50 minutes at the aquarium

Returning home from jury duty today I spent 50 minutes at the Oregon Coast Aquarium. All I had with me was an 18-55mm lens, so I did what I could. I really like the anemone photo, especially the green/purple color combo. The puffin shot isn't good, but what it's good FOR is showing how close we can get to these guys. He was right below me, about 18" away. Those of you visiting the Oregon coast this year would do well to visit the aquarium to photograph the puffins, especially if you're lucky enough to be there on an overcast day so that the white tufts and faces don't blow out. Even here, I underexposed by a full stop to hold back the bright white part. And finally, the best shot I got of a shark during this visit occurred in the gift shop... Jury duty again tomorrow where, if selected, the case could go as long as 6 weeks... heavy sigh. ©Carol Leigh

Polaroid Part Three . . . of Three

Last of the Polaroid emulsion transfer prints. All four of these were taken back in the mid-1980s at a mask festival on the Miracle Mile in Los Angeles. I was working for Polaroid at the time and testing out their new Spectra camera, but also took some 35mm slides of the masks as well, which are what I used to create these. The Spectra was a terrific camera. My framed original prints from that camera still look good after all those years. Wish I did! ©Carol Leigh

Two Crows

Crows, Japanese paper, hand-painted backgrounds, stitching on a friend's shirt, and more ended up in this montage. And as if my week couldn't get any better, I received this good news: "It is my utmost gratitude to inform you that you have been chosen as one of the lucky reciepients [sic] of the Federal Government of Nigeria compesation [sic] for Scam Victims." So if you'll excuse me, I've got to hustle over to their website and give them all of my banking information.  :-)  ©Carol Leigh

3 Square

Boat reflections, railroad car details, part of a building in the Palouse, a thread design I photographed on Jan N.'s shirt, and more show up in this montage. I. Love. Doing. These. ©Carol Leigh

On the move

Chris and I drove inland to Salem today to run some errands. As usual, I took a lot of drive-by shots, such as this highway worker all decked out in neon green. The red stop sign is a nice complementary color to the green. And then on the way back, we stopped near Oregon State University so I could photograph this row of trees -- this time NOT from a moving car! (What a concept.) ©Carol Leigh

Polaroid Part Two . . .

I had forgotten how much fun it was to create these Polaroid emulsion transfers. And a lot of the fun came from the fact that each one is unique. Each time the emulsion was placed onto the watercolor paper, different wrinkles and degrees of wonkiness would appear. The cat (isn't the backlit fuzziness cool?) was photographed in New Zealand; the surfers stand along the shore at The Wedge in Newport Beach, California; and the tulips bloomed in a cemetery in Oakland, California.

Does anyone know if this can be done with our digital images some way? I don't mean using a Photoshop faux Polaroid border, but a physical way of getting an already-taken digital image onto a piece of Polaroid film and then running it through the standard emulsion-transfer-float-it-off-in-warm-water process? Guess it's one more thing for me to research, but if anyone has a quick answer, please let me know. Thanks! ©Carol Leigh

Polaroid revisited . . .

Years ago I created Polaroid emulsion transfers, using a PolaPrinter, which exposed my 35mm slide onto Polaroid print film. The resulting print went into warm water where the emulsion, looking like a floating silk scarf, was gently lifted out and placed onto watercolor paper.

I was cleaning out some files today and came upon a number of these original prints, so I photographed them using a 35mm digital camera. I still love the look and can't wait to perhaps incorporate these images into some of my montages. We shall see. This is a shot of the Huntington Beach Pier, originally photographed using a Canon A1 film camera. I combined the image with a photograph of metal, which created the "stars" in the sky. ©Carol Leigh

No. 209

Chris and I had lunch yesterday at Quimby's in Newport (where we have NEVER had a bad meal) and then walked around afterward to see what we could find. I was attracted to the weathered look of this house. The original image was pale blue, but I fancied it more with a sepia-colored look. ©Carol Leigh

The love affair continues

Another day, different lighting, and the love affair continues. A quest has now begun to find more plumb-bobs to add to the photographic mix. I doubt I'll find any at Target... ©Carol Leigh

Yuki desu (it is snowing)

I get a feeling of soaring cliffs, the ocean, emptiness, snow, and a lone bird. ©Carol Leigh

I'm in love again . . .

