Still Life Photography #2: My Mom's Lladros

Today, I put away the last of my Christmas decorations (the multi-piece Nativity which my mother-in-law made for me and a few random items which I hadn't noticed before).  After putting those things away, I took out a box of Lladro figurines which I inherited from my mother. I've been toying with the idea of displaying these for a while. As I took them out of their box and examined them, they seemed like a good subject for Still Life Photography. 

This week's lesson in Frugal Still Life Photography was about filling the frame with an object or objects vs. leaving white space. I really like the contrast between these two photographs as still lifes. I took both of these with my fixed 85 mm lens (which requires manual focusing on my D5100) in aperture priority mode. The first one is shot at f 4.8, 1/13, ISO 100. The second one is shot at f 2.2, 1/100, ISO 100. I probably should have used a tripod, but I didn't.  The Spanish Lady (that's how I think of her) shines on her own in the first photograph and stands out from the crowd in the second. I think the second one is my favorite. What about you? 
I had originally planned to take my soft light box outside and photograph the figurines there, to see how natural light worked with the box. But there was a howling wind going on, despite the bright sunshine. In the next pair, I just used my living room wall as a backdrop.

There was a lot of light coming in from the window (to the right), and I battled highlights and glare. Eventually I came up with these two shots which I like. Again, shot with 85 mm fixed lens, manual focus in aperture priority mode on my Nikon D5100. Both were taken at f 3.2, 1/50, 100 ISO. The first one is definitely my favorite. I just have trouble learning to love white space; I guess I have, in Cheryl McCain's words, "horror vacui" or "cenophobia."  
So, I took care of the problem by going over to PicMonkey and adding a quote to the second photograph. One very appropriate, given how I was feeling as I worked with these gifts from my mother:

Thanks for looking and commenting today. All feedback welcome!

Weekend Recap

Welcome to a recap of my lovely weekend!
It all began on Friday night when I attended the end of season cross country awards ceremony. My daughter Clara ended up with quite a few awards:

She was most proud of receiving a plaque for being "Rookie of the Year." The Varsity letter, All League star, CCS and State patches are also very cool. I think I'll get her a letterman's jacket and have her various patches sewn on. I'm not sure if all of my readers knows what a letterman's jacket is, but here's a photo of a family friend wearing one:

On Saturday morning, Clara and I got up bright and early, picked up a friend and drove over the Golden Gate Bridge to visit the Guide Dogs for the Blind school in San Rafael, Ca.

Working with guide dogs is exactly the kind of job which Clara would like to have someday, so we went to check out the facility. It is an amazing place, full of the most beautiful puppies and dogs you could imagine! They have their own breeding stock and an amazing training program. We even got to see a graduation ceremony with five visually impaired people finishing their training and officially receiving their guide dogs. Clara has signed up to volunteer there this summer, and she is also considering being a "puppy raiser" next year.
Saturday night I went to a pub with some girlfriends. . . 

We had a lot of laughs playing "Cards Against Humanity," which is a card game of sorts. In each round, the "judge" plays a prompt card which contains a question or half-finished sentence. All the other players pick an answer from the cards in their hand. The answer cards are very snarky and often quite naughty. It's all good fun though!
Sunday began with a hike:

And ended with a healthy pot of soup:

Both of these because I have started a "Take Down" weight loss program at my gym.  28 days, and I'm hoping to get lighter, re-focused on eating well, and back to being able to comfortably wear all my work clothes!
A busy, but fun weekend. How was yours?

Time to Pick the Postcards! (need advice)

Kat Sloma sponsors a wonderful world-wide art exchange called "Liberate your Art." The idea is simple - print up five postcards featuring your art, send them to Kat, and in return you'll receive six post cards from other artists. I've participated for a couple of years and really enjoyed it. If you want to sign up, check out this link. 
I'm doing photographs this year, but I've done mixed media in the past. I'm in the process of selecting the images I plan to print up. I like to do five different images, but many people just print up one. Here are ones I definitely plan to use. 

I think each of these will look really good on a 4x6 post card, and I am proud of each one as a photograph. I want to include one more image, and I want it to be from the plum harvest series. Which of the following do you think I should use?
#1 plums on a fence:

#2 plums in a basket:

#3 harvest basket:

#4 basket on the lawn:

Thanks for your help, and let me know if you're going to join the swap. The more the merrier!

