A home!

OK, still no pictures, so if they're expected... stop reading I guess. I'd hate to disappoint!

I haven't had a chance to take out my camera because I've been busy with a million other things. I'm finally settled in with a room in a house, clothes put away, shower figured out and food in the pantry. Tomorrow I'd like to do a test walk out to the studio to see how long it takes me to get there. On Monday I might be getting a ride to the immigration office, which would be spectacular.

Right now I'm having tea and chocolate biscuits while watching Friends :3 I'm hoping my mom will get online soon and we can video chat on Skype!

I suppose it isn't entirely true that I haven't taken any photos: I have a phone that has a decent camera on it and I've taken a few with that. Mostly I've sent smiling pictures to Andrew as well as house photos to facebook. Yesterday I moved into a house (yay!) and I did a lot of unpacking as well as bedding shopping. I had a mishap with the electrical outlets (D:) so my electronic fiddling was brought to a screeching halt. This morning I had a nice video chat with Andrew <3 before finally demystifying the secrets of the shower. I got a very late start and finally meandered into town around 2 pm. Whenever I leave my neighborhood I get to smile and think about delicious bruschetta: I live right next to Bella Roma! I love that place!

My house is in excellent walking distance of everything that I need. I can walk to the grocery store, shopping center, food, sights, friends houses and work! Yesterday I took two trips to Penneys. I needed bedding and towels and that sort of thing, and I can only carry so much at once! Today I went into town to get my phone looked at (AGAIN) and then did a little grocery shopping. I love food! I wasn't sure what to buy, really, I just made sure I had enough to eat meals today and tomorrow. I figure I'll do some meal planning tonight and then go back again tomorrow.

Time to do some dishes and fiddle around with my room some more. Fingers crossed that I'll have pictures to post before too long!

-MJ

Back to Ireland

Ok, so I haven't blogged in two months. That's a little lame. I was taking photos, but really wasn't doing much with them. I could have sworn that I did a 365 wrap-up post, but I appear to be wrong.

This morning I landed back in Ireland. I'll be here for 7 months and I have higher aspirations for portrait projects than I did last time. Let's hope I can stick with it.

Thus far I have no photos to accompany this post. I'm on the CityLink bus to Galway and should be there in about 3 hours. Lots to take care of today as well, so I probably won't have any pictures for a while. That's OK though, there's lots of time.

I just thought I should pop in here and let any remaining followers know that I haven't abandoned this web space! It will continue even when I return to the States this fall.

-MJ

Much too long.

More than a month between posts? Much too long.

Simultaneously, there has been a lot and very little happening in my photo life. I've been going strong with my 365 project (today makes photo number 343). Not too much longer now! Even though I see the number and I know I've been doing this almost a year, I can still hardly believe that it has been a year since I started it. Lately I'm feeling very guilty about it though, because I've submitted so many cellphone photos. They are still photos, so they do count, but they're not exactly my best work.

On the whole this project has taught me a lot about my creative process, my willingness to commit to a project, my ability to persevere when things get difficult and what kinds of photos I really want to share with the world. When I look through the photos, I'm definitely not proud of them all. And it's not just the cellphone entries. A fair amount of my dslr photos are very lackluster. Most of them I wouldn't have normally chosen to share with anyone. Even though I've almost come to despise this endeavor, I am extremely glad that I decided to do it.

I've come across a few ideas that I'd really like to flesh out, and that aspect alone has been absolutely worth it. I now have a whole year's worth of ideas to extrapolate on at later times if I so choose. That's pretty great.

In even better news, my laptop has been recently upgraded! Still the same casing and processor, but there's a new (and much larger!) hard drive and now I have 4 gigs of RAM. I am so very happy. The day after I arrived in Ireland my hard drive told me it was too full to continue to add photos to my Aperture catalogue. This made me very sad. Now, five months later, I can finally add the rest of my pictures! This is a serious setback in the overall process of having a completely searchable database, but at least I have the space now. I can thank my mom for this, it's her big Christmas gift to me :)

As you may recall, between now and my last entry, I have also had some (mis)adventures with my SB800. It decided to take a huge dump on me and stop working. It was awful. So, I sent it off to Nikon. $130 and about two weeks of waiting later and it was returned to me. They didn't tell me what was wrong with it, it was just noted that "major parts" were replaced. *shrug* It's working now and that's what matters. Although, last night I thought it was broken again. Imagine my horror and sadness. I did not react very well to the fear (crying was involved) that I'd have to send it to Nikon again.

