Getting Ready For the Big Day

Ok kids, I'm back by popular demand!  I just wanted to see how much you all missed me. :)  So I'm a little behind on the whole getting wedding photos up (just passed the six month mark!), but here goes:

I know I still owe you all a final post about the dress, but here is what is technically dress #2, if I remember correctly.  Dress #1 got vetoed as being too simple, and got returned to Bloomingdales.  I wanted to return dress #2 as well (see all the beads and lace?  not what I was thinking I would end up with.), but real wedding dresses are harder to return.  Dress #3 is coming up, and dress #4 is currently still in a box on my craft shelves, about 3/4 of the way done. :)

I made the flower and veil two days before the wedding.  Nothing like leaving all the details until the very end. :)

5 minutes to go time - gotta make sure the lipstick is good!  

All of the photos were taken by our wonderful photographer, Cara Spinniken.

The wedding photos have arrived!

Yesterday's mail brought me a much-anticipated present - our wedding photos!  I have only looked through them once, but expect to see some soon!  Our photographer has posted some of our engagement photos on her blog, if you just can't wait. :)

Bringing the Outdoors In

Seeing as how I'm a bit obsessed with Apartment Therapy's Small Cool contest right about now (thanks for all the votes!), I thought I would take a quick trip through some past small cool contests, as they are a fantastic source of inspiration. The photo below is from the 2009 contest, and while I don't know that I'm brave enough to do this to my kitchen cabinets, I think it looks fantastic. I think this would look great in a series of frames on the wall, as well. Could you take the leap and do this to your cabinets?

(photo courtesy of Apartment Therapy)

Bright and Bold

A few more favorites from the Botanic Gardens:

This one reminds me of a Mardi Gras headdress - no idea what the plant was though.

Up Close and Personal: Daffodils

I love daffodils in the springtime - so bright and cheery. So when I picked up a bunch at Whole Foods, of course I had to get out my macro lens and share them with you all!

Macro Lens!

After stalking Craigslist for a while and dreaming of getting a macro lens, while fully expecting it to stay firmly in my dreams, last week I found a steal! It is from the 70s, but apparently one of the best macro lenses Nikon ever made, and people still prefer it over the new ones. So without further ado, I give you yarn, up close and personal.

Ahh....Fall...

So I really am back from my mini-vacation, but I've been really busy catching up on work so I haven't had any time to post anything. Since I haven't had time to go through my 500 pictures that I took, here are a few previews from the top of Mt. Megunticook, the highest peak on the Maine mainland.

To Mat or Not To Mat?

So I'm contemplating an overhaul of my ViewFound Photography Etsy store, despite the fact it's only been open a few months. So in preparation, I thought I would see what you all thought (all 8 of my loyal readers). Currently, all of my listings are for matted photos, but would you rather be able to buy an unmatted photo? This would cut down on shipping costs and allow for more personalization, as well as I would have the option of adding a mat. I'm leaning towards separating them, but what do you thing?

Altered Reality

So while perusing the blogosphere, I came across this post on How About Orange about swedish photographer Erik Johansson. Take a look below and then definitely check out his website - it's a visual treat.

I feel this way sometimes with Ikea instructions.

Roadworkers' Coffee Break - I had to throw in a transportation-themed one!

You Wove Your Way Into my Heart

So back when I first aquired my beautiful camera, I wanted to accessorize it with a really cool woven tapestry camera strap. Turns out, no one really makes them anymore, so after searching for awhile and not coming up with anything good, I kinda let it go. Boyfriend doesn't approve of the fact I go around with my current camera strap with it's blazing yellow NIKON all over it, as he thinks it's a sign that says "STEAL ME".

So later I came up with the idea to use this trim that I have and just sew it over my current strap. It is currently the strap on a purse that I quickly made the day before I left for Botswana, as I felt I didn't have an appropriate bag for traipsing around Africa. So this is option number 1, as seen below.

The Bag

The Trim

The Trim

So, I had kinda forgotten about the strap, until today when I browsing around on Etsy and came across a couple of great options on Boneca Linda:

The Merlot Camera Neck Strap

The Green and Turquoise Camera Neck Strap

So now I'm in a quandry about which one I want, so I'll make you decide! Let me know which one is your favorite.

