8

Killing Christmas 2010

Finally this week I have taken the tree down.  The balls are in a pile in a garbage can until I get them downstairs and the tree is in a pile in the middle of the livingroom floor.  It looks like a bonfire waiting for a spark.  I thought it was kind of ironic.

7

Typical, Standard Light Post

Today, I really got nothing to say.  Guess all that running last night sucked me dry. LOL!  However, the lightpost is one thing I might miss when we move.  The ones in our hood are really nice.  Must be why the taxes are so friggin high.

6

Boots.

These are the only cowboy boots I have seen that I would consider wearing. They belong to my cousin, who is getting married this summer.

We had a Christmas party on Jan 2 and she came. Half way through the night I realized I hadnt taken my blog shot yet, so I went to find my camera to take some quick shots while no one was looking. I tripped on these boots. Obviously they wanted me to take their picture again (my drunken mind told me) so voila!

The first time I saw these boots was back in October when I did her engagement photos (which is the one in the leaves. Her boots have the red in them) and I added it here so you guys could see that you can change your pictures so the items in them look totally different with an image editor.

For those of you who dont have one, and dont want to spend the money to buy one, but wouldnt mind playing with one, try this free software (I use it to suppliment my photoshop editing, because it has fast and easy point and click stuff and a watermark (watermark is my name in the pic - mamarazzi 2010. I watermark everything that goes on the net, so no one can steal it.)

Heres the link:
http://www.photoscape.org/

5

Hydro = POWER

I was asked to do some hydro tower shots. They want to frame them and hang them in their house. These are my favorite shots of the day.

The first one:

This is the landscape of the 401 and 402 right before you hit London from the west side. I actually had trouble figuring out where to stop to take the pictures cause there were so many options. I like this shot cause of the contrast (I like opposites in pictures) of the forest of small trees behind the forest of towers. Thats a picture we are all missing. We are altering our landscape from natural to unnatural.

The second one:

I love how it shows that man made things are overpowering nature. That is a huge tree, yet it is just dwarfed by the hydro tower. Thge tree is round and flexible and gives us oxygen, foliage, shade and life. The hydro tower is tall and rigid, and gives us hydro, no shade, no life. It is just a carrier of man made energy. The tree's energy (life, fire, sap, seeds, oxygen) isnt something we would pay for anyhow. Interesting.

The third one:

I also love lines and patterns. Hydro towers are great for this. They are long, tall and almost elegant looking. I just liked this shot.

4

Creating Drama Where There is None.

Perhaps one of our most guiltiest pleasures on LM eh?

This is just simply a picture of the sky. I upped the contrast and saturation and lowered the colour temperature and changed it to black and white. This made a dreary sky into something pretty interesting. I find everyone loves a black and white shot, so if you have pictures you maybe arent impressed with, try changing your settings and playing with it in black and white. This is especially true for pictures that arent as clear as youd like. I really love sephia TBH. So you'll see alot of that this year.

3

Winter Wonderland

I dont think its a secret or a suprise that I love snow and cold. If it was, well now you know. And as GI Joe would say - knowing is half the battle. (Someone mentionned on LM that she felt silly wrinting a blog, and who the heck would read it, and how weird does it sound? Well I just quoted GI Joe, so I know exactly what you mean)

Today I did some andgles. Well only 2 angles, cause heck I am only supposed to do 1 pic a day, and I think you guys are getting spoiled here. So I crouched down in the street and shot a picture of my house. The big pile of snow infront of it is what the plows have built up on the road. Looks more dramatic from this angle though. A less on in 'dont believe everything you see'. Photography is a lot like being a magician. We are illusionists too.

The snowy shrubs were at my neighbours and arent exaggerated in any way. I just liked the needles pointing out of the snow and all the opposited involved in this picture - light and dark, soft and pointy...

2

Cardinal Sin

So the day after my christmas party with the boots, we all woke up to more snow. The 402 was closed, the wind was blowing and my Belmont relatives were still stranded at my house. We were all hungover to boot (pun intended).

I was looking out the window while I was waiting for my computer to upload the radar and I saw this cardinal in the trees. Poor thing was blowing all over the place! I couldnt coax him to face the camera. Boo cardinal!

So if you have downloaded the photoscape, you can do these shots. I went into the filters and chose region (out of focus). I chose the greyscale option and put the cursor over the bird. Then I slid the size bar down so that the only thing that wasnt in black and white was the cardinal. Easy peasy. One is cropped so you can see the bird close up. =)