herein may lie the true gift of film, there was no delete button! No one was turning their camera around and previewing their images then choosing what was kept and what was not. Now hear me out, I love digital, I love playing with my images, composing shots, clicking away to my heart’s content. I would not trade that, but what if the control that provides me ultimately keeps me from having images of myself? What will my kids have when they are my age I am now? They will have bazillion photos of themselves, yes definitely taking care of that, but what will they have of me, and us together, if I continue to delete them? I have all the excuses, “I look fat (I have been overweight most of my adult life so obviously I am not changing that overnight). This shot shows my double chin. Ugh look at those crows feet! My skin is showing its age and years of sun worshipping. The greys are taking over my scalp.” blah. blah. blah. BORING. Do my kids care about all those excuses? Do they look at me with the same critical eye I am obviously applying to myself? Of course not. Aren’t I teaching them that beauty comes in all shapes sizes colors and ages, yet somehow not applying those lessons to images of my own self? Guilty as charged.
SO what do I do about it? I need to change, and I have been on this path searching for the beauty of me. Not about the pretty, all about the proof. The proof of my life. The ME in our moments. I want my children to look back and have proof of this me now, and the me tomorrow, and the me 5 years from now.
Yesterday we went to the beach. I had my camera along, clicking away at my kids. They were flying kites, running in the sand, feeding the seagulls and I was watching them and documenting it all. I wanted proof that I was there too so I shot my feet in the sand next to my youngest’s feet. Later that afternoon as I was watching them run, I turned the camera around and clicked the image above. Just me, off center, slightly out of frame, soaking in the sun, crows feet and grey hairs representing. Content, present, alive, me, now. Not for pretty, just for proof.
Does this speak to you? Do you feel like you too hide or delete too much of YOU from your images? Fellow shutter sister Meredith Winn and I are launching our very first 6 week e-course in self portraiture next Monday April 23rd. Click on over to NOW YOU to read more about our upcoming class. Perhaps this is a journey you are ready to leap into too.
Today I challenge you, I want to see your proof. I do not want you to stress over editing or composing. I just want you to hold your camera in your hands, turn it around and focus on the beauty of you. Click! Don’t delete it. Upload and share your image with me please. You are worthy. You are here. You deserve to be seen just as you are right now in this moment.
xo.
I kept gazing at it, like some mirage off in the distance. After our picnic lunch, we took off on a walk so we could get closer. Up near the dunes, where the river meets the sea, there was a dry storage of sorts. She sat up on blocks with a for sale sign taped to the stern. The colors are what grabbed my attention, and yes, how she sat there proudly as if to sail off into the air.
But oh, those colors!
We all gravitate towards favorites. And this color combination tugs at my heart the most. The boldness it invokes in me and my photography is perhaps why I find myself shooting similiar tones again and again. Can colors make you stronger, more submissive, more aggresive, more melancholy? I allow myself to be more vibrant when shooting colors like this while behind the lens. I don’t question this, I simply acknowledge it and gather these strong colors around me like a boisterous tribe of friends.
Photography allows us to go boldly in any direction of the color wheel that we desire. What do you see through your lens? Show us some of your favorite colors today.
I was lucky enough to get to spend the majority of my spring break on a beautiful, pristine, sunshiny beach at the tip of Baja, Mexico. It was heaven. Sifting through my images, all I see are blue blue skies, blue blue water and golden golden sand. With 99% sunshine, even the sunsets are vibrant. Soft light on that beach was nearly non-existent. It was just the quality of how the light was; clean, bright, un-filtered. In a word, vibrant.
I’m not complaining. Not one single bit. But what I find curious is how I am chosing to interpret my vacation images. We had next to no internet access so there were only a very select number of images that would even load through my Instragram. Most of the them were shot or altered in a way that didn’t showcase the blue blues or golden goldens. The first was shot upon arrival, near dark (which was the only time the light got soft). Another was captured upon waking; the soft, dreamy view from my bed in the morning. And my favorite was one of my daughter in the water, captured at the peak of bright, vibrant light and color (and yet, it’s a black and white). Go figure.
As I mused on which image I would share today, I found this gem from my iPhone. The original was, of course, saturated with the bright blue sky and yet my choice was to dial it way down, to give it a vintage postcard feel (via Lightroom) which in other words means to interpret it in a totally different way than it came straight out of the camera.