The 50 States Project

I ran across this really interesting project today on It's Nice That, called the 50 States Project. Basically, 50 different photographers, one from each state, have five assignments, which should fit the theme and their photographic style, including people, habitat, landscape, industry, and entertainment (the last one isn't out yet). I was excited to see what photos were representing DC, and then I remembered, oh yeah, we're not a state. I was more upset about the fact we weren't represented there than the fact we're not represented in Congress. :) But I digress. So I looked back to my homeland to see what Michigan looked like through the eyes of Peter Baker. Most of them were Detroit-centric, so I don't relate super well, but I did like his people entry, "Joe Diesel". Which photos are your favorites, and do they do a good job representing the places you know and love?

What's the Story, Morning Glory?

A Different View

I haven't been playing with my fisheye lens nearly as much lately, and looking through these pictures reminds me I have to get it out more often.

Plants to the Second Power

Here are a few more of my favorites from my last visit to the U.S. Botanic Gardens.

These first two are a plant called the Rattlesnake Master. You have to respect a plant with a name like that.




Stoke's Aster

I've fallen a bit behind, but I plan on putting up some new photos to ViewFound Photography, so stay tuned!

Ready for my Close-up

This past weekend we got to put boyfriend's birthday present of photography lighting to use and have a model shoot of all the purses...now I do modeling both in my day job and my side job, although purse modeling is a little more glamorous than transportation modeling.

We had originally intended to take the photos on my roofdeck, as I was going for romantic urban, and it's nice up there with plants and a railing and pretty buildings in the background. But unfortunately, it turns out that you have to get up there at like 6 a.m. in order to get non-completely harsh light, so instead we had to go around to the alley behind my building and do a gritty urban shoot instead. I thought they came out really interesting, and it was a lot of fun.

A few of my listings with updated pictures:

Red Hot Necklace - Fabric Flowers and Clay Beads

Tailored Tote - Felted Red and Gray Wool

Look Ma, No Hands - Crocheted Orange Cross-Body Bag

And the Mystery is Solved!

So, I had previously resigned myself to never figuring out what the fantastic purple flower was, when lo and behold, two separate sources came up today! Grad school buddy Jeff was perusing his National Geographic magazine and they just so happened to have a picture of it, and the Botanic Garden people actually emailed me back, how awesome is that? Anyways, here it is:

Passion Flower Family – Passifloraceae. Common name – Grenadilla, latin name – Passiflora quadrangularis.

Purple Fringe

And my etsy businesses are off to a good start! My first sale was this week - thanks Jeff!

I've put a few more photos up on ViewFound Photography which I took on my last trip to the US Botanic Garden. I have no idea what these flowers are and I looked high and low for a tag, but no luck. I emailed the Garden today to see if they will help me, but who knows if I'll hear back. For now, I'll just enjoy the pictures. :)

Purple Fringe No. 1 - Matted 5 x 5 Fine Art Photo

Purple Fringe No. 2 - Matted 5x5 Fine Art Photo

Now I just have to wait patiently....

Because I just pre-ordered my copy of the The Sartorialist book! I'm very excited. :)


(Photo courtesy of Amazon.com)

Off to the Woods!

In a couple of hours I will be on my way off to the middle of nowhere, Pennsylvania, to go spend the weekend at boyfriend's cabin. This will be the second weekend in a row that I get to spend time in nature, which is particularly exciting, seeing as how I am a complete city person sans car. Last weekend we went hiking in the Shenandoah with friends and it was so amazingly beautiful. I also got to try out slow shutter speeds to get the beautiful flowing water look, even though it involved crawling around on dirty rocks and taking hundreds of pictures to get one just right. :)

Knock-your-socks Off Bright, or Yowza, You're Blinding Me?

My latest listings on ViewFound Photography are this set of three photos of pink angel's trumpets. The lighting was perfect and it looked like they were glowing, but when I printed them, the colors were significantly more saturated than on the computer (unmatted photo is computer version, matted is printed version). I thought that maybe they were a bit pop-arty, but do you think they are too bright?