The Sea Hag took my stuff!

A few years ago, when I started to enter some photos in shows and exhibits, my aunt Mary suggested that I take some of my photos to a shop in Brackney PA.  The shop - Sea Hag Soaps& Art Mercantile.  I thought I would give it a try and so I sent the owner, Colleen Kane, an email with a few sample pictures attached.  She liked the photos, and was willing to try to sell some, but indicated that for whatever reason she had a difficult time selling photography in her shop.  She asked that I get back to her in couple of weeks after some big event they were getting ready for.  I thanked her, got involved in other things, and never followed up.

Until this July.  I emailed Colleen again and asked if she again would be willing to take a look at some photos and/or the greeting cards that I have been making from the photos.  She would look at them, and indicated that they do quite well with greeting cards.  So on the 4^th of July I left some sample cards with aunt Mary to show Colleen.  Mary left them with Colleen to look at when she had a chance.  I went to Binghamton within a week of the drop-off, and a number of the cards had already sold!  Colleen was very gracious during visit, took more cards that I brought with me, and had ordered some more!  Hurray for the Sea Hag!  So if you have a chance, visit the store, or visit them online.  And look for my cards.

More highlights (part 2 - cool cats and clouds)

Welcome to part 2 of the April - June highlights.

First, I certainly need to mention the forthcoming book by my friend and colleague Gary Leising.  Of course I will plug it here!  But in addition to being a publication worthy of attention on its own, he asked me if I would take his 'author photograph' to appear in the book as well as something for the cover art!  So, here is what the cover will like.  Excellent!

And here is Gary looking poetic.

Still

In other news, the photograph "Still" has selected as a first place winner for the year-end competition of the Utica Camera Club in the category of color photos.  I have shown this before on this site and in my exhibition at the Stanley earlier this year.

Additionally, this photo, along with the ever-popular "Grass Tree Cloud Sky," will be on display at the upcoming Roberson Museum Regional Art Show from July 14 - October 27.  So if you are in the Binghamton area, please check them out!

The highlights... (part 1 - the many Abby)

It has been quite a long time since I posted anything, so I thought instead of thinking carefully about what I should post I should just post something.  So here are the highlights of the last few months or so (April - June)!

I was the unofficial photographer for the Dancenter's 2013 dance recital.  I took over 4,300 photos between the two shows!  That's a lot of photos...  I learned a whole lot about what to do and what not to do in those kinds of situations.  You may see a selection of them at kinkedtreephotography.zenfolio.com

"UNINVITED" at the Dancenter's 2013 recital

"Waiting"

 I once again was fortunate enough to have a photo accepted for the Munson Williams Proctor Art Institute's annual Sidewalk Show.  I have shown this photo a few times. Please vote!

'Warhol-ized' version of "Botanical View"

Speaking of the MWPAI, I also submitted an entry to the photo contest running in conjunction with the Andy Warhol exhibit.  The 'theme' was that you were to 'Warhol-ize' an image.  I gave that a shot.  If you like it, please vote for this too!

It was fun to take this photo I had of Abby and manipulate it in a variety of ways.  Hopefully the outcome is adequate.











More highlights - coming soon!

April updates (part 2)

A few more updates from April:

My friend and colleague Gary Leising used some of my photos for his poetry publications! He will soon have a chap book of his poetry coming out and used a photo for the cover art, and he also is using a couple of "author photos" that I took of him at his house.  I had never really done portrait photography, so we tried a number of shots and a few of them came out nicely.  Nice enough for him to use them anyway!  My thanks to Gary for the opportunity!  I will post the results once they are published.

My photo exhibit at the Stanley Theater came down at the beginning of the month. Each time I am involved in a show (especially a solo show), it is a learning experience.  I am grateful to the Stanley for allowing me to have the show.  It is always nice to see the pieces hanging in a gallery setting.  The final tally was that four pieces sold at the show!!  The Stanley asked if I would be interested in showing again next year (!), so early discussions are underway... stay tuned.

My greeting cards are beginning to sell (!) at MWPAI.  My plan is to stop in to see which ones have sold and how many.  I know that some have because I got a check in the mail!!  I am starting to look for other places to sell them, including RACC - they have indicated interest but I haven't gotten the forms yet.

I just took a bunch of photos at my daughter's dance competition. She did an outstanding job, and I got some good shots of her and others from the studio.

And of course, spring presents many opportunities for photography.  Here are a couple of shots of flowers.  I am trying to learn how to isolate a subject on a white background in the photo... without chopping it out and pasting!

Orchid & Bud

Ethereal Spring

April update

Been a bit too long since I have posted anything.  I have had a variety of things occurring on the photo-front, but I will post them in a series of entries rather than one long rambling post.

One event was the hike of the Asa Gray Biological Society up Bald Mountain in the Adirondacks.  We lucked out and had a gorgeous day for the hike, and the views from the top were wonderful.  I think that everyone had a good time, and I hope we can have more events like that for the group.

Today's photo shows the blues of the Adirondacks. Enjoy!

A birthday, greeting cards, the show, and snow

Rapid fire updates:

First off, Happy Birthday to Erin!  She is now one year older than she was yesterday...

Since birthdays often involve cards, I thought that I would mention that the greeting cards that wrote about in a previous post have at long last been dropped off at MWPAI and should now be available in the gift shop.  Many thanks to the folks there for the opportunity and their patience.

My photo exhibit continues at the Stanley Theater until the end of the month (March 2013), so if you haven't seen it please try to stop by for a look around.

And I like this photo of a snowflake.  I gave it the listed title for obvious reasons, but also think that I could have given it a title like "Comet" or "Shooting Star" given the tail trailing off to the left.  Anyway, here it is.

"Last Snowflake Standing"

The dead of winter

OK, so the title for this post really is based solely on the photos that are included.  The first is a photo - When snowflakes die - of some newly melted snowflakes.  I was out brushing off the car the other morning and noticed that it was snowing very lightly... a flake here, a flake there, etc.  I also noticed that the snow was in the form of perfect little flakes, and they were landing ever so gently on the car windshield and windows (white snowflakes + clean, transparent, dark-ish background = good photo potential). So I went inside, put on some better boots and grabbed the camera. Well, the temperature must have been right at the freezing point and rising.  While the snowflakes had initially landed and stayed in place, once I grabbed the camera they were melting within a second or two of landing... not much time to find them with the camera, focus, and take the shot.  Obviously, I missed these two snowflakes but I thought that the water in the pattern of the melted flakes was interesting.

"When snowflakes die"

The next photo ("Corpus") fits the 'dead' theme of this post, but doesn't really have anything to do with winter.  This photo is the result of a project that my friend and colleague Gary Leising got me started on.  I will talk more about that project and what the results might be in a later post but I just liked how this turned out.

"Corpus"