A farewell to Studio Lighting (help please)

Dear Introduction to Studio Lighting,
It's been real. And it's been fun. And it's been real fun. Occasionally. And only at the end. You forced me to spend a lot of money to try and be creative, and taught me how to make Courtnee's legs look amazing.
Okay, so maybe you're not so bad. But next time, let's try and be less boring. Have a good winter, and see you in the summer for Commercial Photography.
Sincerely,
Kirsten
P.S. Does any one know how I can fix the distortion on the photos when they show on the home page?

Revamp and Little Red

Welcome to the new revamped "Kirsten the Explorer"! I'm pretty proud of the new site, and find it much easier on the eyes than my previous, rather boring template. Admittedly, its not perfect. The picture thumbnail stretches the photo, which is incredibly bothersome, but I'll deal.

Well, today is my birthday and to celebrate I did a photo shoot with Anna and the new love of her life, Foxy. Anna volunteers at the local animal shelter and found Miss Foxy there. Now I'm sure that you can imagine what she looks like based on her name. Everytime Anna comes home, she gushes about this beautiful fox-like dog. I finally saw a picture of her, and was oddly surprised at how foxy she was. I couldn't pass up an opportunity to take advantage of such an unusual dog, so Anna became my "little red riding hood", Foxy my "wolf". Foxy was so patient, and well behaved and sat in all the right places. Oh, and Anna was good too :).




So, my lovely followers, what do you think about the new look and Little Miss Red?

30 Days

I've reached the 30 day mark til I will depart for India. Holy crow*. I'm finishing up on some arrangements, payments, and other purchases, and still don't exactly feel prepared. Yesterday, I was looking over my flight itinerary for my flight there. I leave from Seattle on Jan. 4, and go straight to Frankfurt, Germany (10 hour duration). Followed by a 5 hour layover, I will have a 7 hour flight from Frankfurt to Mumbai, arriving at 1:30 a.m. Eight hours later I leave Mumbai, to Hyderabad, finally arrive at Vishakhatapatnam on Jan. 6. It totals to around 35 hours of transit from Seattle to Vizag. Believe you me, my face is the face of excitement. Now because some forms of humor are hard to detect things written on the interwebs, I will tell you that I just used sarcasm.

While in India, I have to do a project. I've chosen a study of the cemetery art in the colonial cemeteries in Vizag. The art I will be studying will vary from the headstone imagery to any of the architecture. The director of program upon learning that I was a photo major wanted me to document the cemetery and its architecture. The whole attitude towards cemeteries in India are quite different than our attitude here in America. We treat our cemeteries like parks to visit, and wander around. In India, they are not places you go, simply a place for the dead. Upkeep is supposedly non existent, and some believe it likely that the colonial cemeteries will be torn down to make room for more contemporary architecture. The director felt this would be a great opportunity to document the cemeteries before they are destroyed. It should be very fascinating. I would be very interested to see and learn of the funerary customs of the Hindus as well. From what little (and I mean little) I know, their ceremonies already seem uniquely different from our American customs.

There are so many emotions running, and my mind is overwhelmed by it. I've turned to a numb state, neither here nor there, so I can focus on everything that I have to do to finish this semester and be ready by Christmas break. Cross your fingers! Hopefully I can make it.

*So as not to offend the natives, whose beleifs revere those animals of the beefly influence, I am going to attempt to no longer use the phrase "holy cow".

5 Followers!

Yay for 5 followers! To celebrate, here is a neat "macro-like" eye shot. Google told me that I could put a 50mm lens on a telephoto lens and get some very neat, detailed close ups.



It's not perfect, there are still some things I would like to refine, but I think they're fun.

Let any of our mutual friends know I have a blog that they could follow if they are interested. Thanks for the support guys!

"Studio Lighting Can Be Fun! (No really, it can.)"

A few months back, I saw a photo of a girl made-up to look like one of Roy Lichtenstein's paintings, and thought it was such a great idea. Ever since I have been dreaming of doing similar, possibly for my bfa project next year.

So when the next assignment for my studio lighting class was to create an "artistic interpretation" of the word "ring", I jumped at the opportunity to use this idea. We put our heads together and found a way to make it work. This was the outcome:


It was a blast and we are all really excited about the images. JLynn (our amazing model) was such a trooper and let us paint all over her.

