Earthtastic!

Cassidy asked me to take some product shots for her new etsy site Earthtastic! http://www.etsy.com/shop/earthtastic

I'm really excited for her new venture into creating products and selling them. They're all natural, chemical free and made 100% by her. She's doing a really great job and her products are just top notch. She has a real vision for the items she's making and I can't wait to see where she goes with it all. 

This weekend when I wasn't photographing Viking Fest I was shooting her products! She has a few listings up on her etsy shop now and is ready to ship wares to happy buyers! Here are some shots from the weekend.

Crocheted round face scrubbies.

A wrapped package of round face scrubbies, pack of four, choice of organic cotton or not organic.

A wrapped package of two chap stick tubes. The label reads, "Thank you for supporting a chemical-free lifestyle!"

A row of cinammon & brown sugar all natural dye-free chap stick.

A set of three crocheted wash cloths, one blue one white and one white/blue/brown. She also has organic cotton wash cloths available.

A hemp lotion bar. Some of her lotion bars contain emu oil, which has amazing healing/rejuvenation properties.

Please visit her etsy site http://www.etsy.com/shop/earthtastic for more information on her products and to purchase them yourself! She also makes hats and they will be on the website before too long.

-MJ

If you're bored it means you're boring.

My biggest dilemma with photography is figuring out what to photograph.

Once I know what my subject is I can go to town experimenting with angles and lighting until I get what I'm looking for. But until then, I'm just stumped.

It's a rather large problem.

I've been focusing on items in my room. I believe it has been a good exercise for me because it encourages me to create interesting photos out of possibly non-interesting items. Tonight I had a very difficult time finding anything I cared to photograph though. Everything seemed so boring. Perhaps I'm having a boring night.

I would really like to get better at silhouette photos, I think they're really cool! However I hate using myself as a model in photos, it's difficult and frustrating. When I want to experiment I don't want to waste time making sure I'm in the proper place for the framing. Bah.

This seemed like a good idea: me lowering a gummy worm into my mouth. The worm is transparent, I'm not. The worm would be colorful, I'd be solid black. I have a white wall. It seemed so simple!

But not so much. Here's my best photo from my attempt, and there's something hanging on the wall near my arm. Damn it all.

Although, on the positive side, this is essentially the pose I was going for, and I believe the basic idea is present even if it's not perfect.

My sister has started to make her own lip balm, an exciting endeavor if I do say so myself! Before I left my mom's house for school today Cassidy gave me three tins that contained a different ingredient set in each. She asked me to try them out and report back on how long they last, how they feel, etc.

I'm anxious to help her out, and I figured a photo showing off her handy work could possibly help her to sell these once she gets her recipes finalized.

My last photo attempt this evening is this. Once again, not a fan of using myself as a subject. I feel too silly.

I finally lost it tonight having to listen to my camera focus and refocus over and over again. I didn't do much, just screamed, "WHY?!" rather loudly.

This photo isn't entirely in focus, which makes me sad, but again it was the best of all the ones I took of myself. I was aiming for something that would show off the lip balm but it wasn't happening quite how I wanted it to.

I look forward to the day that I own more than one speedlight. It'll be marvelous.

-MJ