Caturday

Just another glam shot of Addy today. I'm still not able to use the SLR with my wrist injury and I actually bruised it from overuse at the Gotye concert. It's a good thing I have a massive stockpile of cat pictures!

Gotye Teaser

If you've been following this blog, you know there's supposed to be a picture of Gotye's shoes as my first teaser image.  Instead, I give you a couple of super fans on the train ride home. I made the decision to sacrifice my signature shot in an attempt to get a better position.

I am in no way upset with this decision.

Pictures will be worked on tomorrow and I'm hoping to have a blog post up by Monday. My eyes are officially shot.

fr EYE day

I never said I'd be sticking to human eyes!

Throwback Thursdays

One of the major reasons I dug into the crawl space was to be able to bring you some of my first forays into concert photography. This shot is Murray and Jian from Moxy Fruvous, taken in 1998 at The Met in Rhode Island. I remember this venue was the size of a closet, and boy howdy, was it an eventful night!

I wrangled a group of college friends to go with me and a couple friends from Milford drove in to meet us. Lisa D. and I were bumped into before the show by none other than Jian. He apologized profusely, so cute.

So I'm rolling with a posse 8 or 9 people deep and we're all having an absolute blast: singing along, laughing and being pretty loud in general. Now I hadn't seen my Milford friends in months because I was away at school, so we had a boisterous reunion. Lisa D. is also very short, so at one point, I offered to let her sit on my shoulders so she could see. I came very close to dropping her, so I shouted that I needed to put her back down. Before I had even fully stood up, I was grabbed by the concert goer directly to my right. He had me by the collar of my shirt and was screaming in my face. It was something along the lines of him complaining about me and my group being obnoxiously loud and ruining the ILLEGAL BOOTLEG he was trying to make. I kid you not.

To this day, I do not know how a fight didn't break out over this. I think I was more shocked than anything else that this grown man had grabbed and shook me, an 18 year old female, and didn't retaliate more than sternly telling him to get his hands off me and to keep them off if he knew what was good for him. But wait, this story gets better!

Later on in the concert, the band gave a shout out to their webmaster, who was in attendance. Guess who that was? Yep, Mr. Anger Issues himself, Chris O'Malley. You can check out his stellar design work over at MoxyFruvous.com. (Heavy on the sarcasm) I wasn't about to let his behavior go, so I went back to my dorm room and wrote him a not so nice email. He defended his actions and gave me a half hearted apology. It's been 14 years and I still think what he did was REALLY wrong, I want you to know, I forgive you, Chris.

Photo of the Week: Week 12

Who hurts themself and waits two weeks before going to see the doctor?

That would be me. And that's my awesome new brace.

So I sprained my DRUJ joint a couple weekends ago and it finally got to the point where I realized I needed to get it looked at. I have a fairly high pain tolerance; when I tore my ACL, I walked off the basketball court, but any time you see a professional athlete have the same injury, they crumple like a doll. I knew nothing was broken in my wrist, but I was starting to think there might be a fracture. The swelling was getting worse and I was starting to drop things for no reason other than my hand wasn't working. So I went to my orthopedic and he diagnosed me with this:

It was a typical case of trying to break my fall with my hand. I knew as I was doing it I shouldn't, but sometimes your body just reacts. In the future, I'm going to try not to fall, but if I do, I'm going to put my left hand down, darn it! I'm going to take it easy on the blogging front for the next week or so. I'll do my best to use the point and shoot for weekly photos, but definitely no SLR. Using the mouse left handed and typing aren't all that easy either. Whenever I start to get frustrated, I remind myself, I could've broken it and ended up in a cast for two months. I'll take the two weeks in the brace, thank you very much.

The funniest part of my visit was when my doctor looked at my right wrist x-ray, he immediately sent me back in to x-ray my left. He later explained that he wanted to "see what my normal was." His words! Turns out that my ulna bone is higher than my radius bone in both arms; they should be on the same level. Wonky eyes, hyper extendable joints, unlevel ulnas. Man, I sound like a train wreck!

Turns out I couldn't quit my orthopedic after all... (see number 8 on that list)

Caturday: Kettlebells

Here's Addy in workout mode. She's got her paws wrapped around a 12 kilo bell right there and is about to start her set of pullover crunches.

You don't want to mess with my cat.

fr EYE day

This subject's eyes don't dilate well, even in the sunlight, but still crazy cool. I can't wait to see what other blue eyes look like up close.

Throwback Thursdays

Happy Birthday to all of you!

I'm being judged

I entered the photo above in a contest at the beginning of the month: T-Mobile's Living the 4G Photo Contest. The description reads: "We've all got that photo, the shot that captured a concert or festival moment perfectly. Your friend on your shoulders, the crowd surfing, 20,000 people singing together with their hands in the air. Well, that photo could see you traveling to this year's hottest music festival in Coachella Valley on our dime."

I'm not so interested in the prize. Don't get me wrong, I'd be thrilled to go to Coachella. I've never been to a festival concert and there are a ton of good bands playing. I'd also win a new phone and a year's worth of service which would be sweet because I already use T-Mobile. But that's not why I entered.

The first round of judging has begun and a photographer from Brooklyn Vegan is taking a look at all the submissions. That, to me, is a better prize. If by some crazy miracle, I make it to round two, I need your help in voting for my picture. Trust me, I'll be bugging all of you.

I also submitted a picture for a cover shot for one of our yearly publications, the Milford Answerbook. It had been rejected in the past because it didn't scream MILFORD. I disagreed, but went out and reshot it.

They liked the boring cover, and I get it, but man, talk about stifling creativity. Two years later, the first shot which was deemed inferior is now "wicked awesome". Let that be a lesson to you: don't give up.

Macro Flowers

I was able to play around with the new lens some more over the weekend, and holy crow, it's awesome. The tiny tendrils look like they are about to attack the crocuses.

