At the Musee d'Orsay

As I'm labeling my way through the pictures I've taken the last few years that I'm behind on - primarily pictures from trips, I've mostly kept on top of the shots I've taken in NYC - I've got a developing issue. The sets that just random pictures of places are the easiest to label (I can label them all things like "Typical Istanbul Street Scene" or "Graffiti in Prague" and leave it at that) whereas the pictures I've taken at museums take a lot longer to label and tag as I transfer the information from the original museum label. Still, I'm trying to start tackling those sets. One of the first that I've finished is a set I took at the Musee d'Orsay in 2010. There are some really lovely things in their collection, though at times it's not an easy environment for photography - some of the corridors are narrow, and the lighting isn't always so great. Still, in two visit there (one in Februrary, 2010, the other in September, 2009) I did get some shots I think are pretty lovely, of amazing items.

The Adoration of the Magi, a tapestry by Sir Edward Burne-Jones


The Church of Auvers, by Vincent van Gogh

I'll admit, this is as much one of my "best" because of the episode of Dr. Who as for any other reason...

The Adulteress, by Jules Cambos


Art Nouveau Bowl


Detail from The Family, by Luc Olivier Merson


The Campaign of France, by Ernest Meissonier


Joan of Arc, by Henry Chapu


Well, that's all for now! :)

Bali Bird and Reptile Park

It's been very nice to finally make some significant progress on labeling the pictures from some of my recent trips. Or less recent, as the case may be. The downside is, I still haven't really put in the effort to label any of the museum sets - I've mostly been tackling the sets that are easier to label and less time consuming than that. This is good, cause I've been getting a lot done. This is bad, because I'm starting to run out of these easy-to-label sets, and what's left will be much more time-consuming to get through and my progress will likely stall. Ah well, can't win them all, right?

This week, I labeled a bunch of pictures from the trip I took to Bali last May. They were primarily taken at three places: the Ubud Botanical Gardens, my hotel - the Sanur Beach Hotel, and the Bali Bird and Reptile Park, which is where the majority are from (read: all the ones of birds or reptiles). So, take a short trip to Bali with me!


I loved the patterns this duck-weed like plant formed. So geometric!


This was an offering and incense left in the garden.


There was a show at the hotel, with traditional drumming and dancing.


The grounds of the hotel were covered in sculptures and such, and they decked them all out with hibiscus blooms.


Owl!


There were lots of parrots at the Bird Park, many flying (relatively) free. This is one of the best shots I got.


I'm really proud of this shot of a Laughing Kookaburra.


This picture was taken about a minute after my friends and I spent $15 US to feed a chicken to this komodo dragon. It seemed to appreciate the meal.


Gecko!


The texture on the lizard skin is just amazing...

Spring Photography

It's been an unseasonably warm winter here in New York City, and while I'll admit I miss the snow, I can't deny that with everything else that's been going on in my life it's been nice not to face lots of freezing cold days and slippery sidewalks.

I've really not had the photography bug of late, and it's worried me. I feel like I've made it too much like work (like I've done with so many other things) as I've striven to only take really good pictures, and that I'm very hard on myself when I get home and, "oh, it's out of focus!" "oh, it's crooked!" "oh, I could have done so much better if only I'd..."

I want to get away from feeling that way. I wanted to remind myself of what I like about photography. Thursday was in the mid-fifties here, and with that gorgeous sign of spring just around the corner, I decided to go for a walk in Central Park and see what I could see. I'd already seen ample evidence in the preceding week that even though it's only late February, spring was really starting to be sprung, so I went hunting for spring flowers. (primarily in the two place I expected most to find them: the Shakespeare Garden and the Conservatory Garden). I wasn't disappointed...


View of the lake, the bridge, with the Central Park South skyline in the background. Okay, I promised flowers, none yet, but give it a few shots. ;)


Squirrel seemed pretty happy with those red berries all over the ground...


Central Park South again, pity I couldn't get any ducks in this shot, there were a bunch around just hangin' out.


