"an elegant tapestry of quotations, musings, aphorisms, and autobiographical reflections" (James Atlas)



Friday, February 21, 2014

Weekly CHallenge: FLOW
















I always wanted to know how to photograph flowing water with a 'soft' focus. Finally, on a hike in Alaska, our photographer guide showed us. First, adjust your ISO level if necessary. Ours was a fairly overcast day, and this was in the murky forest, so we adjusted the light to about 400 ISO. Then you set your camera on 'Tv', then set the time to approx 1/13th of a second (or slower). Use a tripod or make sure your camera is held very still while shooting. Et voila! Soft flow.

Sunday, February 16, 2014

Weekly challenge: OPEN





















In Greek mythology, Zeus gave Pandora (the first woman) a box with the instructions never to open it. Naturally, Pandora opened it and unleashed evil into the world. The only thing left in the box was Hope.
Sometimes, things are better left unopened.
"Open" immediately reminded me of this old tale, and I remembered a recent gift, which I opened with great anticipation. This Pandora's box contained only delightful things. Choose your boxes wisely!



Saturday, February 15, 2014

Knit one, drop one.....ooops!


I'm in the mood for knitting. I've found some beautiful wool (Lincraft and our supermarket, believe it or not), and am looking for easy patterns. I've been knitting a few of these so-called 'potato-chip' scarves. I guess they do look a little like Pringles, and they are quite addictive. The one in the photo is made with some wool I found at Rose Cottage in Ballan.
Just found a pattern for a 'squiggly scarf', so I'll try that next. Perhaps I can make a few and sell them on Etsy.
Lincraft has some gorgeous wool, I like the textured wool, especially with alternating colours. I'm looking forward to our local quilt shop getting in some yarns. I also like to use the scarf pins. Found some really nice ones on ebay, made from bone, wood, and other materials such as paua shell (Javacentric).
YouTube has some good instructions for different knitted articles. What did we do without YouTube??

Thursday, February 6, 2014

Week 4: Instantaneous!























Mmm, that WAS a tricky one! Took me a while to come up with something.
In the end, it was one of my favourite pastimes that inspired me - photography! A photograph is an instantaneous thing, especially since digital photography has arrived. It captures an instant in time - often less than fractions of a second. Before and after the shutter clicks, everything is different again.
That instant can last for generations, in a dusty photo album or appear and disappear in seconds, on the web, in the cloud. It can be history, evidence, proof, memory, art, conversation starter...whatever the need. The instant will never come again.

Monday, February 3, 2014

Cool clouds

Once again one of my favourite subjects - clouds.