One Giant Leap

After my journey yesterday I told my husband that we were definitely going to make some changes to our mailbox. We don't have the kinds of covenants, restrictions etc. that would keep me from doing so. We have one of the really large country-style mailboxes so that we can receive packages, and I had already (a couple of months ago) painted it with some Hammered Bronze paint. Now I am going to really get carried away and decorate it with abandon. No more boring mailbox!!!! Ok, I'm not going to build a metal cat to go around it, cover it with fake fur or anything, but it is going to be something that others will notice (I hope). I'll be the only person on the block with a Sherrill Kahn inspired mailbox! I'll have to wait for the weather to get better, but then it's ON! I'm not truly a "wild and crazy guy" kind of person, but I am trying to break out of THAT particular box. One small step for Ernie, one giant leap for Ernie the Artist!

Mailboxes, Etc.

What a fun day I had today. I spent most of the day driving around looking for mailboxes to photograph for the current Challenge. It was cold and dreary and my hands almost froze. Fortunately around 1 pm the sun came out.

It's amazing how boring most mailboxes are. I guess I've never really given them much thought and judging from what I saw today most other people haven't either. Ah, but there are a few, a special few, who have given them a lot of thought. I proudly present to you today's fun finds.

St. Gene's Inner Artist

Funny(ish) story. My Cheap Joe's art supplies catalog came the other day and I left it laying on the arm of the chair when I got up. Next day, my husband sits down in that chair and picks up the catalog. Next thing I know he's really looking at it. Now you have to know my husband, he's about as interested in art as I am in ditch digging. And about equally as artistic as he is interested. Time passes and later in the day I go upstairs to my computer and there on the printer are all sorts of printouts on "How to Draw". He's decided to learn how to draw. So I tell him I have the Betty Edwards book "Drawing on the Right Side of the Brain". Next thing I know we have matching sets of Plexiglas frames marked with a grid!!!!! Now my Betty Edwards book has disappeared into his cave den, he is the proud owner of a 16x20 sketch book, several drawing pencils, an art gum eraser and a little pencil sharpener, all from Michaels and he is beginning to draw recognizable objects. He is discovering his inner artist and he is MUCH better than I ever thought he could be. He is the kind of guy who is almost obsessive when he decides to do something so his every spare minute since last Saturday morning has been spent learning to draw. AND HE REALLY IS LEARNING TO DRAW!!

HE BETTER NOT GET BETTER THAN ME! (grin)

Never Too Old

Crossbar

Old dogs can learn new tricks. I'm having so much fun with my newly reinvigorated interest in photography. The digital camera age has truly revolutionized my photo taking. Can you imagine taking 150 photographs on film and then having to wait to see them while they are being developed? And then PAYING for them? And then half of them being of mediocre (at best) quality? Of course you can, we're talking just a few years ago. Not only was the camera expensive, the lens, filters, and film processing were expensive, too. Now I'm not saying that "prosumer" digital cameras are cheap, they're not, but I can take hundreds and hundreds of pictures without ever having to pay to have them processed unless I decide to print them. And if I take 80 pictures and only 3 of them turn out good, I'm disappointed, yes, but I'm not out big bucks for processing. Of course, there is a downside. You just about have to have a computer to really enjoy digital photography and I've had very few photographs that I was totally pleased with straight out of the camera. (But I'm getting better at getting it right in the camera.) And very few photos ever make it off the computer into print. But that's ok, too. I can print them if I want and if they are snapshot type photos I can upload them to Wal-Mart or some other store and print them for almost nothing. And they are always there on my EHD or a CD or a DVD (I'm a backup fanatic) in pristine form, not fading and cracking, not getting torn or abused, and when I want them they'll be available. Hey, I may become so good at this and so famous that those CDs or DVDs will be valuable! (stop laughing, stop right now, it could happen) {grin}

Antique Planters

Antique Planters

This photo was one of the "unsuccessful" ones from my photoshoot last Saturday. But for some reason, I still liked it. So I decided to play around with it in Paint Shop Pro and this is what I came up with. My intention was to create a photo in the style of the famous Dust Bowl photos. I think I succeeded.

Photographs Not Taken

On my way to work Monday morning, I got on the interstate at my usual
entrance which has a wide-open horizon for about 1/2 mile. Then the
roadway goes into trees, over hills, loads of billboards, etc., etc.
The sky directly ahead of me was incredible. The overhead sky was a
beautiful early morning robins egg blue. On the left side brilliant
white clouds formed a wonderful pizza pie triangle with the point
stopping exactly in the middle of the horizon at ground level. A
rainstorm had just gone through and on the right side was a completely
matching dark black storm cloud triangle with it's point touching the point
of the white clouds. It was breathtaking!! But by the time I
could get safely off the interstate I wasn't able to see it. So, being
the foolhardy person I am, I backed up (on the shoulder of the
interstate) trying to get back to the original point. But by then it
was gone.

I'm sorry that I missed the photographic opportunity, but I'm really,
really glad that I'm developing the eye to see these things. And that I
had the opportunity to see it. Like seeing a full rainbow, it was a
special thing.

Dentist Day

Not a fun day. Mouth sore, gums sore, tooth sore. Pain. But I'll live to chew another day. Hate Dentist Day.

Out Junkin'

I was on a mission yesterday to find something, anything, to use as a subject for a photo challenge on one of the Yahoo! Groups in which I participate. The challenge theme was Junk/Trash and it could be anything - the interpretation of the theme was strictly a personal matter. I had been struggling trying to find an idea for this challenge. So Saturday morning I headed out, stopping first at a local indoor flea market sure there would be some "good junk" there. It was really an unpleasant place with loud, blaring hip hop music - but I did manage to get one good picture of a doll that I used for the Photoyear 2008 group. After leaving the flea market, I came to an intersection where I always turn right to head on my familiar paths around town. But for some reason I decided to turn left instead and there, less than 1/2 mile away, was a veritable gold mine of the types of items I was looking for. It looks somewhat like a graveyard for old farming implements, trailers, etc. I wandered around here for over 2 hours having the most fun I've had in a long time - composing angles, changing settings on my camera, playing with the polarizing filter (love that thing!), stepping in mud and over strips of angle iron and telephone poles, pressing my nice, new leather jacket into dirty tires of old tractors to steady myself! The place is actually a tractors and accessories business but they were closed and I was uninterrupted (well, except for once when the police decided they needed to check to see what I was doing). The area where I was exploring looks like old junked parts but these are actually items that are for sale. There were also 4 or 5 used 18-wheeler trailers.

I took over a hundred pictures and the majority of them came out as good as I had hoped. I'm proud of the pictures. I am so drawn lately to "abstract art" types of photos and most of these fit into that category. Some of the pictures have been tweaked a little in curves in PaintShop Pro and some have been cropped for tighter framing, but they are for the most part reasonably close to straight from the camera.

I'm really on a roll. I obtained permission from the building in which I work (yes, permission is required) to take pictures of some of the details in the building and they turned out great (imo). I liked these so much that I actually sent 4 of them off to be printed at mpix.com so that I can frame them. They look more like paintings than they do like photographs.

1. Bars, 2. Gate, 3. Spoke, 4. Gear, 5. Drum, 6. Door