I found this wish tied to a tree. To whoever wrote it...I hope you will, too!


Hellebore was blooming all over the place, but as is so often the case, I found it very hard to get a good shot that really showed off how beautiful this flower is...


There were snowdrops. Oh, were there snowdrops. :) There were also crocus, irises, forsythia, some stuff I couldn't name, and - in very sunny spots - daffodils! In FEBRUARY!

Anyway, I've also been VERY good about labeling pictures on Flickr this past week. I've just been plowing through old sets; I'd estimate that I've gotten through around 1000 pictures just this past week! If I can keep that pace up, I'll be caught up by...er...sometime in the summer, I guess. Well, that's a sobering idea of just how far behind I am! However, as of now, I've labeled every picture I've taken in 2012 - which isn't saying much, since I haven't taken that many - and I've "only" got 31 unlabeled sets from 2011 (comprising a few thousand pictures). 2009 and 2010, I'm still plenty behind on - but even that, I've chipped away over this past week, tackling some of the sets that have been lingering longest. lol, at this rate, I'll soon have labeled all the pictures I took in Puerto Rico, three years ago February. Well, it's something. ;) It'd be nice if I can get to the point that I'm less than three years behind (I remember, back in 2009, the goal was to not be ONE year behind! Those were the days!). While pursuing my goal of catching up (last year, this time, I was hoping to catch up before I hit 2,000,000 views on my Flickr account. Well, that didn't happen. This year, I'm hoping to catch up before I hit 3,000,000 hits - which is still 4 or 5 months off or so...) I ended up labeling some spring pictures from last year, which reminded me of what I have to look forward to in the months ahead. There were lots of daffodil and tulip pics, but I don't know, those somehow never turn out quite right. They never capture the essence of that marvelous thing that IS a daffodil. But there were a few others I thought were good...(these pictures were ALSO all taken in either the Shakespeare Garden or the Conservatory Garden in Central Park...)


Like magnolias!


And this lily thing!


And I got one tulip I thought was pretty good!


And I have no idea what this one was, but I got the lighting right!

Have a great Sunday, everyone. ;)

Work in Progress Wednesday, 2/22/2012

Wait, I'm actually keeping my resolution to keep posting? WOOT!

It hasn't been a great week for crafts. Oddly, it hasn't really felt like it's been a great week for ANYTHING. Somehow, I've been busy almost every day, yet I feel like I've gotten virtually nothing done. I've been working hard to dispel that feeling by concentrating on what I HAVE gotten done...but it still doesn't feel like enough, and that's frustrating, since the only standard I'm ACTUALLY trying to meet is my own, and I can't seem to let go of these ludicrously high standards that always get me in to trouble.

Anyway. I haven't gotten all that much crafting done this week. I had hoped to do a bunch of cross stitch on Friday, but I forgot to bring my project with me to the all-day work thing where said crafting was to take place, so that plan was DOA. However, I have done a bunch of spinning!



I've only very rarely deliberately tried to spin as thin-thin-thin as I could. But when I remembered that I had a bit more fiber in the house (I'm running quite low, and I'm still in the mood to spin, so this is a problem that is definitely going to come to a head BEFORE I get to Maryland Sheep and Wool the first weekend of May...) and when, after digging said fiber out, I found it to be a nice dark green/heather alpaca/silk blend, I figured this was an excellent material to see how low...I mean, how thin...I could go. :)



The answer is...pretty darn thin. I won't measure it til I'm done, and spinning 4 oz. this thinly is taking for-fricken-ever, but still, I've got to finish eventually, right? :)

Meanwhile, I've been spending a fair amount of time labeling photographs and moving on that part of things. I'm also writing fiction again! In the past two weeks, I've gotten down close to 8,000 words of a new story. Since my ostensible goal is only 2,000 words a week, I'm pretty happy to have written way more than that, even though it's all flagrantly self-indulgent, Mary Sue drivel. I just keep reminding myself it doesn't matter if it's garbage, I'm reminding myself that writing, badly or well, is just a habit, and one that I CAN fit in to my current life. Oh, and last week I also started a blog about the US Civil War, which is a passion of mine - it's here, if by any chance that's an interest of yours, as well - the content is going to be a mixture of book reviews, discussions of period art and documents, some related photography I've done, and - primarily - discussion and analysis of historical speeches. All of this is being done with a target audience of teachers and teaching-types in mind, though of course I'm still getting it up and running.

