Curious Camera Competition

This weekend, ArtsEye Gallery in Tucson opened the 4th Annual Curious Camera show. Curious Cameras can be vintage, pinhole, plastic, instant, or phone cameras - all nontraditional and all a heap of fun. I'm honored to have my photo "Behind Bars," taken with a Polaroid Spectra camera and Impossible Project film, featured in the show as one of 30 honorable mentions.

Behind Bars

To see the full exhibition online, please click here: Curious Camera 2012 Gallery. Thanks!

Light

The doll, lace, and cameo are back! I've been inspired by the concept of Japanese Noh theater masks, which are fixed but appear to change their expression according to the angle of the light... or more correctly, their angle in relation to the light source.

 I arranged the doll on a piece of dark fabric on the floor and added a layer of lace and the cameo. Daylight was streaming into the room from below, so to speak (from the direction of the doll's feet). I like the spooky look that resulted from this setup.

For the next photo, I rotated the doll 90°, so the light was coming from the side. I wanted to see how this change would alter the look of her features. (And I also added a pearl necklace.) 

I was surprised by how different her expression looks in the second photo. Her face and features seem rounder in the top photo and more elongated in the bottom one. To me, she also looks spooked rather than spooky. What do you think?

Rainy Day

 Having fun with dolls, jewelry, fabrics, and a Polaroid Spectra camera loaded with Impossible Project film. The perfect way to spend a rainy afternoon!

Cameo

Mademoiselle

Velvet

8 Exposures on the Impossible Project Blog

If you haven't had the chance yet, be sure to check out the Impossible Project's blog and read the latest 8 Exposures interview. You'll find a rather familiar interviewee this week...

Impossible Project Blog: 8 Exposures with Britta Hershman

 

A big THANK YOU to the Impossible Project!

F-Stop Magazine: Optimism

Check out the December 2011 issue of F-Stop magazine here, and don't miss the group exhibit entitled Optimism. I'm excited and honored to have contributed!

Look for the following four photos: 

Direct links to the images in my portfolio:
Sunsoaked
Leafburst
Blossom
Upside Up

Impossibly Roman Cyanotypes

A few months ago, I had the good fortune of visiting the Eternal City with a Polaroid camera (loaded with Impossible Project film) in tow. Rome is a city near and dear to my heart, and it was a thrill to revisit some of my favorite hidden corners, as well as the city's iconic monuments. The difference was that this time I could capture them in a whole new way, with a Polaroid camera. I enjoyed taking the original images (See Rome, Instantly), as well as the process of printing them as cyanotypes on watercolor paper.

Same Eternal City, but a whole new way of falling in love with it!

The Spanish Steps and the church of the Santissima Trinità dei Monti

 The Flavian Amphitheater, a.k.a. the Colosseum

 

The view from the top of the Spanish Steps

 

Trajan's Forum, with Palazzo Venezia, the church of Santa Maria di Loreto, and Trajan's Column in the background

 My beloved Piazza del Popolo

Rome

One of my favorite places in Rome is Piazza del Popolo. A vast open space, paved with cobblestones and bordered by an ancient city gate, three churches, numerous sculptures and fountains, and a monumental park descending from the Pincian Hill, it's part outdoor living room and part outdoor museum. And of course it's also a living, breathing Roman square, with scooters, taxis, buses, and cars zipping around its edges. 

The near-twin churches of Santa Maria in Montesanto and Santa Maria dei Miracoli hold particular charm for me... I can't seem to photograph them enough!

Cyanotype on watercolor paper, toned in coffee.

Original image taken with a Polaroid and Impossible Project PX600 film. 

Silky Waters

The calm before the storm.

Well.. okay, not directly before the storm. This was taken a couple of weeks ago in Poquoson, VA. It's an interesting area with beautiful seascapes. I'd like to go back soon, hopefully finding its quirky beauty unchanged by the hurricane.

For Chocolate L♥vers

My newest photographic obsession has a sweet tooth.
If it has chocolate in its name, it has to be good, right?

Right!
Even when we're talking about film.

It turns out that Polaroid made a Type 100 peel-apart instant film for Land Cameras that comes in a special chocolate version. It's no longer being produced, and the stock that is still available today is already a couple of years expired. But that doesn't seem to detract anything from its deep chocolate darks and caramel-colored lights... or from the thrill of taking a photo and holding a freshly developed, still damp and gooey, chocolate-toned print in your hands just 90 seconds after having pressed the shutter.

Train tracks near Lee Hall Depot

Here's how it works: After pressing the shutter, the film is pulled out of the side of the camera, an action that breaks the pockets of developing chemicals and spreads them over the photo. The photo, protected between two layers of paper and plastic, then develops for a short amount of time, 90 seconds for the chocolate film. Then the two layers of paper are pulled apart in a smooth motion, with bated breath and much anticipation. With a little luck, a developed photo will be revealed inside.

I took my Polaroid Land Camera loaded with chocolate film to the the tiny lighthouse at Buckroe Beach...

...and to the tall, dignified, and still functioning light at Fort Story: New Cape Henry Light.

Birds at Buckroe Beach.

I was hoping one of them would model for me from up close, and I had meant to come up behind them in hopes of having them move closer to the water. But they were so quiet and serious, solemnly facing in the same direction, that I didn't have the heart to disturb them and instead photographed them just as they were.

With a little luck, the film can be used indoors... although the results will be dark. Here, Tibetan monks are working on a sand mandala during the American Theater's Tibet Week.

Who says chocolate is only for dessert?

Rome, Instantly

Fun with Impossible Project's black frame film:
Piazza del Popolo and the view at the top and bottom of the Spanish Steps, respectively.

I love Polaroid cameras.

But I have to admit that they're not always practical, since they're neither slim nor lightweight. But when paired with the Impossible Project's silver shade instant film, they can produce unique and fantastically imperfect travel memories... so I decided that carrying one with me would be worth it. I packed a camera and two packs of film, which I burned through in the first few days of our trip.

One of my first Roman Polaroids: Trajan's Forum, with Trajan's Column and the Church of the Santissimo Nome di Maria in the background.

A must-see (and must-photograph): the Colosseum

And, barely visible, but it's there: the Pantheon

Our visit to Rome wouldn't have been complete without a stroll through Piazza Navona, admiring the Baroque fountains and the original watercolor art for sale.

The Piazza del Popolo has become one of my favorite spots to photograph in Rome. With its spacious size, odd shape, central obelisk, and peripheral statues and churches, there is no shortage of sights (and people) to see. Here, the near-twin churches of Santa Maria dei Miracoli and Santa Maria in Montesanto mark the end of Via del Corso and the beginning of the piazza. There is something timeless and iconic about them that I just love.

Another area we enjoy exploring is the neighborhood around the Spanish Steps. Most of the area is a pedestrian zone, making it the perfect place to window shop, stop for coffee, observe local produce markets, and just enjoy walking around.
This photo was taken from the top of the steps, looking out over the city.