Monday, November 05, 2012

Allowing Myself To Play

This picture is a Impressionist rendering of a picture I took on Sunday Nov. 4th at the Mt. Charleston Resort.  I had neglected to take any pictures and rushed out Sunday during a 15 minute break to shoot some pictures will my cell phone.
 
After the break we saw a film by Dewitt Jones called For the Love of It.  The essence of this film was doing something for the love of it, not just in some mundane way.  I have to admit that I was in a hurry as I snapped some shots, but when I looked at the finished product I was pleased.  This photo was taken into the sun, but what I captured were the rays beaming down and I loved it.
 
Dewitt Jones indicated that he does not really stage his shots (he is a professional photographer) ; rather, he chases them and finds just the right angle as it calls to him.  Hmm, I thought, I guess that is what I was doing and did not kow it. 
 
I wanted to get the film so I looked him up and found out that the film ( a training film for business) was waaaaayyy more than I wanted to pay.  So I looked him up on Amazon to see if he had other films and I found an ebook on Iphoneography that he had written.  In the book that houses 50 of his photos, he worked with several inexpensive apps suited for iPhone and iPad.  Two were Iris Suites and ArtisticaOil.  I immediately downloaded them and began to play.  Pay special attention to the word Play because that is not something I often allow myself to do. 
 
I took a photo and altered it in Iris and was able to add my name as a copyright.  I had been trying to figure that one out for weeks and there it was on the first thing I looked at in Iris.  I went back and forth between my photos and his book and realized that he took a picture of his feet while he was walking, altered it in Iris saved it and then called it up in Artistica and turned it into an oil painting.  That was just too cool for me.
 
And so today we have the picture above and I love it for several reasons:
1.  it looks pretty good
2.  I was willing to try and use unfamiliar tools without a major freak out
3.  it opens another dimension to my artistic process
4. It looks really good and I am proud
 
So my dear pilgrims, please take some time to play, some time to try new things and what ever you do in life, do it for the love of it.
 
Peace on the journey.....
pilgrim