Flights of Fancy

I set a goal for myself this year to push the creative edge a bit more - to break some rules or make some new ones to expand out of my familiar ruts. I took some of my archived bird of paradise photos, printed them on a non-professional ink jet printer on plain printer paper (not photo paper), and used water with a brush to "paint" them. The ink blurs like watercolor paints.

Then I rephotographed the finished watercolor images in HIpstamatic using Dreamcanvas. I further apped them in Snapseed and Camera+. I'm not sure these are better than painting in an app like PhotoViva, but I really like the end result and plan to do some more soon. Try your own experiment and send it to me - I'd love to see and share it.

Peek-a-Boo Blossoms

A couple of months ago at a photo seminar at Hui Hoolana, John Barclay challenged students to create a folio, a sort of focused self-assignment. Taking his advice to heart, I began photographing a series of single flowers that were hidden in plain sight - what I termed Peek-a-boo blossoms. Here's the first sampling of an ongoing self assignment. (BTW Check out huiho.org for more info on John Barclay and Jonathan Kingston's annual photo seminar with guest artists Dewitt Jones and Rikki Cooke.)