So...that's been my in progress activity for the week. :) How about everyone else? Check out what folks have been up to over at Work in Progress Wednesday on Tami's Amis and Other Creations Blog. :)

Rhodes

I was reading earlier this week about some of the terrible things going on in Greece as that country faces their economic disaster. It got me thinking about all of the things I'd seen in Greece, and just how much of our cultural heritage we stand to lose if things there go really south. I went back to the immense task of labeling my pics from that trip (man, I'm SO far behind, have so many pictures from, like, my last four trips to label, over the past 3 years...how did I get SO far behind? Time just flies!)

Anyway, I tackled the first set that looked interesting and like I could label it pretty quickly: images from Rhodes!

Rhodes is an ancient and beautiful city, and unlike most cities in Europe, still looks much as it has for hundreds of years.



This is a very typical view of what a street in Rhodes looks like. Some are wider, some narrower; some have tourist shops and restaurants spilling out in to the street, but all of them are of the same stone, and many have overhangs, arches, and connectors across the street.



There are also kinds of nifty little architectural touches - ancient looking lamps, plaques dedicated to Orders and governments and all those who had a presence on the island.

The ancient walls are still standing, and they command fantastic views out towards the ocean.



And then there is the ocean and the sky...



Yeah, it really looked like that. It was absolutely gorgeous, I liked Rhodes, despite the tourist-y atmosphere.

Greece Photographs

It's been an interesting few days. I've come down sick, and I finished reading the book on Optimism that I was reading, and promptly moved on to a book my dad loaned me nearly a year ago - his copy of "The Artist's Way" by Julia Cameron. I'll admit to being VERY put off by the introduction, she spends a lot of energy on talking about how SHE views creativity, and it's just...not how I do, at all. Not even how I WANT to. It's not just the way she discusses God - I could get past that, she makes it clear that she understands that not everyone shares her religious beliefs, fine - it's her attitude that creativity is something that comes from outside of us and flows through us. I don't think that at all, and I actually find that discouraging. I think of creativity as something that resides within us that we learn to accept, channel, and encourage. What's interesting, though, and that I only just realized is that in the end, perhaps the process is okay - she's talking about "letting" our creativity happen, and that's definitely how I view it too, it's about getting out of my own way and letting that creativity that resides within me...out. Anyway, despite my differences of opinion about things thus far, I've decided to give it ago. She says do one chapter a week; I read the first chapter last night, and I started tackling the "activities" in the chapter today. It's gonna be work, and I imagine I'll write more about it as I go - already, having read the sample activities, I've realized some interesting things.

What have I done so far? Well, she talks about doing "morning papers." Basically, wake up, pick up a pen, and immediately write three pages. She says to take half an hour. First discovery: I write small and fast, so I can only write two pages in a half hour. And I don't want to take longer. So, I was a bit skeptical, but I did it this morning. Last night, I set a journal and pen next to my bed, and this morning, I just opened my eyes, flipped the light on...and wrote. And it was interesting. What I really noticed about it wasn't just that it cleared a lot of crap out of my head right off the bat, but that it was invigorating. It wasn't invigorating because of the crap getting cleared out; rather, it was invigorating because, having spent a half hour sitting in bed accomplishing what felt like virtually nothing, as soon as I was done I sprang out of bed and immediately stared getting things done, and I've been getting things done ever since. Found that very interesting, and if it's the least I accomplish, I'll go with it. But tomorrow, I think I'll set an alarm, I think, I hate feeling like I've frittered the morning away (though, having just written that, I just realized...I don't feel like I HAVE frittered the morning away, which is interesting too, and maybe because I've been up five hours and have already gotten a lot done...but I can't credit the Morning Pages with that, since this morning has been a mirror of yesterday morning, before I read that stuff.) ...anyway. Yes. A bit rambling today.

