Friday, December 2, 2011

baby steps

I have officially come to the realization that I am significantly less prepared for this whole undertaking than my perfectionism is allowing for.  Nevertheless, I refuse to lose momentum and so I. Shall. Persevere! In other words, for the time being, this blog will be a journalistic meta exposé of my harsh and fickle mistress, eat and cry, and the cruel dark world that she inhabits. 


Anyway, I spent most of my morning perusing food photography articles.  Among my favorites was Katherine Martinelli's list of take-aways from an ICP course, which offered some great technical tips in addition to a brief moment of elation at the thought of enrolling myself in said course, rapidly followed by soul crushing despair at a price tag somewhere in the neighborhood of $600 bucks.  Have I mentioned that I'm unemployed? Also useful are some suggestions offered up by Saveur that I recently received from a friend who interns for their website.  Their points are definitely useful when it comes to styling but I think I have a strong case of easier said than done resonating through my bones right now.  I'm particularly struggling with the available surfaces near my light source, also known as my bed, and the white balance and color saturation on my trusty but limited Pentax K100D, issues that are relatively hard to repair without photoshop and/or that negligible quality known as skill.  So right now I'm running everything through picasa, since free is about all I can afford right now, and hoping for a productive holiday season of gift-reaping.  


On that note, a few snippets from my holiday wish list (mom? dad? boyfriend? are you reading this?!):


- a photo-editing program of some kind! anything with options more specific than "auto" will do but I guess photoshop wouldn't kill me. 


- a set of elves to magically appear and clean my apartment so that my tripod and lens hood both reemerge from whatever sites of refuge they've taken up against the tsunami of laundry that is creeping in slow motion across my bedroom floor


- colorful fabrics, vintage dishes and oxidized flatware to use in my shots


Here are some pictures of oranges that I took. On my bed. I'm working on a recipe for candied orange peels, hence the scoop of guts in the bowl.  Any suggestions for improvement (or cries of encouragement) greatly welcomed! Also any thoughts on what to do with the mashed up contents of all 6 oranges that are NOT orange juice related.  I know, blasphemy, but I just don't love the stuff.

I want orangier oranges!

3 comments:

  1. Niki, if you'd like a copy of PaintShop Pro X4, let me know. It does much of what Photoshop does.

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  2. Scratch that -- PaintShop Pro is for Windows. Oh, well.

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  3. LOVED the photo of the oranges! Wow such a creative eye Niki.
    And the nonono cat....... totally bizarre..
    ok so now i am hooked on your blog...
    hugs and kisses!
    Stacy

    ReplyDelete