New Developments

A friend and I went shooting today in downtown Rochester, and we ended up at this abandoned building that apparently has been here for quite a while. I am in love with this place. There's so much more of it that I didn't get to shoot today, so I've got to go back some more. It's just a matter of getting there when this gate isn't closed and making sure no one sees me climbing around in there...
It's giving me a chance to try some new editing techniques. I'm not much into HDR imaging and these are all single exposures, but I might try a little bit of it here. I'm also resisting the urge to do this all in black and white, because the tetures and muted colors are just so lovely there-- it's a challenge to bring them out properly.

And hopefully the changes I'm making are looking good...
This week we were assigned to make portraits of each of our classmates in my photo arts class (about 20 people). I was sort of surprised that I enjoyed it as much as I did-- but I think I've just really been needing to shoot more and I just had a lot of fun doing this. I asked my classmates to empty either their purse, backpack, wallet, whatever they carry around with them on a daily basis, and put it on a piece of white paper I laid out and photograph it. Then I took a portrait of the person to pair with it.

I still don't have studio access, but looking at this I see how much my use of light has improved over the last year. For the "product" shots, I just put them on a big light table and used a couple reflectors to control the highlights. I shot all the portraits using pretty diffuse light with a bit of fill flash.

On Monday at 6 AM I have to register for winter quarter classes. I'm still going to try to take 5 classes, but instead of taking history of photo, I decided to start taking French again. My family and I are trying to take a trip to France next summer, and it really is a skill I don't want to lose completely. I thought I had already forgotten a lot of the grammar and stuff, but I got placed into the 2nd Advanced class. I honestly kind of expected to be somewhere in the beginning level, but the professor told me that this would help me with my speaking skills. Other than that, I'll have Photo Arts 2, Materials & Processes of Photo, 2D Design 2, and an art history class.

I've just been pretty stressed lately because I've been working a lot of hours at work, and not only is it complicated to make sure I have rides everywhere, but it's bloody exhausting. And at this point in the quarter, it's hard to have enough time to do my homework and study and everything. It's just tough supporting yourself completely like this-- and I'm trying to save as much as I can for Thanksgiving break. Amanda's hopefully going to fly up to New York City and I'm planning to meet her there for some PBS-related shenanigans :)

That's pretty much everything right now... and now I'm going to clear off my desk so I can start laying out a grid for a design project I'm rather excited about.

Peace,
Lindsey