... it's been a year. :)

Same topic.  Kind of.  It's a project post... but it isn't really about photography.  It IS a little about art (?).  Sometime even before the Bears were doing the Super Bowl shuffle, my dad and I made a pinewood derby cars.  One of the later models was a metallic blue corvette with silver windows.  It's the one on the right. :)

Now I don't mean any disrespect by saying this, but in the first ten attributes I would list about my dad... "crafty" isn't on the list.  Maybe if you meant "cunning" it would make the top thirty??? But as far as making stuff from scratch, that's just not his thing.  Every year, though, when it came time to make a pinewood derby car, he'd take me to the Dahlenberg Barn across from Jansma's Bakery (if you thought of chocolate donuts and started drooling a little, raise your hand... mmmmmmm), where my grandpa Boss worked making wood toys.  My grandpa always smoked Pall Mall cigarettes... even while engaged in making sawdust in a variety of ways.  I remember wondering how it was possible that he hadn't burned the place down.

...it's a project two-fer.

Wyatt is in cadets.  Cadets get to build little cars out of blocks of pine that they race down a slotted track.  Dads get to help.  Super-yay!  We made a car.  It looks like this:

...you're SUPER patient. :)

Yeah... it's been since before Christmas.  So here's THAT collection!

I got an umbrella (the kind you shoot light through... not the kind that keeps you dry), and I used it for this one.  Because things have been REALLY busy, I haven't done a lot with it, but I like soft light for other people's portraits, and I think I'll be able to do a lot of cool things with it once I put in the time.

...this is probably as dark as it gets.

I decided kids may not make the best subjects for the hard, shadowy look I've been fiddling with lately.  I'll try to keep them well-lit in primary colors from now on.  I still wanted to go down the road I was on last time with off-camera flash, though.  I also wanted to know where the road "ends" for that type of picture... how far you can take it... and I think this is it:

...you might like things that bounce.

I get the "bounce the flash off the ceiling to soften the light" thing.  Big white-ish light overhead = familiar.  Ummm... yeah... unless you live in Michigan in November through May... but that's another story.  I've been fiddling around with some tips from David Hobby, who writes this blog.  The dude is awesome for a bunch of reasons.  First and foremost, he shares.  He doesn't hide his techniques.  Quite the contrary.  He actually challenges people to go out and TRY them!  These pictures are a direct result of that.

... you may be seeing me beginning to see the light.

I'm thinking that the answer may be light. Not really like a lack of heft, or a scarcity of seriousness.  I mean the actual thing that makes the picture.

Sitting alone for hours at a time is an amazing experience.  It's hard to believe that hunters are not all philosophers.  For the past few weeks, I've been hunting.  I haven't been killing a lot of deer (1), but I HAVE been thinking a lot.  Watching a sunrise without having had coffee brings you to strange, inescapable conclusions... like the fact that you aren't really seeing the things that are there.  What you are seeing is the light that is bouncing off of the things that are there. No light... no see.

I think this may be what eventually moves me from taking pictures to making photographs.  You can make the light do what you want it to do.  I've had a LOT of fun doing it, too.  In addition to clicking the shutter, I've been clicking a mouse in search of skill development.  One concept that is in a lot of places is getting the flash off of the camera. The way this changes your pictures is... well... day and night.

... do not adjust your monitor.

Style.  Should you chase it or just let it come to you?  I'm not talking about no-pleat, flat-front euro pants or the thankfully brief resurgence of the cardigan sweater.  What I'm asking is do you aspire to master a particular style, or does your work eventually become your style?  If it does, how does it?

If you like the way something looks, do you just tend to do more of it?  If you do so much more of it that you do less of other things, does it just "become" distinctively YOUR work?  Is it eventually a level of comfort that makes a photographer's work recognizable?  I hope not.  I hope I never chase a style... or settle for one.  If you see me getting into a technique rut... please, please stop me.  I never looked good in cardigans.

More after this jump... heheh... jump.