I fall in love with the strangest subject matter. Remember the oil cans from last year? Well, right now it's plumb-bobs . . . I have only one, but I hope more come my way. And what will be next? Theodolites? ©Carol Leigh

Of crows and time and inspiration

I'm conducting a photomontage class right now and I fear I've become so immersed in doing it that my own creativity has dried up! For the past week it's been a struggle to come up with something in my own work that I find interesting and different. I've been working on this guy for a couple of days and it's gone through many permutations along the way. When I push too hard, it pushes back and the results seem contrived.

This one's now done. And it's time to move on. But to what? Time will tell. ©Carol Leigh

It would be so nice if you weren't here

Tough day for photography yesterday. No parking available at my special little beach. Next beach had way too much blowing sand to safely shoot. No parking at the fishing boats, either -- everybody's taking advantage of good weather for fishing and they have to park their vehicles somewhere while they're away. So when I returned home, my only choice was (sigh) the cat. As you can see from the slightly cranky look on her face, she wasn't happy that I was crawling around under the dining room table trying to photograph her from her own level. Kind of an "it would be so nice if you weren't here" sort of look. Shot with a cheapo and cheesy 18-55mm lens, but a lens that focuses a close as 6" inches, so it comes in handy. ©Carol Leigh

My, what big, um, EYES you have!

I'm moving photos around these days, shifting things from one hard drive to another, from one external drive to another, and came across this shot of an old telephone in New Mexico that I'd never done anything with. It provided a bit of humor for me yesterday, when I especially needed it. ©Carol Leigh

Little brown bag

Shallow depth of field with just the front edge in focus, sepia toning, I'm pleased. ©Carol Leigh

Autumn

The square format is appealing to me these days and I've created all sorts of montages such as this that are completely abstract, consisting of practically nothing recognizable. I'll combine walls and trees and rust and netting and shadows to create a mood, an impression. A bit of paint becomes a harvest moon. Scratches imply birds or salmon in migratory motion. The seasons change, the colors of summer fade into browns and oranges, blacks and greys — the colors of quiet continuity. ©Carol Leigh

Big Square No. 2

A gangplank, an L.A. highrise, a rural Oregon warehouse, pine trees, handwriting, and a lot of staring at the computer monitor went into this piece, which took about five hours to make. My decision now becomes, do I go have a cup of coffee and begin my day? Or go back to bed and finish my night? ©Carol Leigh

No. 145

Corrugated metal, wood, cement walls, salt stains, some drawing of my own, and, of course, a ruler! ©Carol Leigh

Tulip Fields

Walls, bits and pieces of other photos, and a black and white treatment went into the making of this piece. ©Carol Leigh

Walls, Paper, and Time

©Carol Leigh

Crows through the glass, alas ...

A combination of crows, metal, a hand-painted background, and more for this one, which I can't decide if I like or not. Time will tell. ©Carol Leigh

Eucalyptus Leaf

©Carol Leigh

Metal Calligraphy

In my current photomontage class, Janet G. posted an image that had an Asian feel to it. Inspired by her work, I took a look at some photos I'd taken of metal and combined a few to come up with this piece. Art is everywhere, is it not? ©Carol Leigh

Lakeside

A moody, almost Asian-feeling photomontage. ©Carol Leigh

Ampersand

Created from some of the photos I took yesterday on my Oregon exploration. http://carolleighdailyphoto.blogspot.com/2010/03/its-journey-not-destination.html

©Carol Leigh

Powerball 13

Scratched metal, a sidewalk in Tucson, adding machine tape, and more went into this one. ©Carol Leigh

Heading Home

I'm beginning to think lack of sleep enhances the creative process. Again, around 2:30 I was wide awake. Even the cat, who usually accompanies me wherever I am in the house, knew better than to get up, remaining snug and warm on the bed. But if I'm up, why not go MAKE something?