As photographers, we are artists. And as artists we have the option to manipulate our images the way we want to. We can use our photo editing tools the same way painters use paint. We are the masters of our photographic vision. Personally, I don’t know why I edit images like I do. I just do what feels right for each image and follow my creative bliss.
Have you ever thought about your process of processing? Do you use a heavy hand? Are you more subtle? Do you love acclassic black and white or SOOC? Share with us what you find and link to an image that shows off your favorite interpretation today.
Deborah shoots images like this with whichever camera is handy and spends her weekends instigating adventures for her two kids.
Deborah can be found on Flickr at Damiec.
Aaaah, it’s that time again. Share with us the colors that paint your weekend.
The word focus keeps crossing my path. It’s so interesting how that works. Little whispers from the universe.
I strongly believe that whatever we focus on will grow. I love this quote by Marianne Williamson.
We can always choose to perceive things differently. You can focus on what’s wrong in your life, or you can focus on what’s right.
~Marianne Williamson
Over and over I’ve seen this work in my life, both positively and negatively. I’ve focused on my troubles and they’ve continued to grow. I’ve focused on my art and it’s flourished. I’ve focused on a bad relationship and it kept getting worse. I’ve focused on beauty and found more beauty. I could go on and on.
It works. We can use this ‘power‘ for good or for evil. I try my best to choose good.
Tell us/Show us….what are you focusing on these days?
There is gratitude during those minutes following a long day of work. A lesson in cultivating a spirit of self-love, and acknowledging the things that are important to me. It’s a bit strange. I cannot wait to go back to the ones I love and yet very much enjoy feeling that sense of completion, of connectedness with my self.
For the past few weeks I’ve developed a habit of taking photos on my way back home. I love how they reflect those moments in between the many demands and commitments of daily life, and remind me to slow down, and give thanks for everything that happens to me.
How about you? Do you have those moments during morning or evening commute? If yes, do you pull your camera and capture them? Please share with us today.
In a forum such as this one where people gather and connect about their shared love for photography it’s no wonder to me that there’s a running conversation about the value of light. As photographers it’s what we do. We search for light and we seek to capture any bit of it that enchants us. Sometimes it’s about replicating a feeling or documenting a moment and other times it’s about creating a new one. However you view your photography, your camera may be the brush, but it’s the light that you mix on your pallet.
Some people I know, are moved by melody; others by prose. More still, by taste, style or sense of place. Of course any combination of these in the right dose and application hold meaning for me, but nothing touches my soul like the sun. My love affair with the stuff (and consequently my roller coaster relationship with darkness) started before I ever picked up a camera, though.
Every door I walk through, the first thing I see is how the light enters the space. If I’m coming to visit you, don’t waste your time cleaning up, just draw open the blinds. The corner of a room where sunlight gets caught fascinates me, and golden glowing edges of cheekbones or jars are the things of my dreams.
I know exactly where the sun falls on my sofa at every hour during every season and nothing makes me more melancholy than august evenings when the light begins to fade and I know what lies ahead.
Scientifically it’s a thing—this need for the ultraviolet. For those of us who are afflicted, there’s a piece missing and we are at risk during winter’s shorter days. Here’s where the camera comes in for me. I’ve learned to get through those darker days by absorbing every ounce of sunlight I possibly can and drawing it up to the surface when I feel the weight bear down.
I collect the light with my camera. It exists in my computer and in print for me to inject directly into my mood as needed. I walk through days of usual and ordinary and I see things that are anything but. Light becomes a commodity and it takes on shapes and forms that can brighten even the darkest days.
I know I’m not alone in this need for light. Those of us who make photographs, we feed on it. Vitamins, light therapy, yoga, antidepressants. None ever really helped before. Who knew that a camera might be the thing that could actually do the most good?
And so, as the sun streams through my kitchen window later into the evenings now, the feeling of weightlessness is palpable. The emotional hatches, tightly battened down sometime early last fall, have been removed and I am liberated.
Do you have a favorite photograph that is all about the light? Share the link below!
Image and words courtesy of guest shutter sister Amy Drucker. You can find Amy on her blog, at Flickr and on Instagram at @amy_druck.