The Bitter Half
Walking through South Melbourne at lunchtime today, I passed The Clarendon hotel and chuckled when this advertising poster caught my eye: that’s just clever copy-writing. I do love how this 40s-style pin-up is hefting a broken heart in her hand too, ready to smash it over someone’s head.
British Art and Turkish Coffee
‘Hylas and the Nymphs’, by John William Waterhouse, 1896It’s afternoon coffee time, yay! On the afternoons when I work from home I make a little pot of Turkish coffee (from fresh-ground beans). For years I have been using the same Scottish-made stoneware mug that was a birthday gift from my sister Star. It is printed with the John William Waterhouse’s painting Hylas and the Nymphs.
The caption on the painting in my book The Pre-Raphaelites, by Christopher Woods (Weidenfeld and Nicolson London, 1981) reads:
Hylas was squire to Heracles, one of the Argonauts. When they stopped on the island of Cios, Hylas went off in search of water, but was lured to his death by water nymphs. This picture is now Waterhouse’s best-known work, and has become one of the key images of the femme fatale in late Victorian art. Waterhouse’s style is a uniquely personal blend of fantasy and reality, and he is one of the few Victorian artists to paint the Greek myths convincingly.
And now my coffee’s finished already, boo!
No More Coffee :: Hornbecker // DreamCanvas // No flash
The Flying Saucer or The Rainbow
The Flying Saucer :: Chunky // Blanko Noir // No flash
I took this photograph of a rainbow out of my lounge room window. I love the dying light of the sunset and raindrops on the window. But it wasn’t until after I downloaded it that I saw the flying saucer. Wow! What a capture! Do you think Area 51 would be interested?
…Oh wait, it’s a reflection of one of my downlights. Phooey.
Magical Barcelona
What springs to to mind when one utters the magical word, Barcelona, aloud? Undoubtedly one of the first is Gaudi’s riot of colour and imagination: La Sagrada Familia, Park Guell, Casa Battló (or the House of the Bones). Mouth-watering tapas, Spanish chocolates, and churros. Museums galore for art lovers – impossible to take it all in. Modern hunter-gatherers will be struck dumb with amazement, mind-bogglingly thrilled with a myriad of shops tucked around every corner.
Four and one half days was not enough to cram everything in – I wince when I think of what I missed out on.
Playing With Toys
A real autumn :: Jimmy // Float // No flash + Tilt Shift Generator + iDarkroomWacky colours and light effects, strange distortions and happy accidents – what’s not to love about a toy camera? Or at least, their descendents: the toy camera digital apps for iPhone. A loyal fan of Hipstamatic for a long time, of late I have started to cheat … I mean, experiment with other camera apps.
Last month I stole some photos of a pretty Asian woman who was decked out in a red evening gown, and having some portraits taken by a professional photographer in the Botanic Gardens. The woman was standing under an elm tree, golden with autumn; the grass underfoot was carpeted with leaves; a lake, glimpsed through a golden curtain, was the backdrop.
A real autumn :: Jimmy // Float // No flash. The Jimmy combined with Float washes out the golden yellow leaves.So, as I mentioned, I snatched some photos of the woman in red (and wasn’t the only doing so, mind you) using the Hipstamatic app, set on random. Later, I chose one of them, shot with the Jimmy lens on Float film (above), and took it into Tilt Shift Generator. I applied some radial blur, and adjusted the contrast and saturation (below).
A real autumn :: Jimmy // Float // No flash + Tilt Shift Generator. Add some blur, pump up the saturation and contrast.But I knew I could make it even more vibrant and evocative of autumn. I took the altered photo into iDarkroom, and changed the colour with the Cross Process Yellow filter (top). Wow! Now that’s what I call an autumnal image! iDarkroom allows you to give your photos texture, light effects, frames, vignettes and surface erosions, such as scratches, as well as applying different colour filters.
Ducks in the Botanic Gardens :: Watts // KodotXGrizzled // No flash. The original Hipstamatic photo.I really like warm tones in photos, and tried turning up the heat in another image shot on the same day (above). I also gave it a blur, this time with a linear effect. Next I applied the Cross Process Yellow, and also tried the Faded filter for a vintage look. (Scroll down for the series.)
I love the Hipstamatic so much, it’s easy to forget to play with my other toys, but the results are rewarding.
Ducks in the Botanic Gardens :: Watts // KodotXGrizzled // No flash + Tilt Shift Generator gives blur
Ducks in the Botanic Gardens :: Watts // KodotXGrizzled // No flash + Tilt Shift Generator gives blur + iDarkroom gives Cross Process Yellow effect
Ducks in the Botanic Gardens :: Watts // KodotXGrizzled // No flash + Tilt Shift Generator gives blur + iDarkroom gives Faded effect