Okay, I'll admit it, studio lighting can be fun--its just really frustrating before you get to the fun part.

Fiber Fiber Night

Vincent Van Gogh's Starry Starry Night recreated with produce.

Portfolio Series

Bah! I know I said that I would post next on the stuff I have been doing in my Intro to Studio Lighting, but not much of the stuff is either fun or fascinating. My Digital Photo class, however, is quite the opposite. I may not be Learning things that I will have to use a whole lot, but I'm having a lot of fun trying to be creative. Example: I was up until 3 or so in the morning, re-composing Van Gogh's "Starry Night" out of produce to be scanned. I don't have the picture ready yet, but I would recommend looking up "Scanography" or "Scan-o-graphs". There is some pretty interesting stuff.
I'm finally applying to the photography program this semester, and the portfolio I'm have to turn in requires that I have a series (a grouping of cohesive photographs). I finally finished shooting and printing last weekend, and I feel pretty good about them. Here's a peek.
I say this all the time, but it doesn't make it any less true--the colors are actually more vibrant than they are displayed here. For unknown reasons, I find the flickr layout annoying hence I rarely use it, and I use sites like facebook and blogger to share my stuff with my beautiful supporters. Unfortunately for me, those sites take a huge dump and smear it all over my photos and diminish the color vibrance and quality. I'll just have to deal with the results of my decisions and stick to the sites that are in dire need of some pepto. Enjoy!

Mmmm... Nature...

And all its yummy deliciousness.

Book Arts

Meet my new favorite hobby. I'm taking a book arts class this semester, and I'm pretty sure that its the coolest class offered at BYU-I. Here are a couple of the things I've made so far.






The first is a very simple bound and cover, but still nice looking. The second is supposed to be a very organic book. There is no hard cover, only the leather. I loved the raw edge of the leather an wanted to maintain it, so I incorporated it into the signature's edge (the edge of the pages). The last is my favorite so far. Its called the perfect bound, and is really fun to make. I also inserted an envelope/pocket doodad for little bits of junk paper with little notes on them I always seem to have.

Next: adventures in studio lighting

My new favorite boy

Continuing on catching up. On August 7th, my sweet sweet nephew was born at 9lbs and 9oz, and a 22 inch head. A week after he was born the parentals and I went to go meet him for the first time. It was love at first sight. It got even better when I got to hold him and he melted into my arms. I think my heart melted too. Here are a couple shots I grabbed of him.






Oh, how I love that boy.

On another note, for the whole 7 weeks I was home I was on the nervous side of wetting my pants. Then I found the most amazing form of entertainment: Bollywood. Now I find myself on the excited side of wetting my pants. Yes, I have bladder problems. But now I fully expect the Indian people to randomly burst into song and dance, as well as experience the phenomenon known as the "epic breeze" wherever I go. And I may or may not be harboring a secret crush on Shah Rukh Khan. I'm not sure if its due to his amazing abs, or his charm.

Family Photos

It's been a while, and there is much to catch up on. First up, and most recently I had the opportunity to take photos of the Cartwright family. They were a fun family, and the girls were hilarious! Especially the youngest (as evidenced by the following).







My job was pretty easy because they were all beautiful to start with. Next up: My nephew.

Assisting Charlene Hardy

I had the privilege of assisting the very talented Charlene Hardy while she tackled a newborn shoot. She had a couple different poses that she wanted to experiment with on little Maycee, and needed some assistance in performing those. I most excitedly took the opportunity to assist her to see her in action and maybe soak in some of her talent through osmosis or something. Throughout the shoot I would get to hop in a snap a few photos, so here are a couple that I shot.






I don't feel like I can take too much credit for these, Charlene made the set and posed Maycee. It was a great learning experience and I am so grateful to Charlene for letting me help and learn from her and try to absorb even an ounce of her talent. I get to have the opportunity again on Friday when I help her on another shoot. I'm looking forward to it!

Fire in the Sky

What a day for pictures. There was a fire out at the Idaho National Laboratory on Tuesday that brought great big smoke clouds to Rexburg. Of course, it was a windy day here in the Burg, causing the smoke rise high, doing some crazy things with the sun and the sky. The sun kept flipping between a bright red and a vivid orange. Kind of creepy and really sinister looking? Yes.