I went on a purple flower binge because I think they're the most striking. I love the leopard print on the lily in the center, which I think is a dwarf lily. Here's one from the point and shoot to give you a better sense of size.

While I was taking pictures, James thought he could sneak past me. There's no sneaking anything past this lens. It went from macro flowers to portrait in the blink of an eye.

Aria's working on her smile and if you look close, you can see her one little tooth.

Photo of the Week: Week 11

 

There are tons of pictures where you can see Mia's face, but I like this one better. No offense to Mia, but it captures the pure joy of popping bubbles better. Kinda like this video...

 

Caturday: Guest Edition

I know I've gushed about how awesome Cletus is, but it's worth repeating. Such a tough guy.

fr EYE day

Welcome to my new weekly post. You can complain about my pun all you want, it's my blog, deal! I decided it would be fun to do a macro series on eyes, what with my new beaut lens and all. I'm still working out the details of lighting. This one has a bit too much window light, so I might have to set up a scrim or softbox or something, but still, you can see where I'm going with this. Eyes are amazing and the patterns are going to be really fun to check out.

So when you see me next friends and family, be prepared: I'm gonna get up in your grill. Consider yourself warned.

Throwback Thursdays

An absolute treasure from my past: One of the first photos I was ever proud of! Granted I was 11 years old and Mark Price was my hero. This was shot with a point and shoot Kodak film camera, no zoom, barely a step above a disposable camera. My father sweet talked our way down to the court during warm ups so I could take some pictures. Thanks for that, Dad, and thanks to the super cool security guards that allowed me to. Oh, and thanks to Mark Price for not laughing at a really excited kid who was the only one wearing a Cleveland Cavaliers shirt at a New Jersey Nets game.

Unfortunately, my sense of timing was not spot on at 11. Right after I took this picture, he looked up and smiled. I bet Lebron James wouldn't do that for his fans. Mark Price, nothing but class.

You take the good with the bad

A follow up to my last post, and something completely different for me.

No pictures.

I had planned to go to a show tonight. I actually went there. I parked my car and sat in it. And then I didn't feel like going in. Little known fact about me: I'm really shy. Painfully shy. I sometimes question whether or not I should be a photographer because I'm so shy, and then I realize, that's probably why I love photography so much: I can see the world through my lens and not have to interact with people. I can show you my world without having to come up with words. A lot of the time, I can fight through it, but sometimes, like tonight, I just don't want to deal. So I started up my car again and drove back home.

I try to keep this blog positive because who wants to listen to me whine, but we've all got our things. Sometimes I can't even buck up the courage to go do something I love. Sometimes I'll drive all the way to Brooklyn to see a show by myself. I can't figure it out.

I guess tonight was just one of those nights where the introvert in me wants to see if I'll implode.

New Toy!

My new macro lens just arrived, so I had to take pictures of some of my stupid office decorations to test it out. I can't wait to use it for real.

Acrobots from ThinkGeek

I'm hoping to get to a concert tonight after work at The Outer Space in Hamden to test out the new lens in a low light setting. Shan Ren is an indie folk band from China and I think they're going to be fun. How can you go wrong with a $3.00 cover???

A Test for the Possum Posse

Is it time for The Possum from Hoarders to search for greener pastures? With facebook's timelime impending doom on the horizon, The Posse might need a new house capable of holding all our snarky comments.

This is a test. Feel free to use the comment section at the bottom of the post to see if it will suit our style.

To my tens of dozens of followers, feel free to ignore this post.

It's that time

I couldn't wait for my new macro lens to get here to capture the first flowers I saw, so I went with the point and shoot macro function. I think it's safe to say Spring is officially here.

And you know what that means...

Photo of the Week: Week 10

This shot is from a surprise party, the moment before the guests of honor arrive. I love how everyone is shushing in the background.

Caturday

A trio of black and white prints were scanned for this week's Caturday. I call these Addy's glamor shots.

I came across these after my exploration into the crawl space. I think she's only a year old in them. I'm trying to think why I had film in my camera; I tended to kill off a roll with pictures of my pets. My guess is that I had just purchased a lens and wanted to test it out without the crop factor of my digital.

Either way, she looks pretty darn cute.

Throwback Thursdays

When Davy Jones passed away last week, I wanted to post this tour book for Throwback Thursday. Unfortunately, it took a little effort to find it in the crawl space. One week late isn't too shabby. I feel like Davy didn't get a whole lot of attention for his untimely death as the train wreck that was Whitney Houston did. I wanted to give Jones his due, at least on my little space of the internet.

The Monkees reunion tour was my first concert. My father got me tickets after I let him pull one of my front teeth out. (It had been loose for days and my constant tinkering with it was driving him nuts.) I was a HUGE Monkees fan, absolutely in love with Davy and seven years old. Although it's not listed in the tour book, I saw them play at the Oakdale Theatre in Connecticut, back when it still had the rotating stage. I remember the woman in front of me had a sign and she held it up every time the Monkees were facing us. Thanks for that, jerk!

Weird Al opened and he was absolutely brilliant; he played a lot off of Dare To Be Stupid.  His final song was One More Minute where he walked through the crowd, handing out handkerchiefs. The Monkees took the stage, well, three of them, to the roar of the audience. My seven year old brain could not comprehend why three old men were standing there. I'd just watched an episode of their TV show that day. What had happened to them? Apparently, this happened to a lot of kids my age.

So here is the complete tour book for the concert, just like I promised my friends on facebook. I wish bands still put things like this out. I would love to see my pictures in a concert book! Enjoy!

I love that additional tour musicians got their own photo spread. Look at the 80's fashion! 

 

And just look at the prices of the merch! $15 for a t-shirt? They cost like $45 these days!