What Would You Take?

This photo was taken tonight from the parking lot at the top of Pierce College. This is a very scary sight!

A friend of mine who lives in Rancho Palos Verdes, which was threatened last week by a fire, posted an email to our group asking "what would you take if you only had 10 minutes to get out of your home? If you had an hour?"

Interesting question. I can't honestly say that I would take much with me. I think I would take my computer, my software and a few photos if I only had 10 minutes. If I had an hour I would take a few clothes. Other than that, I think I would let everything else go. I think sometimes we get too attached to the "things" in our lives. I could certainly live with a lot fewer things in my life.

*note to whatever "powers that be" are listening - this is NOT an invitation to burn down or otherwise destroy my home or find some other way to take away my stuff*

Do we really need all the "stuff" we accumulate over our lifetimes? How many things do you have that you've never used/worn or only used/worn it once? I have several things I just HAD TO HAVE and I've never used it, or I've only used it once.

I can't imagine what it's like to stand there and watch (or watch on TV) your personal world disappear. I applaud those people who are interviewed after a disaster who say "we have our lives, that's the most important thing". My heart goes out to all those affected by these devastating fires and I salute all those who are putting their lives on the line to save other's lives and property.

Gumby & Pokey at The Beach

Wow, they have BIG seashells on this beach Gumby and Pokey found!

This was one of the set ups I tried with my fake beach that didn't work out. I was trying to make this look like the sea shore. There is water there at the bottom but it doesn't look like it. I probably should have put something blue or dark under the plastic to give it some color. But anyway, you can see what the basic set up was for the fake beach from this photo - folding table in the back yard, painter tarps and a couple of bags of sand box sand from Home Depot.

I believe this was the concept shot that started the whole beach idea. I wanted t shoot Gumby and Pokey at the beach, but didn't want to drive all the way down there to do it. I should play around with Photoshopping in a horizon and a shore line.

LA Arboretum

I love reflections (which reminds me I need to look for another reflections photo taken in downtown LA). If I remember correctly, the day I took this the pond was quite green, so getting this type of reflection of the sky and tree made it look better than it actually was at the time.

Interesting thing about cameras and the people who operate them - while it's true that the camera doesn't lie - it only records what is put in front of it - the camera operator, through lighting, selective framing and focusing can create an impression of a scene that is quite different from what is actually there. And this is all before it gets into Photoshop, where it can become anything at all! I guess the moral of this story is don't believe everything you see.

Candles In The Dark

I have an infinity mirror set up at home. It has posed a multitude of challenges trying to make good images. I originally set this up about 8? years ago when I was still shooting film - or I should say shooting film exclusively.

Challenges to this type of shooting:
Lighting - I don't have studio lights so I have to bring every lamp in the house to light the scene and still it's not enough. When I shot very slow to compensate for the light the color shift went very yellow or orange, which in this particular picture actually enhanced the look.

More lighting - I had to shoot at night to reduce the reflection in the front mirror (the two way mirror) and even then the spill over from the lighting on the objects between the mirrors caused a lot of reflection on the front mirror.

Space - this is set up on my dining room table. Not a lot of space to set up and move around.

I haven't really tried shooting this with a digital camera yet, mostly because I haven't had the time and because my dining room table is usually piled up with other projects. I really like the effects I can get with the mirrors and I have a lot of interesting ideas of playing with hiding things behind each other so they don't show in the primary face-on shot you see first so they become like little "Easter eggs" to find as you look more at what is in the photo.

If you're inspired to try something like this please let me know how it works out for you.

Family Jewels

I kid you not! This is called a Family Jewel tree. Never even heard of it until my friend Mike posted these photos on Facebook today. I got together with a few of my friends whom I haven't seen for several months and Mikey brought one of these seed pods for us to view "in the flesh" as they say. Needless to say it our conversations for a while were quite...um....interesting!

Nature makes the most unusual things! According to Mike this particular plant belongs to the milk weed family. These seed pods will, at some point, burst open and all the fluffy little seeds will fly out, looking for a place to settle and sprout.

Splashes of Color

Some at work got flowers today. I was inspired to take photos. I like getting close to things to see the fine detail. I think I'll try doing this image in pastels.

Jellyfish

I volunteer at the Ford Amphitheatre. On Saturday mornings they have family programs. Because it's an open air theater, they drape very large parachutes over the stage and audience areas to block some of the sun so the audience and performers are more comfortable.

When the wind blows the parachute undulates and the effect is like being in a tank with a large green jellyfish. It's quite mesmerizing.