And so I put this together from a variety of photographs, including sidewalk texture, handwriting from an old journal (thank you, Rich Baker), one of my own background paintings, and more.

Coffee at breakfast and I'm now wired up and ready to continue on. Abby the cat is asleep in the chair next to me. We all have our priorities . . . ©Carol Leigh

Poppy

©Carol Leigh

235

This has taken me weeks to put together. Sometimes you just have to set something aside and let it rest, let your brain muddle it over, and then when you come back with fresh eyes and fresh ideas, it often all falls into place. The components are worn, torn and weathered labels I photographed on an old trunk, as well as numbers from trains, fishing boats, houses, nautical charts, and burlap bags. Oh, and there are some rivets in there, too. ©Carol Leigh

Sunflowers in February

Sunflowers from Trader Joe's. ©Carol Leigh

Black Crow Black Night

Woke up this morning at 2:30 and had to make something. Had to. This is going beyond obsession! I used a lot of different elements in this piece, ranging from geese I photographed the other day, to a couple of my paintings, a crow on the beach, numbers from the side of a fishing boat, a wall photographed in San Diego, and more. A lot more. Think I'll go back to bed now. ©Carol Leigh

Architectural Detail

Architectural detail . . . from The Presidio in San Diego and from Santa Fe, New Mexico. ©Carol Leigh

Walls

A combination of walls from Mexico, Oregon, and California plus rivets on a bridge. ©Carol Leigh

Palm Tree Bark

A new project in the works. But then I realize I've not shown the previous "new" project. In due course. ©Carol Leigh

Disconnect the Dots

©Carol Leigh

Corvallis Tree

Driving home from the airport yesterday I photographed this tree from the car window. I grunged it up, added some elements, and ended up liking the rather old-fashioned look it has. Good to be back with my own computer "gear." ©Carol Leigh

Home again

My flight home from San Diego didn't arrive until late afternoon on Thursday and it was pouring rain, so we elected to stay in a motel and drive home today instead. (It's a 3.5-hour drive from the airport to our house and it encompasses one of the most dangerous roads in Oregon. In the dark, in the rain, and when we're tired isn't the best time to be traveling.) So this morning we set out before sunrise and, en route, decided to take a few detours to see something different. The lighting was exquisite. Beautiful clouds, no rain, little patches of fog here and there, and then the coast was crystal clear, with the ocean looking a rather tropical blue and green with big waves coming in from the south.

In the first photo, I liked the strong shape of the tree and how the road leads my right up to it. The second photo is especially appealing to me because of how the tops of the trees seem to echo the tops of the hills in the distance.

The third photo shows how sometimes loggers will leave one sentinel tree remaining on a hillside, and this one really stood out way up there. And then I took a drive-by shot of trees lining a golf course. The grass of the course was in blue shadow, so it appears quite aqueous in the picture. And then finally the Oregon coast, from a vantage point just up the road from our house.

I'll be prepping and posting some of the photos from my San Diego trip once I get them off my laptop and into my "real" computer. ©Carol Leigh

Brief interlude between photos . . .

Since I'm in San Diego right now and have no access to a fast computer and "real" Photoshop, I won't be posting any montages until I return home toward the end of this week. I've been shooting "components" like crazy, but there's no point mucking around with this stuff without my Wacom tablet, my software, and a faster computer than this little laptop. AND IT'S KILLING ME! More to come soon . . . Carol Leigh

House in the Woods

Photographs of textured metal, a "drive-by" shooting of trees, and a rustic house photographed on the coast combine with smudges, shadows, and more texture. ©Carol Leigh

Dahlia in glass bottle

Last summer I photographed dahlias and am still working on them, integrating them into photomontages. The beauty of all this is that it never ends. ©Carol Leigh

Morning Calm

A handpainted background, canvas, a crow, various shadings and blendings come together here. I'm especially fond of the bit of blue at the bottom. Overall I like the feeling of quietude, even though the colors are rather riotous. ©Carol Leigh