Sunday, December 26, 2010

D-359 Where to find inspiration

Here are a few tips to re-ignite your creativity, these tips always help me.
Take a vacation, LOL, o.k. if you can't do that then maybe you can . . .

-take a walk with camera in tow
- try something different, try shooting at a different angle,definitely try a new technique,something different to you.
- join a challenge
- take a picture then say to yourself, "how can I take it different" walk around your subject and try different angles.
- duplicate an image you love
- look at one of your images that didn't work and redo it.
- look at fashion magazines, travel magazines. Whatever genre you are interested in has magazines.
- take pictures of the details and the details only (get close and personal)
- take a picture of someone/something you love.
- try it in black and white
- take a photography class, if that not feasible try a photography book.
- let your friends inspire you . . .

I've been inspired to try some night time photography by Jo Garret at "Sometime between Dusk and Dawn " her whole 365photography project has been night photography
and Terry at "It's a GreytDay for a Photo" who has been cranking out beautiful night time images. I asked David if we could take a drive to the city, which is about a 30 minute drive for us and he was willing. So here is Chicago's (Illinois) famous skyline. Chicago is a beautiful city. I shot this from the planetarium across Lake Michigan. The sky had a strange color tint, like more snow is heading our way!
dailyshoot Daily Shoot
#ds406 What fuels your creative process? Illustrate it in a photo today.

Chicago, Illinois - Skyline on 12/26/10 15 degrees Fahrenheit, partly cloudy. Definitely a winter night at the Windy City.
Just amazing - the city never sleeps!

Chicago Skyline-1
These were edited in Topaz.

There are a few more from this outing if you are interested in my Flickr Account.

I was asked how I set up yesterdays image. The Christmas tree. I initially wanted to try taking a pictue of the whole tree, like Elli did here, A Scrivnerburg 365
but I did not like the cluttered look of our CD Case behind the tree, so I had to find a different angle. Since I had to use a tri-pod, and since my poor tripod is like 50 years old, it won't hold my heavy lenses so I picked the 50mm which is nice and small/light. Put my camera on a tripod and focused on a closeup of the tree. I allowed some of the lights from the background to flow in.
settings were ISO 200, F/11.0, shutter speed of 2.5 seconds.
I had lights on the mantel, about 10 feet from the tree.
I just had to move around until I found a spot I liked.

Well, 6 more days to go for me on this project. I hope you have enjoyed the journey as much as I have.

A great big thanks to Elli for featuring me on her blog and for her continued friendship for the past couple of years. Thank you my friend.

Reading Typepad Vs Wordpress
Jeff Korhan

9 comments:

xolexo said...

Thank you for the tips. They'll be put to good use starting tomorrow!

As for your Chicago photo, I am awestruck. Breathtaking capture! <3

Nikhil Ramkarran said...

Nice city shot. A departure for you. I wish I could find something different to do for the few days I have left, but its back to work on Tuesday and more of the same for me :(

I definitely think I need a break in order to get the creative juices flowing again. I've just bought a cheap film camera (Pentax, so it will take my current lenses) and I will be learning film photography next year :)

Nikhil Ramkarran said...

P.S. I use wordpress. Started out with a free blog on wordpress.com, then I moved it over to my own domain. I was very impressed with how easy it was to just move everything over.

I've never used Typepad, but I've read several people's views and they all seem positive. My problem is that it is a paid solution and I already had my own domain. It didn't seem to make sense to have to pay for something else.

greygirl25 said...

Your Chicago skyline is amazing. I get the drive thing, Portland is 60 minutes away. I'd be working that city every night if it weren't.

Thank you so much for the plug, you are very kind.

Now that you have six days left of this project, what is next?

Judy said...

Very nicely done.

Colleen Friesen said...

What great images and generous tips. Thanks for doing this. I really loved the close-ups on the Christmas ornaments. Inspiring and lovely. You have a great eye for composition.

Colleen Friesen said...

Thanks for your great images and generous tips. You have a great eye for composition and lighting. I'll be back for more ideas. Much appreciated...

Anonymous said...

Lovely shot of Chicago skyline. I don't think I would be brave enough to battle the cold weather for night time shot in Chicago though ;)

Unknown said...

Your photo is absolutely stunning! I would like to try something like this...but I think one needs a city? This needs to be printed very large and hung up prominently!

Thanks for the great tips on inspiration! It will be very helpful as we start a new photo year.

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