January 2008

Here is a very interesting link showing scale of things in our universe.  Use your scroll wheel once you’ve finished reading each section, to get down to the next section.

The other night, Jeff helped me build a light box for taking still-life photos. I saw the idea chez Lolly, and used the tutorial at Strobist.com. It was a snap! I let Jeff do the cutting though, since box cutters make me nervous — what can I say, I’m not the most graceful person and I really like having all 10 fingers still.

Find a bix box:

Cut out three sides of it:

And tape tissue or tracing paper onto the cut-out sides:

Then use any light source (the above shows my sun lamp glowing down on the light box) to create the diffuse lighting you want. It’s pretty cool! Here are some of the first results:

This is going to be great for photographing small knitting projects and yarn stash too!

I’m delighted to announce that some of my photos are now for sale on ImageKind. Check it out!

My father started an artist’s blog as well - he is a painter. You can find it here.

So I did it, I started, I’m taking the plunge. From January 8, 2008 till January 7, 2009 I plan to take two photos per day.

A daily self-portrait shot…. This one was playing around with photoshop using a “mask” to keep color only in one part of the photo. It took a while to do, and I know a lot of folks think this technique is ubiquitous — but it was my first time, and I think having only colored yarn is pretty fun!

And one other shot not of me… Here is a shot of our hallway with just a little bit of light — I was testing out the tripod my mom gave me:

I’ve done seven days straight so I’m off and running. Already I’m taking lots more pictures and challenging myself. The goal is to challenge myself to keep shooting. All this talk of starting my own photography business was completely intimidating the desire to shoot right out of me! So here goes…

My self-portrait set.

My project 365 set.

Ha! Just when I fooled you into thinking I’d abandoned knitting content completely, I pull from my hat an FO! My Mediterranean Socks are done at last.

They are cozy, comfy, handknit… They fit perfectly and match many things in my wardrobe — what more could a girl ask for?

Details:

• Pattern: Toe Up, Two-at-a-Time, Magic Loop! I cobbled together ideas from various pattern sources, including 1) Socks Soar on Two Circular Needles (in particular the Cable Top pattern), 2) The Magic Loop booklet written by Bev Galeskas and 3) Summer 2007 Interweave Knits article “A Better Sock from the Toe Up”
• Yarn used: Lane Cervinia Calzetteria in Capri colorway (#907). The yarn was fine to work with, and feels nice and warm against my tootsies now.
• Yarn quantity: Two skeins in their entirety for size 10.5 women’s U.S. Part of the reason for knitting toe-up was to enable me to use as much yarn as possible.
• Needles: One long Addi-Turbo needle in size 2 U.S.
• Time to knit: Five months, with a European adventure and Christmas in the midst of it.

I also wanted to flash some knitting goodness I received for Xmas (or was it my birthday?) from my sis:

Nope, unlike what my brother-in-law thought, it’s not some hideous, crazy-knitter necklace! Those are stitch markers made from scrabble tiles by SplitYarn. Perfect for a crazy, knittin’, Speed Scrabbler like me. The Christmas goodness included a few other useful items as well. Thank you Christa!