The clouds had some really beautiful purples and dark blues. Next to the green trees, it was simply amazing.



The wind blew the thickest and blackest smoke over R mountain a little bit later, and with the sun still shining an orange tint, it looked pretty intense. It made for this sweet picture.



As I was driving out to R mountain, I passed a little lake that looked inky black from the black clouds above it. It was shveet. The last report I read on Wednesday said that the fire has burned around 170 square miles. That explains all the clouds. Its like the Hanford fire all over again.

College Grad Shoot

Erin asked if I could take some photos for her graduation announcements, I of course agreed with great excitement. She is secretly, or maybe not so secretly, one of my favorite subjects to photograph. How could she not? She laughs at everything! So here are my favs:

I like this one a lot. But Erin thinks she looks like a succubus.

Congrats Erin for graduating this semester. You only have a few weeks left til its over, and you can do it!

I may smell of motor oil....

First off, I got a bike. Its orange, vintage, and awesome. For a week now, I've had a hankering for some Snoasis, a.k.a. the best snowcones in the world. They have some really unique flavors with cream on top. Amazing. The combination of having a bike and the craving for some good snowcones made for a good excuse to go.

7:15-
C, N, and I took bikes with N on her longboard. It had been a blistering hot day, and we caught it at the perfect time when a breeze was just coming through cooling off the evening. The sun was still out, and it was b-e-a-utiful. We sat on a bench, and watched as the clouds with some nice lightning rolling in, I wasn't worried. I don't mind riding in the rain, in fact, I love it.

7:45-
Half a block from home, we're stuck underneath the entryway at subway, waiting for the hail to clear. Believe me riding against the wind, rain, and hail is nowhere near close to a day on the beach.

7:50-
Hail stops. Rain continues. Mad dash home. No sign of hail. Puddle jumping.

8:00-
We see a large group of girls from Colonial House standing on the side of the roundabout. The gutter had formed a puddle of EPIC proportions. What have we to do but join them. There really is nothing better than getting sprayed with gutter water from cars speeding by.

8:20-
The cops show up. Everyone disperse.

Its almost 11, and not a lick of homework done. Lets just say, awesome night.

More Multiple Exposures

Fun? Yes, yes it is.

Fun with multiple exposures

I first discovered the joy that is double exposure when I way toying with an old minolta film camera. I have been addicted ever since. So much fun! I am a minimalist when it comes to photoshop, and only use it when necessary, so what you see here was done in camera. The only photoshop used was recovery in camera raw.

The Dailies: 10

Its a great day at BYU-Idaho.

The Dailies: 9

Laundry day.

The Dailies: 8

This is what happens when you're stuck inside on a rainy Sunday.

The Dailies: 7

Capturing what my summer evenings feel like.

The Dailies: 6

Gas: $8. Groceries: $67.07. Soaking in the bliss of the "Low Cost Leader": Priceless. This is what happens when we make a Winco run.

The Dailies: 5

I was fascinated by the way that the dirty dishes sat so beautifully in the sink, flowing from one idea to the next. There is so much contrast between the harsh lines of the silverware, and the soft round edges of the plates. The color/material drew my eyes, the inviting blues and the warm brown, with a combination of the cold silver.

The Dailies: 4

What I enjoy about the summer semester in Idaho is seeing all the lilacs. This particular bush was beautiful and massive. With the gardner there as a reference, we get a sense for how huge it is. Although the weather is dreary, we do get to see the vibrant purple from this lovely flower.

The Dailies: 3

Tenderly cradling her cup of heaven, and the rest of the world is just a blur. Sometimes you need an escape, and the Cocoa Bean is the getaway car. Excuse the shameless product placement.

The Dailies: 2

Her shoes alone, capture the essence of her character, without seeing too much of her face. Bright, and little feminine with an edge to it.

The Dailies: 1

An interesting view from outside my door. I found it fascinating how from this viewpoint, space was split into quadrants, and within those quadrants divided by more lines. Its like my eyes are playing the old table tennis video game bouncing from side to side to side...