I need an insight, could I borrow yours?

There are several things I'd like to talk about in this blog entry. Several things I've done this weekend, several things that are happening, and several things I'm worried about.
But first I'd just like to say that the top photo is from my shoot today with Christy at another farm. We went out in the paddock(in the cold...) and hung with some mares. I want to buy one. Her name was Mary(my gmom's name was Marie, Muh-Ree) so I felt kind of connected to that horse. Mary was particularly fond of me too. She kept resting her nose on my shoulder and nudging me for attention or food, but still. She was this beautiful wild horse. Apparently all the mares were kind of unbroken. I've never wanted a horse to necessarily ride. I've always looked at it as a companion. I saw this video once of a man in India who had this crazy relationship with his Arabians. They loved him so much, he was one of the herd. I'd like THAT relationship with my horse more than rider and horse. That's kind of why I have alot of respect for my friends who own horses. Their relationships are more about companionship and trust between them and their horse than anything else. Hopefully some day my dream will come true and I can afford a farm with horses. My flash didn't work during our photoshoot, but I did get a good amount of nice shots to work with. It was just tooooo cold outside. My hands were getting numb and it was becoming increasingly difficult to change settings on my camera.
Christy was my last TTD shoot for the semester. Dec. 2 is my senior review. I'm prepared with work, but I am not so mentally. I'm nervous about having other teachers look at my stuff and wonder why. I still need to write my thesis statement. I've been thinking but nothing really fits what I am doing. I guess while I am away I'll have to do some serious meditating on it...
All together different...I saw "Twilight" the other night. Ick. I'm sure if I was 17 yrs old, I would have loved it. I would have drooled more over Rob Pattinson. I'm sure there'd be some hope in my heart about being Bella some day, but I am not 17. I think Rob Pattinson is a handsome guy, but he didn't make me head over heels for this movie. The book is the way to go.
As a photographer I look at movies differently than others. A feel a good movie is frame after frame of beautiful, inpsiring photographs. At any point in the movie you can remove one still from it and that still will explain everything that is happening before, at the time, and after. The composition is perfect, the colors, the lighting. A good actor doesn't need to speak to be a good actor. It's all about posture and facial expressions for me. Body language says more than words. The whole point of this book is the tension between our two main characers Bella and Edward. That's what has made this book so popular. The sexual tension between two teenagers and the craving for seducation from a vampire. Hey, I'm sorry, but that's just what makes this book so damn addictive. Sexual tension was nooo where to be found in this movie. NO WHERE. The only sexual tension comes from the 17 and under auidence who wishes they could jump Rob Pattinson's bones. The actress who plays Bella and Rob have no chemistry. She fits the part, don't get me wrong. She's beautiful, pale, dark brown, mysterious. Yet there were absoultely no sparks. I want to redo this movie. I'll make it darker. I'll make it sexier. I'll actually stick to the book. Someone hire me. I'm so disappointed. This is not anything like harry potter. At least the movies were fantastic.
(I told you this was a long post...)
I can't wait for my trip. I need to get the hell out of here for a bit. I think this place is making me slightly crazy. Or maybe it's just this semester? Either way, I'll be glad when my love and I are hanging with Coal and Charlie. I can't wait to see the kids.
Next.
I have to e-mail my teacher my 'insight'. I need to write another paper. I'm probably writing on the farm I was at today. It was the farm of a pack rat. Rusted tractors, old, broken down cars, lots of tires and buckets. Oh, TONS of farm cats running around. I just don't know what angle I want to go at this. Coming up with something 'insightful' apparently isn't as easy as I thought it was. I have insights. I think all the time. I think so much I get annoyed...
I have too much to do... I'm done. You won't be hearing from me for a while.
Peace.

Abandoned Houses

Kirsten and I made our way to the woods. We ended up keeping with the abandoned house theme. We also went to a part of the woods were a recent fire had occurred and got some crazy looking photos of her walking around in charred black remains of trees. Very eerie.


This is Liz, who's wedding I assisted at the other day. I love the composition of this photograph. The lighting is beautiful and you can see the details of her train.

What does "Trash the Dress" really mean?

Baby would you light my fire

There you go. You only get that shit in Hollywood man. Even though it pretty much rained all day Saturday, Christy and I beat it out by probably 5 minutes. I'm glad we got to run around with the horses, it's like a childhood dream come true for me.
As for Kim...well, as you can see from the first photo, she was determined to get that ugly dress dirty. The best part is whenever we go to Kelly's farm there are always people there. They just stand back and watch, most of the time laughing. But it's all good. Both days were very successful photoshoots and I got some kick ass images.

P.S.
The next door neighbor's dog gave birth to puppies on Saturday. They are pure breed Speckled Pointers. There are five up for grabs. Anyone interested? It's $1,000 for a female and $800 for a male. That is so cheap.



Not.

And I thought I partied hard.

Crazy, crazy weekend. Lots of cleaning, partying, and photo taking. I finally now have a chance to sit down. All went well with photos and the party. I am very relieved.

On Saturday I took photos of my lovely friend Christy. We visited the place where her horse is being boarded and went out in the field. It was hysterical. There are two horses there and they followed us around like two giant dogs. These horses have soooo much personality. They would suddenly freak out and run around like crazy. At one point Christy had her horse on a lead and he decided to get down in the dirt and roll. He rolled around for a few seconds and then jumped up. He went crazy. He bucked, he reared, it was awesome! I got one of the coolest photographs for my Senior thesis. Christy is in her pink prom dress, holding the lead, and her horse is up on his hind legs. It is one of my top favorites. But not to be outdone...
Kim and Kelly were my models today. Kim bought a western style wedding dress for 25 bucks and Kell wore a pink 80's bridesmaid dress that she got for 10. I had Kelly cut up the sleeves of Kim's dress. I was trying to light the pieces on fire but it didn't work out. So we did the next best thing. Kim rolled around in a puddle and then a pile of saw dust. Kelly sat in soem mud. It was pretty great. Those dresses are hideous as you can see in the above picture of them. The top photo is of Christy's horse holding the lead in his mouth after she took it off. So cute.
Pretty successful and busy weekend I'd say.

