Jack

Today I was out and about all day, but got a nice shot of our friends' dog, Jack, on my iPhone.  It's cellphone quality, of course, but Jack is adorable, nevertheless.

Descending garden stairs

This is a "bonus" post for today.  The style of this image went down a distinctly different path than my other self portraits and I was a little hesitant to present it at class last night, but it received much more attention than my other photos.  So, for documentation sake, I wanted to post it here.  Since I had already posted one already, I didn't post it Tuesday (George liked the one of me posing at the piano better), but I continue to be drawn to these dreamy, old-looking styles, so I wanted it included.  I really like the sunlight in this image, the framing of the trees and bushes and the stone walkway leading to the subject.  I also like portraits where the face is undetermined.

Mojo in the living room

Over the last few days I've taken so many photos and pressed myself to be creative, so today, I'm going for just cute.  Mojo hasn't made the blog yet, so I followed her around the house until I got at least one reasonable image of her.  Nothing fancy, just my sweet little kitty.

Deb in Living Room

Of course, just as we get to the end of the week, I'm actually starting to have fun with these self portraits.  Once I freed myself from thinking it was about "pretty" pictures I could get more creative.  The one I did today is in the "creative" category.  Not what I would have considered a portrait before this photography class, but after looking at portraiture of various artists I realize now that it really just refers to "images of people"....not a posed "portrait".  (In fact, this image is inspired by one of the recent photographs I reviewed).  Of course, by its nature, a self portrait is posed (it's hard to get a candid of yourself!), but it's fun to create images that don't look like they were done by a studio photographer.  Also, I've found that now that I've "gotten over myself" and begun to just look at my image as a subject, I don't have to impose on other people to do my work.  I think George is particularly happy that I have "found myself" in this sense. In my last class, every week he had to pose for me and he did not enter into the modeling world happily.  So....who knows what next week brings, but here's one more self-portrait.

Deb at piano

I continued to make self-portraits today on a quest to have at least one I could use tomorrow in my photography class.  Today I had a little better luck and actually felt fairly good about several images.  This was George's favorite, so I decided to do this one.  I tried many, many ways to get a photo of me playing the piano, but either the angle, lighting or focus was always off.   So, I just gave in and decided to pose.  Not the most creative, but it's better than most of the others.

Gnocchi solo

I just can't do another portrait today....so I'll go back to taking pictures of food!  Today I put my gnocchi lessons to the test and tried it on my own.  I'm making the sauce right now....butter and sage....and looking forward to a nice dinner.

Edward

This is a photo of our friend Edward.  He is a wonderful musician, so of course I wanted to photograph him playing his guitar.  It was also a good way to get him to play for us for a while!  At least I think I got a few good shots to use for my class this week......I'll be happy to move away from portraits!