What's seldom is wonderful!

Thursday, July 30, 2009

Wedding Gift

DH boss got married for the second time, I took some photos of the evening they had their celebration party, and put together this frame for them. It's not the way I thought it would turn out, not quite sure it's something I'm too proud of - but I will give it to them and see if they like it.

Triple embossed heart, stamped with demask stamp whilst still hot....

Note the stitiching that nearly killed me, the machine did not like the 2 strand gold thread and this took all night to do, good thing I was going for the distressed look as I was distressed by the time I got it done....

Going Manual with two willing models

Call me the rain magnet - all week long, just when I wanted to get some photos taken it rained, again on Sunday when I had some time it kept trying to rain - Yesterday when I dropped girls off to the movies and drove to Howth to take photos it started to thunder with torrential rain so after 3 very dark shots I had to run to the car...

On Sunday however, just between showers, I took these two shots in manual mode. I can feel my brain starting to understand what settings to start at and what might just work, it is a slow process, but I am getting there....

This first image is of my DD, just caught in a lovely moment
1/100 f/6.3 and ISO 400 as it was so dark

This photo is of my DD best friend and my nearly adopted daughter, hope her mum likes this one!
1/100 f/5.8 and ISO 400

Monday, July 27, 2009

First photo shoot...

1/20 f/5.0 & ISO 800

1/50 f/4.5 ISO 200

1/320 f/12.9 and ISO 200

1/200 f/5.6 ISO 400

1/200 f/14.0 ISO 400

Saturday was a glorious day and Sunday was so dark and dismal - but as my two friends work on the weekends it was hard to get a date to suit us all, so we had to go with a dark day and threatening rain all afternoon, but these two were so great to work with - I really enjoyed it and they just did it all for me to photograph - no real hard work for me. I did play with the settings on the camera, but was terrified when I got a error on my memory card that I just want back to Auto and stayed there, and got the photos off the card asap. Most of the shots are just sharpenend, cropped and lightened as it was about to rain for the whole 2 hours. - Woops just realised that some of the edits I did have not saved as I hoped, so some of them are lighter and some in B&W....

Saturday, July 25, 2009

In the zone....

I have been in my element for the last two nights, U2 are playing in Dublin and very close to my house and the sound of the concert has been drifting on the evening air towards the house and I am in my craft room, being crafty and listening to the songs and singing along in my head - BLISS!!

Here is a little book I made for my friend Lisa with the photos that I have taken of her baby - now I have blurred his face out (not too nicely I might say, but to protect the baby's identity as he is in her care - doing the right thing!) - but hopefully you get the idea. I even had my sewing mahcine out, and it was out again tonight for another project I hope to finish soon.

The photos in the book are all ones I took and I took some more of him tonight I am so very pleased with them.

We had a family day at the zoo today, and the sun shone and we had a picnic - it was just wonderful. Got some lovely photos in the zoo and even went to the scary Manual side of my camera - so will have a look at what I got and upload some soon.

I have my first non family photo shoot tomorrow. The son of a friend of mine has gotten engaged and I am so delighted to be able to take their engagement photos tomorrow - so pray for some sun and that I am in a creative mood and don't crumble under the stress.....scary thought.....

Nite all - U2 just finishing their set, and they saved the best songs till last....

Friday, July 24, 2009

Ramblings....

This lovely basket of flowers arrived from my friend Trish and her husband James to say that they had a lovely time in our holiday home in Drumshanbo - it really made my day! Thanks Trish! They are just fab and I caught a quick shot of them just as the sun broke out for a few moments......(Please don't die flowers, you are just so pretty!)

Had a great time at the crop last night - helped Lisa make a start on her wedding invites, we did a bit on them but were sharing a punch so while I rested my poor sore hands, I got to have a little play and made this for a friend who really liked the ones that I had made for the teachers, so here is one for her, so Carrie, it's on the way to you....

Tea time is generally "Witching hour" in our house and in the midst of the chaos, I spotted this double rainbow and it really made me stop and think and take a deep breath.... Hope it does the same for you....