Tagged: photos

May 5, 2013

art studio gallery show: my photographic prints

At the end of every semester, the Art Studio hosts a week-long gallery show. It’s a wonderful chance for us to display our art, and it’s also a great way to preview the art course offerings – many students don’t realize these classes are available at such a technical school.

My work in this show marks the completion of my Photography minor. I completed two independent studies: one in Black & White film, one in Color Digital. Pure contrasts.

I had difficulty choosing subject matter for my black & white study (i posted about it back in January) but finally decided on hands/body language/gestures. My intent was to capture the many things we can tell about a person without seeing his or her face.

After a few rolls of film filled with failed attempts, my study took a better turn. I took my camera to a familiar place, a place filled with interesting and hardworking hands: the machine shop where I work as a Teaching Assistant.

I captured my students and my teaching assistant buddies, all working hard and all speaking volumes with just their hands. I can feel how awesome Ryan feels when he sits on that table for a quick break, and I can tell Valoryn’s hand belongs to a girl by the way she holds the handle on the mill. And Jim’s hands, practiced and worn, celebrate 20 years of teaching.

I’m happy I used this study to capture something so precious to me. I’ve loved the 1.5 years I spent in that shop, and now I’ve captured it forever.

My color study focuses on textures, patterns, and, well, color. The first half of the semester was posted in full here, and I will post the rest soon. The digital prints come together so much faster – we don’t get the bonding time in the darkroom like I do with the film prints – so I don’t feel as attached to these. But it felt wonderful to see them all together on the wall.

There’s something to be said about hanging art. All semester, I’ve referred to these as “studies”, but they don’t become cohesive studies until they are up on that wall, coordinating and opposing one another, drawing parallels and contrasts, and saying, “I am art. That’s why I’m on this wall.” It feels good to finally have them all displayed.

I apologize for the awkward lighting in the photos; I intend to make scans of the black & whites and post them in full. But I love having documentation of them on that wall.

May 14, 2012

perfect playground picnic

lemon pocket pie at the playground picnic (with its nutrition facts captured indelibly... oh dear)

As classes were winding down for the semester, the sun managed to beckon Brad and I away from our studies for a little photo-picnic.

Chicken salad, the best Apricot iced tea in the world*, blackberries, and lemon pocket pies made the perfect picnic lunch. It was a beautiful day, sunny and breezy, and it was wonderful to escape our books for a short while.

But this wasn’t just a little picnic: it was a little photo-picnic.

blue and red swings at cleveland's martin luther king jr. blvd

You see, there are these swings.

They are tucked alongside the almost-highway that is Cleveland’s Martin Luther King, Jr. Blvd. We’ve driven by them a million times, and I just love the juxtaposition of the bright red and blue swings against the green grass next to the gray, noisy street. Such a peaceful spot next to such a busy commuter zone.

And I’ve always wanted to take pictures.

blue jungle gym sunburst at cleveland's martin luther king jr. blvd

So we climbed, and swinged, and I snapped away.

red swings at cleveland's martin luther king jr. blvd

The commuters crawled by, onlookers gaped at me and my camera… but it’s their loss. I was capturing colors; they were sitting in traffic.

daisies and the blue jungle gym at cleveland's martin luther king jr. blvd

Don’t forget to take breaks, even on the busiest days! It makes all the difference.

*seriously, this makes the best iced tea. after trying my first batch i returned to the store and bought the last four boxes they had. now that it’s available in bulk from amazon, you know what i’m doing next.

July 2, 2010

refresh

It’s a holiday weekend, summer’s making me antsy, and my recent gocco success has me fired up. So why not give you guys a sneak peek of my latest project?

Samantha Snap is my latest brainchild: an etsy shop focused on my love of photography combined with my recent obsession with paper goods. Yeah, I’m a little bit crazy. But this seems like it’ll give me a good time.

To start out, I’m planning on adding 5×7 prints of some of my (and your) favorite photos. I have been scanning my black and white film negatives, too, and those are even more awesome than the best of those featured in the year in haiku. And I’ve got my fresh-off-the-press orange camera gocco prints, which will hopefully be followed by moleskines.

Maybe it’s just the college kid in me, who believes in art as art. For awhile I want to dance away from the practicality of sewn objects and just toy with things that are pretty. We’ll see how this goes.

It’s amazingly refreshing to come up with an entirely new brand. The last time I did this, I was starting my freshman year of high school. I have learned so much since then about business and the internet and logos and marketing and especially about myself. I feel that right now I have the energy that starting up a business requires (at least one that’s on etsy). So there’s no fear… I’m just plain excited. It’s a refresh, and I can do it all right from the start. I’m talking budget sheets, a business plan, the works. eee!

Really, it’s all about camera love. Lately, I’m all about camera love.
And of course, it’ll be about gocco love, too. You know me. I can’t stick to one thing for long.

In case of confusion, ask questions and I’ll answer them!

Fluffyland is “down for maintenance”. Is this why? Does that mean it’s going away?
No! Fluffyland is staying around for awhile. I’ll still be keeping up with all of that, this is just another project to keep my creative soul bouncing around. It’s down for maintenance because I’m installing a cart software update that’s being fussy and taking more work than I thought (like always).

Will Samantha Snap be solely an etsy shop?
I hope not. I know etsy is very convenient, and the thought of the convenience does sway me a bit, but etsy’s just a good starting point. If things go well and I decide I want to keep this going for awhile, it’ll get its own site. I like to have the control and the professionalism that etsy can’t provide.