TTD with BeepBot Round 2

I didn't end up spray painting the dress today. I felt maybe that was too extreme for the first round. I may paint the dress later instead. Mon felt that spray painting was too toxic for her, so we just went to some water and did some fun stuff. I've been trying to keep to the same surroundings for each girl, so mon was by water the first time and once again this second time.
I really love this image. I think the lake is beautiful and I love how wind swept she looks. Even though that dress was like 10 times her size, it was only 10 bucks and I love that kimono... it all worked out even with no spray painting.
I'm very excited to keep going with this project. I think everyone has been having a great time just being crazy. Alot of my girls feel pretty liberated afterward. I swear its the pretty dress in a weird location. No one would ever go where we have gone in a dress, and get all nitty gritty. It's awesome!
After a way too long work meeting for no special reason I am now going to go write my Profile Essay thingy on my love, I hope this one knocks my teacher's socks off. I'm determined!!

TTD With Kirtsen

I had a really awesome day today with Kirsten. She was the lucky girl who got to wear my Senior Prom dress that I had designed. When I thought of the scene for the dress I saw rocks and bricks. Old abandoned buildings in the middle of fields are perfect.

A new direction

So lately I have been feeling like my photographs are not to the point where I can say, "yes, this is exactly what I want", I've been feeling the complete opposite, they haven't been hitting the potential that I expect of myself. But I just had an idea... With a few lightroom presets to be my guide I have decided to go in the direction of a dark color scheme that so far seems to be enhancing my TTD photos more the way I'd like them to be. It's still not where I want, but hopefully after this coming Sunday shoot I may push my boundaries and get there. I hope.

I love how I've been posting nonstop since 12:30.

Photoshop blues

I'm feeling sort of frustrated right now. I'm looking at the work I did on Sunday with Kelly and I still don't feel I've hit the right note. I'm looking at my shitty print outs from my passe printer and wondering if it's any better than last time.
The photos hanging out on my screen don't look the way I'd like and they definitely aren't the awesome digital photographs I see on personal web pages.
What am I doing wrong? If my digital class didn't move so much at a snails pace then maybe I'd be where I'd like to be.
At this point I'm debating taking out a film camera because fill always works out for me. It's just expensive. Really expensive and so far I've been saving alot of money this semester by not doing the film deal. If I had more Photoshop know how I might actually be were I hoped to be. Hurmph.

TTD Round Two with Kel

This is part of what I did today. I did a much more trashier trash the dress with kelly again. And by much more I mean, mucking out horse stalls and rollin' in dirt. Is that trashy enough now for you Mr. Teacher?
These photos were actually better than the last batch, but I will probably mix the two since they are two different dresses and great photos overall. It was an awesome start to my day.
Then we went to Goodwill in search of dresses needing to be trashed. I found one, which is actually a pretty ivory dress. It was ten bucks! Kel got this hideous pink 80s number for 10 as well. I am super excited. I need to go to some more thrift stores and find some more dresses.
The rest of my day went slightly down hill, but whateve'. I have alot of work to do this week. It's October my friends, which means its midterm, and crap just kicked up a knotch. Holy moly.

I prefer pretty

So today my teacher saw the beginnings of my Senior thesis. I feel like I have accomplished something. I like the photographs I have taken so far for this project.
My teacher only thinks its a 'good start'. Ok, fine, whatever. He doesn't understand where I am coming from. He doesn't get trash the dress, the concept is beyond him. He think my photographs should be more of a play on feminism than Pretty Fashion photos. Oh well, I like what I shot. A girl in my class(who doesnt like me) said that to her the dresses aren't fancy enough but she was too far away to tell. Well, keep your mouth shut then. If you aren't willing to get out of your seat to take a look then don't assume.
I am going to keep a few of these photos because I enjoy them, but yes, I am going to go in a more extreme direction, I think I have to.

More of Kelly

Here is some more of my work, I didn't want to put my little watermark on it, but it is copyrighted so there. The colors always come out weird when I upload so I may put it on my blog. What am I doing wrong? Even when I print out my photos the colors are all weird.
I really love this photo. I wish more of my photographs captured such a haunting beauty.

Round One of Kelly's TTD!

I have some pretty wicked friends man. They do the coolest stuff for me. Thank God for them!
Here is Kelly and Schug! This is round one of Kelly's TTD shoots. I love them allllll. We ran every where on her farm and it rocked. I am super lucky that I have a great friend who's family owns a farm and has her own horse. I am paying her back with a bottle of Jerry Garcia wine later, haha. So far this Senior Theisis has been going pretty well. I won't count my chickens before they hatch though. I do need more models! I only have about 5 so far, I need to ask this other girl I know, she'll probably say yes so thats 6, I'd love more. Someone? Anyone? I think I may put a sign up at school asking if anyone wants to run around philly with me. We shall see.
My weekend wasn't bad. I need to read, I am reading Persopolis for Middle Eastern Art. I know that was made into a movie, I saw snips of it here and there, it should be an interesting read. I will let you know.
That's all! Photo On!