Confessions of a Serial Book Buyer

I like to think of myself as someone who enjoys reading. Because I love books. I love reading book reviews and thinking about the books I will read and how much I will enjoy them. I love going to my book group and talking about books, especially hearing about the books that other members read. I love going to book stores or perusing Amazon's book store on line. And I love buying books. 
But, truth be told, I have a dirty little secret . . . I don't actually read that many of the books I buy.  I am a serial book buyer! The screen shot above shows the books in my kindle which I have bought and not finished. In fact, four of them (The State of Wonder, Lamb, When God was a Rabbit and The Four Agreements) I never even started! My bedside stand holds a pile of unread or unfinished books, including The Lacuna, Lark and Termite, March, Middlesex, Fieldwork, So Brave, Young and Handsome, Peace Like a River, and The Other Boleyn Girl (all,except one, started but never finished). I can't believe I'm the only one in the Serial Book Buyer's Club, am I? Come on . . . 'fess up!  Do you finish all the books you buy? If you start a book and life gets in the way or it's not compelling, what do you do? Do you hold onto it or toss it?
Of my kindle books, I know I will not finish Unbroken, and I am unlikely to start Lamb or State of Wonder. I actually want to finish White Dog Fell from Sky, The Art of Fielding, Await Your Reply and Let's Pretend this Never Happened. I feel like I should finish The Orphan Master's Son and Cloudstreet (but probably won't). I remain optimistic about reading When God was a Rabbit and The Four Agreements. Of my bedside books, I am most interested in finishing Peace Like a River and Middlesex. Not sure about the others.
I think I'll pick my top four unfinished books from each group and give myself until the end of the year to finish them. If not, I will give them away (or send them to the cloud).  I'm going to create a gadget in my sidebar to track the books I finish in 2014. And my first book will be:

I read this book for my book group. I liked it a lot and rate it 4/5. Erdrich did a wonderful job of immersing me in a specific time and place; the subject matter captivated me, and her characterization and writing are spectacular. It's filled with fascinating themes that I know will generate interesting discussion in our book group. But I was not sold on the ending of the book, and the narrator/point of view (a 13 year old boy) is not my favorite. Still, I would recommend it, and it makes me want to read her Plague of Doves (which is a precursor to this book). 

One Photo and Twenty Words: Illuminated

We hiked to the top of the quarry on New Year's Day. She turned. Illuminated by the sunset, I captured her. 
                                                                  ***********************
Abi is hosting a meme this year, featuring posts containing one photo and twenty words. You can find this month's selection at this link.

Zoom In < Zoom Out #2: Still Life Photo Shoot

I'm taking the Frugal Still Life Photography class with Cheryl McCain. The first lesson inspired me to shoot a still life with everything in focus, some amount of shadow and to dig out the soft light box which I bought several years ago and never play with! I'm very happy with how this photograph came out.  Here's the pull-back shot:

I bought this light box set up many years ago from a blog friend who offered it in a post for a very discounted rate. I've only used it once before, but I'm looking forward to experimenting with it a lot during this class. 

The kit includes a box with three white diaphanous sides, one black side and a soft fabric insert which is blue on one side and grey on the other. It also has a camera stand (basically an adjustable tripod) and two external lights. It all folds up and stores in a flat package about the size of a pizza box. There's a version of it for sale at Amazon for $75 (click here). It seems to have gotten mixed reviews - I agree that the lights in my version are WAY TOO HOT (this may have been fixed in the newer version), but, contrary to other reviewers, I found the camera stand very sturdy (if a bit persnickety to get it set just right). I don't have a tripod (I bought a monopod for shooting sports video instead), so I was glad to find this in the kit. I remember seeing some DIY light box projects back when I was looking into purchasing one. I didn't have a lot of time yesterday to play with it, but I found it worked pretty well. I'd be interested to hear about other's experiences with light boxes.
The pair makes a perfect zoom < zoom out combination for the weekly photo meme sponsored by Helena, don't you think?
Cheryl's lesson also discussed photographing glass objects and featured things spilling out of glass. This inspired these three additional still life shots.

Do you have a favorite in today's post? (Hint: it's best to click on these photographs to see them a bit bigger and much more clearly).  If you're taking the Frugal Still Life Photography class, how did your first photo shoot go?

My Month in Numbers: A Visit Home

Miles traveled to visit our extended families: 402

Miles traveled on alternate way home: 465

Number of people in small sedan: 4

Number of dogs with people in small sedan: 2

On Christmas Eve, we visited Paul's side of the family and saw:

his parents: 2

his brothers and sisters/in-laws: 5

our nieces/nephews: 4

great-grandchildren: 4

On Christmas day, we ate:

1 prime rib (lovingly tied by my brother-in-law who used to be a butcher)

2 loves of artisan bread

We played 1 game of Family Jeopardy and took lots of group photos, including:

3 goofy brothers

6 happy siblings gathered together for the first time in several years

6 cousins in their traditional stairway pose, and

16 members of the Ontiveros clan together for a wonderful Christmas Day!
******************************************************************
My Month in Numbers is hosted by Julie Kirk. You can see other December MMIN posts and join in by clicking over to this link. I love the flexibility offered by the MMIN memes. I use it in many different ways - this month it was the perfect way to blog the last of my Christmas photos (December Daily still to be posted!). Thanks Julie!