Pay attention . . .

I had granola for breakfast with sliced strawberries on top. I sat at the table eating, reading my e-mail and didn't really pay attention to what I was eating and tasting until there were just two bits of strawberry left.

A wonderful breakfast and I missed it.

I missed the gingery flavor in the cereal, the taste of the pecans, the softness of the oat flakes, and the cold, fresh bite of the strawberries.

I had breakfast but I didn't realize it. I wasn't paying attention.

What does that have to do with photography, with the images I create?

I pride myself as being a person who notices things, who sees a lot that others miss. I even have a blog on seeing (woefully ignored over the past several months). I am a noticer.

I didn't notice my breakfast. And that's going to change.

Maybe we're conditioned to notice not everything, but selected things. Someone may be particularly attuned to sound. Another to color combinations. Another to makes and models of cars. To architectural styles, to textures, to shoes. And maybe that's a good thing, for if we noticed everything, we'd explode from sensory overload.

Where am I going with this?

As artists, it's our job to notice things. We see the designs and patterns on a sea urchin shell. We notice the way the shape of something over there echoes the shape of something over here. Or the way the wind blows the spray back from a cresting wave.

And all these things we notice we bring into our art.

That sea urchin design may show up on the side of a clay pot we're making. The echoing shapes may show up in a collage we're creating. And the spray off the crashing waves? Well, sometimes things are just meant to be quietly admired and appreciated for what they are. Simply noticing the spray adds to the quality of our life, and who knows (right now) how and when it will show up later?

What's my point?

Breakfast is the most important meal of the day. Pay attention!

©Carol Leigh

Mini-Macro online class coming up

A short online class designed for those of you who feel you've already got a pretty good macro photography base and are looking for some fun projects to do within a 6-week period. Lots of feedback, questions asked and answered. Stretch your artistic and technical skills within a short time frame. Class begins MARCH 1, 2013 and runs six weeks. Registration fee: $85.

Here's where you can sign up.

©Carol Leigh

Bubbles

Doing a bit of macro work using a 100mm macro lens and an extension tube. Love the colors. ©Carol Leigh

Mini-Macro coming up . . .

A short online class designed for those of you who feel you've already got a pretty good macro photography base and are looking for some fun projects to do within a 6-week period. Lots of feedback, questions asked and answered. Stretch your artistic and technical skills within a short time frame. Class begins MARCH 1, 2013 and runs six weeks. Registration fee: $85.

Here's where you can sign up.

©Carol Leigh

Mini-Macro Online Class Begins 3/1/13

Designed for those of you who have already completed my Macro and Close-Up Photography online class and/or those of you who feel you've already got a pretty good macro photography base and are looking for some fun projects to do within a 6-week period. Lots of feedback, questions asked and answered. Stretch your artistic and technical skills within a short time frame. Class begins MARCH 1, 2013 and runs six weeks. Registration fee: $85.

Here's where you can sign up.

©Carol Leigh

A soft spring

This is one of the few flowers the deer don't eat, thus giving me a chance to do some photography. I used a 100mm macro lens, a 50mm lens, and some extension tubes to move in close. I also purposely overexposed by 1.3 to 2 stops to make things look lighter and brighter. A very wide aperture (f/1.7 to f/2.8) created shallow depth of field, making everything look soft.  ©Carol Leigh, who wishes all it took was a little overexposure to make her look lighter and brighter!

P.S. An accompanying haiku:

soft in spring's new light

the flowers arrive (again)

reaching toward the sun

Money

My online macro class ends today, and our last lesson was "money." It's amazing what you can find to photograph on currency when you really start looking and move in close. Here are six photos I took of a bill from Myanmar. Why can't U.S. currency look as good as this? ©Carol Leigh

Ready for a picnic!

Students in my current "Mini Macro" online class have been working on shooting silverware. Since "silverware" doesn't have to be silver, I photographed some plastic utensils as an example for them. Fun stuff! Just waiting for the weather to clear up a bit and these "props" can be used on a picnic. ©Carol Leigh

Family "jewels"

My mom and I both had charm bracelets that we began when we were living in Hawaii and then Japan. Her charms were pretty cool — all sterling silver — and so were mine, but some were made of silver, some were enamel, etc. Here you see one of my mom's charms hanging from her bracelet.

My grandmother Carol Leigh had this big silver cuff bracelet that she got maybe in the 1930s, 1940s. It's from Taxco, Mexico and now sits in my jewelry box. I buffed up a section of it and photographed it a couple of weeks ago.

Both these pieces — and now these photos — remind me of two strong (often annoyingly strong) women in my life.

And now I'm going to be strongly annoying and remind you that I have an online macro class coming up that begins March 1. It's a shortened version, with just four lessons/assignments in six weeks. And it's designed for those of you who have close-up equipment and who wish to work on a series of simple yet challenging projects. The first lesson will be, obviously, JEWELRY.

Six weeks, four lessons/assignments, begins March 1, registration fee is $85. For more information and a link to my store to register: http://www.carolleigh.net/classes.htm

©Carol Leigh, insufferably annoying from time to time!

Macro jewelry

One of the lessons coming up in my Mini-Macro online photo class is about photographing jewelry, exploring lighting and depth of field. I have this old silver and amethyst necklace in a glass jar on a shelf in my studio. I kept the necklace in the jar and shot through the glass, filling my frame with beads and silver. Weird? Yes. Cool? Yes. Fun? Yes.

©Carol Leigh, who is usually weird, infrequently cool, sometimes fun...

The power of backgrounds

In addition to the various drives contained within my computers, I also have 10 external drives — all containing photos. It's getting out of hand, to say the least. I'm in the process of consolidating, moving photos around, and as a result, I'm coming across pictures I'd forgotten about, such as these three.

I took the photos to illustrate what a difference a background can make. I set the pushpin on top of a glass brick. In the first shot, I used holographic shiny paper as my background. Why? Because the pin and the glass are translucent/transparent. I wanted a colorful and "light-encrusted" background to echo the lightness of the pin and the brick.

In the second photo, I put an American flag behind the setup, just to see what it would look like. I LOVE how the stripes look through the pushpin, but the background itself is kind of blah.

And finally I used (if I recall correctly) the holographic paper AND some translucent, gauzy purple fabric, which I waved around during the exposure so that it would blur out.

And now if you'll excuse me, I have a bazillion more images to move around!

©Carol Leigh, who will soon be announcing a new, "Mini-Macro" online class for next year . . .