New Year coming up!!

I hope all who read this had a very Merry Christmas with their families. I'm old school, so I will say Merry Christmas because that's what our family celebrates. If you celebrate something else, then that's great and I'm happy for you too!

Although I have been sick this week with a cough and sometimes flu-like symptoms, I was still able to get on my computer. So I finished up my last project which was putting pictures of my sisters and myself from our Mediterranean Cruise trip on a DVD! That was a first for me, and trust me it was a challenge. First of all I had to go the DVD route (which I had purchased a stack of DVDs just in case I was going to need them for a project), since the CDs I had wouldn't take all the photos even though I had resized them from their RAW status to JPGs, and to an even smaller size, but large enough to be able to be printed if need be. I even added music to it, which I wasn't planning on doing, however, it just worked out that way. I just used my MSN Media Center to do it. I was lucky too in picking music I didn't even listen to before selecting -- yikes -- that's risky! For some reason a few of the first photos loaded didn't rotate, even though they were already rotated in the file. I don't know what was up with that - maybe someone can share some light on that subject?? I thought of calling my nephew but I didn't. So that project is done and they are off in the US Mail!

This morning I just happened to look out the window and there was a cloud by what we call our 'lion' on the hill. The cloud looked like it was smoke coming out of the mouth of the lion, so I ran and grabbed the Canon T2i and clicked off a couple of shots. I liked the black and white version the best.

I also spent some time today looking through my negatives from Europe and I have enough there to keep me busy for a looooong time! I'm anxious to get back in the darkroom. I think I will warm up by developing some film for my son that I haven't done yet! I want it over with and off my list!!

Christmas is coming!

Wrapping the loose ends up for Christmas. I'm basically done being ready! Whew! Yesterday I went down to Sacramento to pick up some of my framed pieces that were on display for a Second Saturday earlier in the year and ended up in a public gym/personal trainer establishment. They were sad to see them go, but it was time to move them. So now I have 15 framed pieces that need to be cleaned and I'm thinking of taking them out of the frames and just selling them as matted prints. They are getting 'older' now. A lot of them were from my France, NYC, and San Francisco series. I can't afford to just have them taking up space in my studio, when they're meant to be enjoyed on an every day basis! ;)

I'm going to call Aaron Bros. today and find out when their One Cent Sale is - buy one frame, get a second for one cent! I'm thinking it's going on right now! I'll be needing some gold fancy frames very soon for my Italy images.

I was busy making CDs for some family members yesterday and the day before. We had our family Christmas get together last Friday, so I figured it would be easier to put them all on disk rather than me making prints - cheaper too! It takes a lot of time to do that. I'm still working on a project for my sisters. Hopefully I get that one done by New Year's!!

I may have to paint something real soon, as I keep having these great dreams of beautful skies. Last night I dreamed of a black and white sky with only one portion or thing in color. As I'm looking at it, there are men there with digital equipment messing around and I'm saying, "Wow, look at that sky, it's how some digital photographers make them!" Silly stuff!

MERRY CHRISTMAS!!

Wonderful Christmas-time!

The only photography I've been doing is putting together some photo albums. I don't print out what I call 'snap shots', I take them to Walgreen's. I reserve my precious ink for my artwork! ;) And the photography I have done this week is for our family when we took the grand kids out fishing the other day to Folsom Lake. Well, the water was waaay down, I mean we had a bit of a hike to find the water. We weren't really depending on catching any fish, it was all about being with the grand kids, which was a lot of fun for us. I did take quite of few shots using my Canon T2i - both color and black and white. I'm posting a photo that I took in digital black and white. The lake was so eery looking, almost like the surface of the moon.

We have a family gathering tomorrow so I've been busy baking and getting ready for that. I'll be working the High Hand Gallery on Sunday and of course on Saturday is our Third Saturday, but it's also our 3rd Anniversary of being in business! If you'd like to come out to High Hand Nursery, the High Hand Gallery, we will be open until 8:00 p.m. Don't forget the '3Vigne' wine tasting will be open from 12:00 to 5:00 p.m. (They may even stay open until 8:00 p.m. - I don't know!)

High Hand Gallery

Christmas is coming upon us and life is so busy right now. I haven't been in my studio or darkroom except just to share it with friends and show them around. I'm not giving any photographic images as Christmas gifts either as my family has already informed me earlier in the year that they have no more wall space!! Okay, okay, not to worry! (I guess they don't know how to rotate artwork!)

