In a Viennes Garden

Florida To Houston

83/365
Week 13 theme: GET PUSHED 24 March - 30 March

The team: Benman31 and basselal

Challenge 1: Collaborative Double exposure

Leopold (spending a vacation in Florida) and I (stuck in already-hot Houston with extremely busy and stressful stretch at work) agreed to do a collaborative challenge. The first installment is: Collaborative double exposure. We both take two pictures a day and send one per mail to our get pushed partner. He is free to process, crop and do whatever he wants with the picture but has to make a double exposure out of this shot and his remaining shot.

Here's my first double exposure. A two lane road in Florida leading to Houston Skyline.

The White Cat At The Window

76/365
Week 12 Theme: High Key (17.03 - 23.03)

“Horror is The Removal of Masks”

65/365
Week 10 Theme: DOUBLE EXPOSURE (03 March - 09 March)
ODC: The masks we wear

(The title is a quote by "Robert Bloch")

Calm Like A Bomb

64/365
Week 10 Theme: DOUBLE EXPOSURE (03 March - 09 March)

Suits

59/365
Week 9 theme: STREET PHOTOGRAPHY 24 Feb-2 March

Pay The Machine

58/365
Week 9 theme: STREET PHOTOGRAPHY 24 Feb-2 March

Brief Encounter

57/365
Week 9 theme: STREET PHOTOGRAPHY 24 Feb-2 March




"A fellow will remember a lot of things you wouldn't think he'd remember. You take me. One day, back in 1896, I was crossing over to Jersey on the ferry, and as we pulled out, there was another ferry pulling in, and on it there was a girl waiting to get off. A white dress she had on. She was carrying a white parasol. I only saw her for one second. She didn't see me at all, but I'll bet a month hasn't gone by since that I haven't thought of that girl.

"Bernstein" from the movie "Citizen Kane"
****************

I'm not usually a big fan of "selective coloring". Actually, it's not that simple. I don't really "hate" selective coloring but I feel that in the vast majority of cases it's "gimmicky" and overused. Still, I did use it on very few occasions where I felt it would work.

For this photo, I really tried to resist. I must have made 7 or 8 different versions with different edits. I kept going back to this one. I just felt it is the most striking. and after consulting with Gretchen, I decided to go with it.

I'm allowed 1 selective coloring photo a year. Arn't I?

Easy Rider

55/365
Week 9 theme: STREET PHOTOGRAPHY 24 Feb-2 March

Find The Connection

54/365
Week 8 theme: DIPTYCH (17.02 - 23.02)



You probably need to be at least as old as I am (maybe a little younger) to know how those two items are connected.

(this idea is not mine. I think the meme has been online already for several years now)

Valentine Cookies for Lunch!!

45/365

Impressionism, Woman with a Laptop

42/365
WEEK 7 theme: Focus Pocus (10 feb- 16 feb)
ODC:Out of Focus



So, I think I voiced somewhere in this group my doubts about this week's theme. How can I get a good photo but blurry on purpose? I know it is doable (I probably have one or two on my stream) but it is very difficult. What adds to the challenge is that the theme states that "nothing is (should be) in focus".
I was almost already thinking to myself that, after two solid weeks of doing the theme every single day, I might skip this one.

But, the next day, the challenge was still on mind. I felt that I have a semblance of an idea in my head how to make it work. But the idea itself was out of focus.

Until [http://www.flickr.com/photos/zandrsmum/] (extremely thankful to you) posted a link to the great photo stream from [http://www.flickr.com/photos/46625367@N08]. Only then my idea clicked. I remembered in the 6th or 7th grade when the art teacher was explaining a certain technique of painting for our next assignment. At the time, he did not name it but I later discovered he was talking about "impressionism" (we just had to do it with Pastel).

I would have loved to take a walk sometime today to try to take some photos outside. Unfortunately, an extremely busy (and rainy) day prevented that. So I had to try something at home.

I'm curious to see what people think.

Abstractions

Abstracts: Part 3

Week 6 theme: ABSTRACT (3 Feb - 9 Feb)

38/365: Eclipse

39/365: Primordial

40/365: Canyon

Abstracts: Part 2

Week 6 theme: ABSTRACT (3 Feb - 9 Feb)

36/365: Angles

37/365: Spheres

Circle

100 Possibilities: 88/100

Abstracts: Part I

Week 6 theme: ABSTRACT (3 Feb - 9 Feb)

34/365: Arc

35/365: Diagonal

The Ace Of Spades

33/365
Week 5 theme: SONG LYRIC (27 Jan - 2 Feb)


"You win some, lose some, it's still the same to me
The pleasure is to play, it makes no difference what you say
I don't share your greed, the only card I need is
The Ace Of Spades"

Motorhead: The Ace of Spades

You Can Lean On Me

32/365

Week 5 theme: SONG LYRIC (27 Jan - 2 Feb)

"Well we all need someone to lean on
And if you want it, well you can lean on me"

The Rolling Stones: Let it Bleed

Emancipate

30/365



30/365
Week 5 theme: SONG LYRIC (27 Jan - 2 Feb)

"Emancipate yourselves from mental slavery;
None but ourselves can free our minds."

from "Redemption Song" by Bob Marley

"Big Fan" Revisited

Get Pushed is a Flickr group where people who sign up for a monthly photographic challenge get paired together to challenge each other to shoot something different what they ordinarily shoots.

