I hope everyone has had an absolutely wonderful holiday. Mine was absolutely, amazingly special. Life is good. Very, very, good. In fact, life has never been this good. It feels as if life’s volume is suddenly one hundred percent louder and sweeter.
I’m behind with emails, comments and the like but I will be caught up well before the weekend. I will be sending out some Christmas New Year cards, too. :)
It was going to be animated (and possibly printed), but I ran out of time; presenting my holiday card to all you wonderful people who have emailed me, read my weblog(s), left comments and given freely of your kindness and friendship over the past twelve months. I’m posting this here in case I run out of time to email it out.
Click the bunny to see my greeting!
Today has been one of those no good, very bad, horrible days (much sad news from family & friends). A day when what could go wrong, did go wrong. And to top that off, something from dinner has made me feel all blurky. But the weekend is promising to be a lot of fun so today must just be the year providing me with the last bad day of 2006. Roll on 2007!
Whenever I feel not so perky, I really feel like watching Doctor Who, well, more than usual. I’m going to head off and make a nice cup of tea, fluff my pillows and settle back to watch the good Doctor for a while. Fantastic!
Capt. Jack Harkness: [incredulously] Who has a sonic screwdriver?
The Doctor: I do!
Capt. Jack Harkness: Who looks at a screwdriver and thinks, ‘Ooo, this could be a little more sonic?’
The Doctor: What, you’ve never been bored? Never had a long night? Never had a lot of cabinets to put up?
I wrote that post last night, but ended up not publishing it. Maybe I should have, because it’s not even 9am and today isn’t going well either. My budgie Scully, who I’ve had for about twelve years, died during the night and then when I turned on my computer, it’s showing signs that it’s on the way out, too. If bad luck comes in threes, I should have only good luck left for the rest of 2006. I hope!
“No pessimist ever discovered the secret of the stars or sailed an uncharted land, or opened a new doorway for the human spirit.”
“One can never consent to creep when one feels an impulse to soar.”
~ Helen Keller.
Woo hoo! I should have my portfolio site finished this evening! About time, too! I’ll link to it once it’s live. Ah, feels good to be *this* close to finishing! :)
Note to Self: Do not, I repeat, do not count your style sheets before they go live!
Yes, I just found a bug. Not happy!
I’ve long been fascinated with inside of flowers, especially the stamens. The stamens on this lily were exceptional; they almost seemed to radiate light from within.
We are told to let our light shine, and if it does, we won’t need to tell anybody it does. Lighthouses don’t fire cannons to call attention to their shining – they just shine.
~ Dwight L. Moody.
It may not be a real lighthouse, but it reminds me of one. It also reminds me of how important lighthouses are, both the real and the metaphorical.
I’m entranced by the magic of capturing a moment in time. Photography is one of the few ways we have of stopping time, of capturing a special moment forever. Our memories are another. There are so many beautiful things in this world, many of which quietly wait for their turn in the spotlight, for their turn to be noticed. So many never have that moment. I think that is why macro photography delights me so. Most people can see the big picture, they can see the sunset, the mountain ranges. But how many see the way the sunlight delicately shines on the petals of a tiny native flower. How many see the individual plants, rocks and the refracted light that make those mountain ranges so special?
I love finding those tiny glimpses of eternal, natural beauty that most other people pass by without so much as a glance. For me, beauty is in the details. Not things that are big and showy, but in the special and very rare things that grace this world. I don’t think beauty is solely in the eye of the beholder, I think it is also in the heart of the beholder. The most beautiful things in this world are those that most people never see. And that is where photography, macro photography, seduces me. It highlights and celebrates those tiny, beautiful and elusive details.
While sorting through some old files, I came across some of my earliest digital photos taken with an old Polaroid digital camera. I also found one of my first pieces of digital art from a period when I was fascinated with aging photos and making them look like worn prints. Oh yeah, I also loved adding water drops and flowers. Back then, I spent hours designing intricate art including very small illustrations of jewels. One of my first web sites, hosted at Geocities, offered free web graphics and was called ‘Designz’. I would scan flowers, leaves and other items and then manipulate them into photo realistic backgrounds.
Thinking back now, I wonder why I stopped designing in that style? At one point, my work was going to be included on a cd that would accompany one of Andy Shafran’s books on Paint Shop Pro (I cut my designer teeth in PSP!). Then there was the time that I was invited to write a couple of chapters on Flash animation in a book to be produced by members of a design community I belonged to at the time. Both books never went through from the publishers end (I’m not entirely sure about the PSP one, however), but it was still nice to think that I was considered for those projects, even if they never actually saw the light of day. Maybe I’ll get another chance to write for publication in the future!
Anyhoo, two of the photos I found and one piece of digital art are behind the link below.
Continue Reading“Designz (couldn’t I have been more creative with the name?!)”
Oh dear, I think I’m coming down with a cold! It would come on today of all days when I have so much to do. I hope it’s just one of those 24 hour things, because I will not be at all happy if it lasts past this week. I didn’t think it was actually possible to get a cold during summer. Ugh. Time for heavy duty orange juice and ‘fever’ inducing naturopathic drinks to try and fight it off. Wish me luck!
One of the things I’m working on at the moment is selling prints of my photos. If you’ve got some spare time, I’d really appreciate it if a few people could have a look at my Flickr stream and tell me which (if any!) photos they think would make great prints. You can comment here, email me or leave a comment at Flickr, whichever you like. Thanks in advance!
The latest episode of Sticks & String features an interview with the owner of my LYS. Jan is a lovely person, she’s helped me with more than a few knitting problems. I may not have learned how to knit if not for her help and advice. If you’re a knitter or other fibre crafter and find yourself in the upper Blue Mountains, call by and visit her shop!
