Cup O' Lex

Its a funny thing.

When I was dating my now husband, I was living in Denmark and I can’t remember exactly when it was, maybe around May, but they had this interesting holiday/custom that we don’t have in the States. It involves making a pile of wood, and burning a witch at the stake. Well, it’s not a real witch, just the effigy of a witch. They make a doll or figure of a woman and tie it to a stake and burn it. I asked Simon why and what this is about. He told me that several hundred years ago some priest (or some other religious figure) went around the land and cleansed it of witches by burning them at the stake. This holiday was in celebration of his accomplishment of that. Now I, not having been born and raised in Denmark, thought that that was really twisted and sick, but Simon just said that it was just something that people do. Just an excuse to drink and party. I still couldn’t fathom how people didn’t see that celebrating a guy who killed women, who probably weren’t guilty of anything, was kind of uncool.

Then we moved here to the States. In Denmark they don’t celebrate Halloween, although, I’ve heard that it is just recently something people are starting to do. Simon came here and found it strange and ironic that children walk around dressed as devils and demons and demand candy from their neighbors. Not to mention the house/car egging and toilet papering traditions. He also thought it was kind of strange to see how everybody is dressed up all through the month of October. And noticing all the skeleton and graveyard decorations, mostly he thought it was really kind of sick and twisted that we were “celebrating death, as if there is anything to celebrate about it” as he put it. I think the other reason he especially thought that it was weird that children were dressed up like demons and devils is because in Denmark people from the States (especially when compared to Danes) are considered very religious and very “Christian” and he wasn’t expecting to see Americans doing something like that.

The thing is, in our respective cultures and countries, we grew up around these things so we sort of just accept them as being “normal” or “just something people do”, but it got me thinking. How many things do we do that we just accept as being “normal” or “just something people do” that, if we looked at them through a fresh pair of eyes, we might be repulsed by or even begin to consider kind of sick and twisted?

Photographing children diagnosed with autism has its challenges, but definitely can be successful, even, I think, really fun.

This makes me want to cry:

http://www.istockphoto.com/forum_messages.php?threadid=85064

I have some really good friends in Denmark who own a sign and print shop called Idé-Sign. I used them to print the prints, like this one (called "Love Letters for the Fire"), I had had up in the last art show I was in. Normally I would use my lab, Backprint, attached to my website to sell prints, but I was in Denmark at the time, and I liked being able to talk face to face, photographer to printer. It turned out well. Idé-Sign has this really fantastic paper- that is not actually paper at all, but a very thin plastic material- that has a satin, slightly metallic finish. I think it made my work look great.

I sent the files via email directly to the printer in Denmark. If I had requested, they could have then printed the images and then mailed them to me at home, but why wait?

Aside from having a few minor color issues at first because I forgot to send the prints worked on in ProPhoto RGB, this ended up working great for the show... but what about now?

I have this certain emotional attachment to my artwork. That is why photography works for me. If I sell a print, I can still keep the original file and make more prints. This particular piece I enjoyed creating because it was a throw back to my intense "Fiona Apple days" (I still love Fiona Apple by the way, I just am not as depressed and driven in that direction as I once was).

I'm thinking about selling prints of these images on my website (once I can figure out how to price them). This is where Backprint comes in really handy.

This shoot was more or less spontanious. I heard that there would be a Middle Eastern dance recital at Kéan Coffee in Newport Beach, the students and friends of Lilla Varese- a local celebrity of sorts, and I just happened to be in the area at that time. When I arrived at the coffeehouse I realized I was not well-enough prepared for this shoot.

This is my favorite piece from the show. In fact, I liked it so much, I kept it and it hangs in my living room, which is just as well. Janelle, the dancer in the piece, I was never able to contact for a model release (yes, I know, its even questionable that I should post it on the internet without a model release, but I feel that blogs should be considered media similiar to magazines, which don't need model releases, but that is another debate all together...), also, some of the Photoshop brushes I used in this piece are from Obsidian Dawn. Stephanie/Obsidian Dawn is pretty good about the usage of her brushes though. She has a creative commons license on them and requests that she simply be credited somehow and that if it is a commercial piece and it is impossible to credit her that you contact her and purchase the rights from her instead. I think that is pretty reasonable. On the other hand, though, I also have a love-hate relationship with that idea.