Anyway, the cumulative effect of everything that I'm working on is that, while I wouldn't say I'm feeling inspired, I'm definitely feeling okay about just doing what I'm up for. I don't feel like "I MUST!" or "I WILL!" but I do feel a sort of quiet, resigned feeling of "I CAN!" It's been building for the last three weeks, starting when I started playing with my photographs again, and...I still feel that way. Anyway, over the last three days, I've gotten through labeling three or four more sets of my Flickr photos, and pinned a handful more of my better photographs. They're still all from the Greece vacation in September.

Santorini

Do you know about Santorini? OMFG, I LOVED IT THERE! It was probably my favorite stop of the trip, except maybe Istanbul. I would LOVE to go back to Santorini and just relax there for a week or two. It was stunningly beautiful, and breathtaking. When I got back to the ship after my day there, I joked to my mom that CLEARLY, I have to become a geologist. The volcanic caldera that is Santorini CLEARLY needs to be extensively studied. Sure, there's always the chance that the volcano will erupt again, like it did 3,000 years ago, and blow us all to kingdom come, but in the interim, there's all that sunlight and beauty and hiking and SCIENCE to do. It'd be a sacrifice, to risk my life that way, but someone has to do it... :)


This is the first view I got of Santorini, coming out of the ship looking at the biggest city in the island cluster, called Fira. See that switch backed path? I climbed up and down that. Yeah, it was damn hard...


My main goal on Santorini was do a hike - I walked from Fira to Ia and back again, about 7.5 miles each way. I was REALLY happy when Ia finally came in to view...


It was very common to find small shrines with rocks stacked against them. I have no idea what the religious significance of this was, but it was neat...


There was a spit of land with a huge spire atop it that I decided to climb. Hundreds of years ago, the Venetians had built a castle on top of that spire, and the ruins are still there - it was mostly destroyed by earthquakes. The most fun/scariest/stimulating part was when I had to free-climb up the last 15 feet. I was going to chicken out, but there were a few other American tourists there too, and we all stared at it, and finally one by one we decided to take the chance. Alone, I wouldn't have done it, but I'm glad I did...


Like every where else I've been in Europe, graffiti was every where. I fell in love with this one - Love, To Be Announced. They'll get back to us when they've figured out whose name goes in the heart...


There was no where in Santorini where you looked and didn't see a breath-taking view.

Athens
The other set I labeled was the pictures I took in Athens. This was ONLY the "general" pictures, and doesn't include the Acropolis, museums, etc. It was mostly graffiti, actually.


Like this guy...


And graffiti-Cthulhu...

But the real highlight of these shots is this one:

I adore this shot. I think it's one of the best photographs I ever took. I remember when I was standing there I was even thinking, "if I get this shot the way I want it, it's going to be amazing." I took several minutes just looking at the statue, walking around it, taking a few shots...and it worked. It turned out just the way I hoped. And I love it. Thank god for all that sunlight!!

So...I've just got to keep it up! I'll write more about "The Artist's Way" as I go, and post more photographs. And I'm still doing other crafts - I just didn't make enough progress this week to think it'd make a very interesting post. Maybe by Friday. :)