An earlier post on this Blog showed my reply to a challenge by JeezyDeezy, a follow Flickrer and 365er. This is her reply to my challenge. This is the first photo to be published on this blog that is not taken by me.

Her write up on Flickr is posted below without editing. 

                                                          ***********************  

"Big Fan" of Basselal

For this Get Pushed, Round 30, I was thrilled to be paired with Basselal, whose dark depictions of the world have been fascinating me for a couple years now. He gave me this challenge:

Your subject could be a photograph taken by another (famous or not, although a famous photograph helps with familiarity), painting, or even an album cover or a movie poster.

- You should not just "replicate" but "re-imagine" the work and put your own spin on it.

I'll give you two level of difficulties (at least that's how I see it) and it's up to you to chose one of the two options:

- A work of art of your choice (photo, painting, album cover, poster, etc). I imagine this could be easier since you can pick something you are familiar with and know well.- A photo from my photostream (which I will not call a work of art). Although this might be fun for me, it might be more difficult for you to go over the photos and pick something that you would like to recreate.

As soon as I looked through Basselal's most interesting stream, I knew I'd choose the 2nd option.

Here is the image I repurposed:

A Space Oddity

29/365


Week 5 theme: SONG LYRIC (27 Jan - 2 Feb)

"Here am I sitting in a tin can far above the world
Planet Earth is blue and there's nothing I can do "

Space Oddity: David Bowie





Continuing with the weekly theme. This idea for the photo needed a lot of work in Photoshop, which I rarely do (or have the patience for).

I tried my best not to "cheat" by using elements that are not originally shot for this photo. So, out of the many layers (much more than you would guess by looking at it) only the stars are not mine (I even wanted to do that but it was cloudy). The moon is from an older photo I took myself. All other elements were shot specifically for this composite.

High Key Challenge

For round 30, I was excited to be paid with JeezyDeezy, I follow veteran 365er with a great photostream. her photos are not only very creative, she also have great photographic skill to pull off her great ideas. You can get a lot of inspiration by visiting her photostream.  Extra points for her great response to my push.

Her push to me was:

"I would like to challenge you to create a quintessential 'high-key' image. One that is over-exposed (whether in post or in camera) by a full stop and a half or two, so that the dark colours become bright and vivid, and the medium colours become beautiful pastels, and the highlights are blown, but in a soft dreamy way, not a glaring, irritating way. "

an extra condition to the push: "please, I would like to see you do this in colour."

Here goes my "free card out of jail". B&W is much more forgiving. But, the idea is to push beyond the comfort zone.

I had no idea how I'm going to do it. First, I though of a scene in nature without people. But after looking for examples for inspiration online, I decided that it would be better as a portrait. Still, I did not want to do a traditional portrait.

I took this photo about a week ago and although I wanted to experiment some more, extremely busy week and the fact that I'm fairly happy with it made me decide to go with this photo.

Looking at it now, I'm not sure if I did achieved the 1.5 or 2 stops over exposer. I mainly tried to go by colors as my main criteria. The vivid red and pastel light colors. I also tried to avoid shadows (one of the main criteria for high key" by using a fill light. There might be still some there, if you are a purest.

It was a fun challenge. Thanks to JeezyDeezy.

Darkness at The Break of Noon

Week 5 theme: SONG LYRIC (27 Jan - 2 Feb)
"It's Alright Ma (I'm only crying)" By: Bob Dylan



Darkness at the break of noon
Shadows even the silver spoon
The handmade blade, the child’s balloon
Eclipses both the sun and moon
To understand you know too soon
There is no sense in trying
********

I Think Dylan is probably the greatest song writer. So many images from his lyrics I wish I can translate to photographs. They are just very difficult to do.

I Wanna Hold Your Hand

27/365

Red Planet

21/365

Redlight

19/365

The Dancer At Jones Hall

18/365

Pink Nose

17/365

Just Do It!

16/365



Up until about 4 years ago (probably a bit more), I was very strict about my daily workout. Then, life happened. Back to back medical procedures then recovery, followed by a month of travel and other stuff (basically three months of complete suspension) threw a wrench in my routine that I couldn't get over. A new work assignment with much bigger responsibility and work load did not help either. Being initially fit gave me a false sense of confidence. "I need to do this, but I don't need to do right now". It took a long time (and many pounds) to get back to being serious about this.



It's been a few weeks. I'm still easing in. My routines are not even close to how rigorous they used to be. I'm looking forward to getting closer to that level, although being older does not help.



It's important not to worry about the results this early. The important thing is to stay the course.



Just Do It!

Egg on White Satin

13/365

Don't You Die On Me Now

12/365

Morning

11/365

Tumbling Dice

10/365

Crude: Part II

9/365

Crude

8/365

Veins

7/365

Stone Rose

6/365

Coffee Told Me

5/365

A Visit to The Dentist

3/365

Game of Thrones

3/365

Two

2/365

Lucky 2013

1/365 (2013)