Sunday I will be working again at High Hand Gallery from 10 - 4:30 p.m. so if you are local and you're reading this, please stop by and see me. If you need to do any Christmas shopping this would be the place. There are lots of gifts to choose from either from the gallery or the new Bricoleur shop or the florist or from the nursery. Some of the High Hand Gallery Artists have made Christmas tree ornaments and we have them displayed on several Christmas trees! And if you get a little thirsty, then there are the 3Vigne wine tasting rooms from three local wineries that are open on Saturdays and Sundays from 12 - 5 p.m. Bring your significant other, your friends or yourself! It is quite the destination these days. And don't forget to bundle up for the fruit sheds. It's a little chilly in there, so put on your Christmas sweater and scarf and drop by!

Epson Ultra Premium Matte Paper

Yesterday I was able to get some Christmas shopping done, and then today I worked out in the yard all day! We've had such great weather I had to take advantage of it.

I did continue to finish up with some more cards, so I got that accomplished. On Sunday I also printed out some digital black and whites on Epson's Ultra Premium Presentation Paper Matte. Not every photographic image looks good on matte, and other papers I could say the same thing too. However, I did print out two black and white images on the matte paper and loved them both. This one I'm posting today is again from Burano. I tended to switch over to my programmed black and white function on the Canon T2i when I saw more of the 'still life' types of scenarios. This one was shouting out to me when I was there. It's just an image of ordinary everyday life there - the laundry hanging out to dry, the bikes left at the front yard - simplistic as it was, it was worthy of capturing. It printed out fabulously on the matte paper and I'm very happy with it. I'll mat as many as I can with the amount of mats I cut not long ago, then whatever I don't have, I'll cut.

Just to touch again on the ICC profiles for all papers, I have to admit years ago I would just do trial and error kind of printing. I mean, it was new to me and I guess I just loved wasting paper! Hah! But I learned that one should read the instructions for the settings - I mean it's all right there so you don't have to go thru all that wastefulness. So read the cheat sheets, that's what they're there for.

ICC Profiles

Over the weekend I was busy with a couple of projects. First I needed to head over to High Hand Nursery and take photos of the High Hand complex for their newsletter. I almost got there too late, as it was pretty bright by 10 a.m. But I think I managed to capture a few that hopefully will work out. That project pretty much took up half my day. I came home and started working on my second project of printing out some of my digital European photographic images.

It was basically a 'study in ICC profiles' for me. (FYI: Definition of ICC - International Color Consortium profile. An ISO-approved color management standard for specifying the attributes of imaging devices such as scanners, digital cameras, monitors and printers so that the color of an image remains true from source to destination. A profile can be embedded within the image itself.) Come to find out I didn't realize that I had purchased the wrong Ilford Galerie inkjet paper. It wasn't working in my Epson and neither did it fare well in my HP printer. I'm like, 'what the heck?' I kind of thought the box was looking a little different, but you never can tell, companies continually change their product names and styles of boxes (Epson's really good at that). I accidentally bought the Ilford 'Classic Pearl Paper', when I should have been buying the 'Smooth Pearl'. You know, getting older is a real challenge these days! I was so mad because I had purchased the box of 100 Sheets!! I like the results you normally get from the Pearl and like using it for my cards. I opened the box and used several sheets trying to figure out what was wrong! So now I can't return it! Dangit!

Once I figured out where I went wrong, I put the Ilford paper away, and continued with the Epson Ultra Premium Glossy. I spent Sunday afternoon printing out more color digital photos from Italy, as well as making some new cards, which I haven't done for a while. This is a new image from the island of Burano. Just loved all the colors in that small town.

Darkroom Day

Wednesday I did head back into the darkroom and started developing one of my Venice images! I very rarely make test strips - I know, I know - but even when you do make them, you still can end up making 2 or 3 prints until you get it right anyway, so what's the diff?? ;) The image I printed was one of the Venice gondolas all lined up on the Grand Canal. Since I don't use flash (which in this particular instance I probably could have used it!), it was a slightly contrasty photo, which means some major dodging in the foreground. Then I ended up with an additional 3 second burn in the upper right corner. Unfortunately, I do not have a scanner large enough to scan 11x14's. Yesterday I bought more darkroom supplies so that once I get going I won't have to run down to Sacramento. Sometimes I order online too which has a short turnaround time of about 2 - 3 days.

Here is a digital image from Cephalonia that I actually took in color, but like it better as a black and white. If I were to go to the wine country here in the USA I guess I could probably find a shot similar to this one, but there wouldn't be Vespas out front, they would definitely be Harley Davidsons!!