New Ways to Sort Through My Photography

Last week, my friends on Ravelry told me about Pinterset.com. Have ya'll heard about this? Well, I'm not yet sure what I think about it overall, but I'm finding that it's particularly useful for organizing things that I'm working on related to my Ravelry activities and my crafting business. My most recently thought-up use for it is for sorting through my Flickr photographs. See, I've got 10s of thousands of images up on Flickr, and while I'm going through and labeling them or looking for specific shots, I'll often spot one and go, "hey, that might be nice enough to put on a card or print as an 8 x 10!" ...and then I promptly forget all about it. But no more! Now, I'm just going to pin them to a board in my Pinterest (my username is Claire P Houck, or unforth, if any of ya'll are on there...). Before, I would do this sort of thing but assembling lists of links. The problem with this was that I'd have to then open every link in order to look at it. Or sometimes, I'd make a temporary file on my computer, but this is also a pain - I have to go from Flickr to my local storage, find the shot, and copy it over to the folder, then label it - and I STILL have to click the file to know what I'm looking at (or use a photo-editor/browser...)

But no more! Now I can just pin it, and go to the board, and look at them all at once!

I decided to test how this would go by going through one of the smaller, unlabeled sets I had up on Flickr - in this case, the pictures I took during the one day I spent on Crete during the cruise I took last September. There were 29 pictures in the set, I labeled all of them, and then I went through again and just pinned the ones I thought might be nice enough to consider making in to cards/prints.

It's awesome, cause now it's so easy to do things like...write this post and include the four images I singled out!

We visited this nifty castle overlooking an arm of the Mediterranean...




Our group then went to this small town in the middle of no where. Just as it started to rain, I spotted this...


Then, mom and I got sick of traveling with the main group and broke off to do some exploration in Chania.

There was really cool graffiti all over Greece and Turkey...

Will all of these get made in to prints? No, almost certainly not. But now, I can find them again easily, compare them to other shots as I identify them, and keep stuff easily organized. And, also nice, other people can Like or Pin my pins - so I can also see if I manage to post something that other people respond to very positively! Which will be very helpful (and, in fact, one of my shots got a "like" while I was writing this post!)

This'll be a big job in the long run, but I think it'll be fun. :)

National Archaeological Museum of Athens (Part 1)

As I work to get back on track, I'm starting by working on labeling the many still unlabeled pictures that I've got on Flickr. Right now, I'm tackling one of the bigger sets, those that I took at the National Archaeological Museum of Athens. Last fall, I visited Greece and Turkey, and it was fantastic, and I took a ton of pictures, but I still haven't gotten most of them labeled. I took about 800 total at the National Archaeological Museum of Athens, which was the most spectacular assemblage of ancient Greek art that I've ever seen. Now, that includes all the labels, so it's really closer to 400 - 500 pics. I've only labeled about 50 of them so far, so as I proceed through the labeling, I'll post some more that I particularly like or found interesting. (normally, I'd wait til I'd done the whole set before doing a post like this, but I'm determined to get back on track posting in the blog, so sacrifices must be made... :) ) The marbles are definitely the highlight of the museum. They have thousands, and many are very, very fine, from throughout Greek history. This is a Kore. Kore are a traditional type of female sculpture from the ancient Greek empire. This one is the most beautiful I've ever seen. Some of the pigment is still left on her chiton, and the detail work is spectacular. When I see a work like this, I wonder how ancient sculptures must have looked when they were fresh and new and hadn't been buried, weathered, and otherwise damaged by the past two millennia. This is the base of a funerary sculpture, showing four people betting on the fight between a dog and a cat. The details are just breath taking. I think that dog is in trouble... Speaking of dogs... I just like this one. The most interesting thing I've already labeled are the shot I took of the remains of the Antikythera device. The Antikythera Device is one of the amazing remains of the ancient world. Found in a ship wreck off the island of Antikythera, it's taken a century of research to figure out just what it might be. As far as we can tell, this complex construct of gears and bits and pieces was a mechanical astronomical clock, which used the movements of the moon and stars to tell the time. Workmanship of it's like doesn't appear again for 1500 years. It was made in the 1st century BC. The one I most wanted to share on this blog is this one... Not as remarkable as the others, but take a closer look! That lady, sitting on he left, is holding a spindle in her hand! Yes, she's a spinner! This gravestone dates to the 5th century BC, but some things really haven't changed that much. :) That's all for now!