Sunday, January 2, 2011

Adventures in Still Life


So this morning I got to try another type of photography yet unexplored:  still life.  I have already told myself that I don't want to fall into taking this type of photo most days just because it is "easy" (again, I was wrong about that), but since I haven't tried it before, it is about 20 degrees outside and I'm still in my pj's I thought it would be a good option.  Definitely not as easy as I thought it was going to be.  I had these keys in mind from the beginning; I bought them at an antique mall near me a couple of months ago just because I thought they were cool (and cheap!) but haven't had a use for them yet.  I tried several uninspiring shots with just the keys and realized I needed something more.  Nothing felt right until on a whim I grabbed a whisk from the kitchen and then finally it started to feel right.  In the end it was actually kind of hard to choose just one photo.  There were some others that were real contenders, that put more of a focus on the shadows from the whisk (by the way, I was not using a flash, just the morning light coming through an east facing window), but I chose this one.

1 comment:

  1. Oooooooooooooo this one is REALLY cool.

    I like how you describe the experience of art as going with your gut, with what "feels right." (Also I consider myself something of a bumbling moron when it comes to art criticism, so my usual gift with words is going to sound stunted. I'm afraid you're going to hear a lot of "Oooooooooooo pretty!!!" and "Wow" and "Cool" a lot. Sorry.)

    But I do like the sharpness and clarity of the metals, and the interplay of lines and subtle curves -- the shafts (heh) and ends of the keys, the straight lines and curves of the whisk, the straight lines of the surface they're lying on. I love the subtle changes of the light on the metal.

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