Really, it would appear that I just happened to buy a total shit pack of batteries. I put five in and the flash popped once.... then no more. "Hm". So, I put in five new ones. Flash popped once and then... no more. Commence crying. I gave one last shot, put in five more new batteries and... it worked? I was baffled and relieved. I have a pack of 36 Energizers from Home Depot and a lot of them haven't worked very well. As long as my flash is working though, that's what matters.

I have taken my new found appreciation for my SB800 and turned it toward my shiny silver umbrella quite a bit. Tonight's photo saw my TTL cable in action while I held the SB800 into the umbrella. The light is so nice and I have hardly begun.

-MJ

Inspiration. Maybe.

I need some inspiration.

I have a folder on my external that contains shots that inspire me. Will I ever do anything about it? I go through the folder sometimes, and I'm careful about what I add. I look at a lot of photos, more now than I ever have before, and sometimes I see a shot and before I know it I'm going to right click and save. Perhaps it would behoove me to study the photos more frequently and attempt to pin down what exactly about then I love so much.

Even though I have said it a lot recently, I'm still having issues finding motivation to take pictures. The newest issue/excuse is that my sb-800 broke. I am in bummerville about that right now. During my Halloween party I set up a backdrop and my umbrella and took tons of pictures of my friends all dressed up.

It was the best idea I've had in a long time.

My fondness for black and white continues to grow. I'd like to put some effort into doing high-key shoots. This definitely requires getting my flash repaired. I think the light bulb is burned out. Please tell me that I'll remember to take it to the post office tomorrow, and double-please let Nikon be fast with turn-around.

The other day I ordered a smaller umbrella, a 30 inch. I was only able to utilize it in a shoot one time before my flash bit it for good. The inside of it is silver which created an awesome amount of contrast. I was taking photos of Unjuy and they were really nice. It'd be great to get photos of him with his eyes open. We were in a dark room and his pupils were extremely dilated, plus I currently use the built-in flash on my camera as a remote commander for my sb-800, so that trigger flash gets him blinking before the flash can actually go off. Damn his double set of eyelids!

I have a list of photo ideas that I have yet to dive into. I keep forgetting about the ideas, and when I remember them it's usually too late in the day and I can't execute them properly. Must fix this.

This photo would be much better without the distracting background elements.

While I was taking photos on Halloween I started to think about how much I can't wait to have more equipment and space. It would have been awesome to have a backdrop that was wider and covered the floor. A second light coming from the right to get rid of the harsh shadows would have been good too. I feel good about what I managed to accomplish with just the one light/umbrella though. We all had a nice time and that's important too.

I just love to photograph people. It was a dream come true. I had a room full of dressed up, high-energy people that wanted to have their picture taken. I rounded them up and called them in front of the sheet and just snapped away to my heart's content. It was so awesome. I felt so happy about it all.

In February of next year I'll be returning to Ireland. This excursion will see me there for a full 12 months. Just think about what I can photograph in 12 months. I didn't use my camera enough during the second half of my three months there over the summer. I need to plan a bit better. I also need a better bag for while I'm there this time. More planning, definitely. I have so many places that I want to see. Ger does a lot of walking/hiking/outdoor things and I am hoping I can go with her on some of those adventures and get amazing photos! It will require getting up early and I'll want to just pass out but I'll get to see some incredible things so it will be worth it and maybe it'll toughen me up a bit. ... but most likely not >.>

It's high time that I put the energy toward a sunrise photo. I've always wanted to, but then it comes time to wake early and I think, "Eff this" and I go back to bed. Tsk tsk.

I'm fast approaching the tail end of my 365 project. I am looking forward to being finished with it. Lately I've been doing a lot more camera phone photos than I'd really prefer, but as I already stated I am having some serious motivation issues. I can't think of something to photograph every day, and I am sick of uploading a dumb photo. It's important to me to finish this though. Today was photo number 309. It has helped me to think a bit more creatively and to find interesting aspects of the maybe not-so-interesting things around me. I don't regret starting it. All the same though, happy that it's almost finished.

-MJ

I have been slacking.

I really enjoyed blogging on a daily basis in Ireland. Not as much is happening here in Washington. Or perhaps, I have been pretty darn busy and I haven't spared a thought for my blog. It is true that I've been busy! Working working working. Either way, Owen said he needed to read my blog and I remembered that I hadn't posted anything in a while so I thought I'd make an update :)

And sadly, I have been slacking on my photography. I have submitted far too many cellphone photos in lieu of real pictures. I have a list of photo ideas and yet I feel uninspired. No, not uninspired. I have been lazy. Unmotivated? Either way, I just haven't been putting forth the effort. 