See, for those of you who don't know (and I was one of those people until pretty recently, its only due to my friend and fellow photographer Josh Durr who introduced me to this), these flourishes and designs all over this image are Photoshop brushes. They can be found all over the internet, particularly at deviantart.com. I found these Obisidian Dawn brushes there. The way they work is you can download the already created brush files (they are .abr files) and load them into your Photoshop brush palette. From there you can manipulate and use them the way you would any other Photoshop brush. And see, this is where I get all "I don't know about that".

In photography and art there are rights to protect creators from people stealing their creations. We've all heard of it, its called copyright. Now, if you take a photograph, you own the copyright. Most of the people who make Photoshop brushes take their own photographs from which they make their brushes. That's all fair and good. However, the copyright law says that if you take something and manipulate it extensively that you no longer would be violating copyright if you called it your own or did not give the original author credit for their work because it falls under "fair use". In a different type of artwork under the same subject there is a battle going on between Shepard Fairey (who created the Obama "Hope" poster) and Associated Press (click here for article). So, the thing for me is, do I really have to credit people who make Photoshop brushes?

In this case I chose to because I like Obisdian Dawn brushes and I think that other people should find her stuff. Also, and more importantly to me, I did not manipulate her brushes very extensively. The only thing I did was maybe change their size and flip them. But, even still, does that mean I have to give her credit?

To put this into context: I also am a painter. This is more of a hobby of mine than a money making thing, but anyway. If I buy a Winsor & Newton series 7 Red Sable (fox tail is *kiss* magnifique for painting, especially oil) (yes, I am a snob) brush, one of the finest brushes you can buy, am I then obligated to credit them on my paintings? That just seems silly. And the thing is, aside from that, I automatically am manipulating the Photoshop brush from its original state everytime I use it. So, how is this a copyright violation if I don't credit them?

I am very interested in hearing what anyone has to say about this. I don't know all there is to know about this subject and would like to find out if there is another side to this story.

A few weeks ago (or maybe almost 2 months now, gosh, how time flies!) I participated in a Sabrina Ramos Event, a photography show, at the Sarah Bain Gallery in Pomona. It was really a fun experience, even though I only found out a couple of weeks before the show what exactly the theme of the show was. But, actually, that kind of insanity before a show is quite common...

Originally I had thought that this was a painting show, which I also do paintings, and so I started to gather some work and think about canvases and frames. I had only about 2 months warning, but I thought I might be able to swing it, even though the month just before the show I was going to be in Denmark, and the month just ahead of me was one of my busiest work months of the year.

So, I gathered my work together and left for Denmark and wouldn't you know it, it was then that I got the flyer for the show- it was a photography show. So, while I was in Denmark, thanks to Flickr, I made up something from a recent shoot just before I left the country. It turned out ok. This is the first piece I did. I will also post the others in the coming days. I am thinking about selling these on my website as prints, as well.

At the art show I had this printed on satin finish and mounted on wood. The frame was red velvet. I built the frames myself. The person who ended up buying this piece absolutely loves it, which makes me feel pretty good actually. You know, you put so much work into a show, so much blood, sweat, and caffeine. Its nice to see someone really appreciate what you did.

So, what do you think? Would anyone buy this if I went through the trouble of making it available as an art print? I'm thinking about selling it just as a print, no frame, no matting. It keeps the cost down and particularly of the shipping costs, because I deliver my prints all over the world.

Yesterday I started a One A Day set with the official group on Flickr. I've been meaning to do this for quite some time, but have been putting it off because I keep worrying that I'm committing myself to something I don't know if I'll be able to finish.

Well, today I wasn't really feeling it, but since I started it yesterday I felt I really should not skip one now. I also think that it is good for me creatively to make myself try to find a way to fight through my particular block for the day and be creative anyway. So, I looked around for inspiration, found my sketchbook and got all excited about this sketch I did a couple of days ago. I took it into Photoshop and thought about combining it with some photographs I had already taken and/or applying brushes to it etc. I started to play around with it and this came to me and I was all happy because I had gotten some experiementing done and had come up with a piece for my One A Day, yay! And then just before I posted it I looked at the group rules- The only acceptable material is photos.

You've gotta be kidding me! After all that?!

So, in the end I posted this photo that I had in my archive. I didn't make it today, but it is a photo (and I've never posted it before):