After about two and a half weeks I finally adjusted back to Pacific Standard Time. Even though that has happened, I am still sleeping poorly. If I wanted to make a project of it I could photograph how tired I look every morning, but I think that might get a little depressing :P

Last week I helped my mom make dinner! It was meatloaf and it involved me touching raw ground beef in a very serious way. I am very proud of myself. Tonight I was going to help her make a roast, but my Grandma made it first so my mom wouldn't have to cook on her birthday (happy birthday mom!). I think we're going to decide a different meaty dish for me to cook for more practice.

I have yet to attempt driving stick shift. It is high on my list though! My volunteer never got back to me regarding availability, so I may need to get more aggressive. I really want to learn. That would be a major accomplishment.

Tonight I realized that most likely I won't get around to painting my 40K army while I'm here. Thus far there has been so much else going on and I think I'd prefer to make a few blankets instead. I do love sewing! I have some sewing to do for my Halloween costume. I am really looking forward to taking pictures of my friends in their costumes. I may set up my large umbrella and try having a fun shoot, so long as my friends are in compliance! :D

-MJ

A birthday and a dog.

But not a dog birthday. I don't think I know anyone that hosts birthday parties for their dogs. That's OK though.

Today was Elijah's 3rd birthday! He had a party with lots of friends. This is the first time I've used my camera in just over two weeks. It felt good to be taking photos again. I've had a hard time getting motivated to take photos during my transition back to the States. I should be fine going forth and completing my 365 now.

There were many children in the house today, I wasn't entirely sure what to do. I wanted action shots of course, but there were so many limbs and toys and balloons flying around that it was difficult to get FACES in the shots. I came away with a few that I'm happy with though. Some very nice ones of Elijah enjoying his super awesome train cake.

I made a big effort to really use my SB-800. I was fiddling with the controls almost the whole time. I found that the TTL wasn't really working as well as I would have liked it to. I know that there's a bit of an issue with relationship to the aperture on my lens, so a lot of the photos are a bit darker than I wanted them to be. Not a huge deal, I can lighten them in post, but it would be nice to not have to worry about it at all. There's still so much to learn!

In general it seems that upping the ISO to 200 makes enough of a difference to lighten photos that are taken while I'm zoomed. Of course if I forget to put that back to 100 and I take a photo of someone as close range the photo is completely blown out. It was an exercise in quick transitions, so all in all it went well.

After the party I went to visit Jacki :] and finally meet her puppy, Hiro! I brought my camera with me, still in shutter bug mood, and planned on taking many photos. I'm happy to say that I succeeded in taking many photos. I would have taken even more if my flash batteries hadn't 100% died on me.

No problems though, because I got some super cute photos of this fantastic doggie! Another exercise in acting quickly with a squirrelly subject!

All in all, a great return to my 365 project.

-MJ

Still not feeling it.

I still haven't taken any photos. My camera is packed in my suitcase still. I've thought about my 365 every night for the past four nights as I climb into bed, but I'm just not feeling it yet.

When I set out to do this project I had very high aims of not missing a single day and seeing it through to completion. I'm standing firm at photo number 276. Less than 100 left. Originally, my full circle would have ended about a week before Christmas. As it is now I'll be into the new year before I'm finished.

Not really sure what happened in Ireland to make me stop taking photos there; I was mostly just pretty distracted I guess. Since arriving back in Washington I've been busy non-stop with packing and unpacking and moving and organizing. My 365 is important to me, but not living out of boxes is a more pressing matter.

At the rate I've been going I should be completely unpacked and settled by the end of the week. I know I'll definitely have photos from this coming Saturday, it's Elijah's 3rd birthday! At least I know that the latest I'll be starting again is then. That's nice.

On Friday I ordered test prints from a printing service that I've been reading about. They should arrive in the mail today and I'm really excited. I'm closer and closer to having my etsy shop up and running! I have it 'open' but I have nothing for sale. I've been going through my photos and deciding which ones I want to offer for sale and I also have a large list of ideas of photos to take to help with my shop.

Exciting!

I just remembered that I need to backup my hard drive to my other external. If I lost all of my Ireland photos I honestly think I would die.

I may take a break from moving and packing today to put up Halloween decorations. I would like to be festive as hell for the next three months.

-MJ