Alicia Bruce Photography

girl's best friend

2012-01-07T17:27:00.004-05:00

Today, the world lost a wonderful dog, and I lost a friend.

RIP Rambo. 1996-2012.

picture the holidays: 30/now there's no looking back

2012-01-01T09:22:00.001-05:00

Today's picture is my one and only iPhone shot. I took it in the car after Christmas on my way back to Virginia without the intention of using it for this project, but I now feel that it fits.

Usually New Year's Eve is a bittersweet time, and this year is no different. Even though tomorrow will probably be a day like any other, it's the significance of one year ending and a new one beginning.

2011 brought a few sad times - like the loss of my first grandparent last month - but mostly good times. I got married to the love of my life this year, so 2011 will always hold a significance for us above other random years gone by.

In 2011 I also went through a transformation from looking for salaried careers in January, to working in a local shop through the summer, to working as a photo editor from home through the fall, to finally getting started in my own business. Hopefully 2012 will bring me business and many great opportunities on that front, which is partially why I chose this picture showing my camera necklace for today's prompt.

The other reason is because of that locket. My parents gave it to me for Christmas this year and inside are two pictures of my dog. He's 15 and just celebrated is 16th Christmas this year. He's obviously old and while healthy on the inside, is still showing signs of aging, like not being able to get up or walk on his own. He is still a happy and loving dog, but looking forward, I do realize he can't live as long as we'd like him to. The locket is so special to me already because no matter what happens, I can and will always carry him in my heart.

This picture shows to me that there are both good and bad things to anticipate in the coming year, but it's going to come no matter what, and I have to deal with it all the best that I can. But I figure as long as I have my doggie in my heart and a camera in my hand, I'm off to a good start.

Happy new year!

picture the holidays: 29/a toast!

2012-01-01T09:21:00.001-05:00

Standing here

The old man said to me

Long before these crowded streets

Here stood my dreaming tree

Dave Matthews Band: The Dreaming Tree

picture the holidays: 28/through the looking glass

2012-01-01T09:20:00.002-05:00

picture the holidays: 27/a breath of fresh air

2012-01-01T09:19:00.001-05:00

picture the holidays: 26/the day after

2011-12-31T19:24:00.000-05:00

The day after Christmas is meant for napping (even if I never got mine in).

picture the holidays: 25/this magic moment

2011-12-31T17:04:00.000-05:00

A series of moments that hold magic for me:

My oft-mentioned Christmas Eve bubble bath.

The moments as the sun is setting on the night before Christmas, as my dad was outside chopping extra branches off of our tree before bringing it inside, while my mom is showering and we are all anticipating the arrival of the family. For us (and many other families as well), Christmas begins on Christmas Eve.

The few minutes prior to being allowed downstairs to open presents on Christmas morning. As a newly married couple without children, we still get the chance to be 'the kids' when we go to our parents' homes for Christmas. This includes sitting on the steps and waiting to be called down to see the tree that Santa decorated overnight. This may not be a visually interesting or good picture, but the feeling is special to me.

picture the holidays: 24/enchantment

2011-12-31T16:58:00.000-05:00

It's New Year's Eve and I'm back to posting! As much as I enjoyed the Picture the Holidays project and had been keeping up with it steadily, when Christmas rolled around I focused entirely on spending as much time with loved ones as possible. I paid attention to my prompts via my iPhone and tried my best to take pictures for them, but otherwise spent my time home savoring the moments.

Christmas Eve. One week ago tonight the magic was about to begin. I see Christmas through child's eyes without any prompting because I believe in the magic and wonder the holiday brings. I still wake up before the sunrise, bright-eyed and bushy-tailed on Christmas morning waiting for the rest of my family to rise. I still take my annual Christmas Eve bubble bath before the rest of the family arrives at my parents' house. I still fall asleep Christmas Eve while watching A Christmas Story; it's the one night a year I can fall asleep with a TV on (I don't even have a TV in my bedroom here in our house!).

This year, I photographically chose to view Christmas through my cousin's eyes. She's at that age where she is still hanging on to the magic of Christmas and the rest of our family knows that it won't be long before she no longer asks me to track Santa for her as she's done for years now.

Looking like a mature little lady when she first got to my parents' house, she soon changed into her pajamas and wondered where Santa was flying to next. A reminder that she's growing older, but is still a child.

picture the holidays: 23/life is sweet

2011-12-31T16:48:00.001-05:00

picture the holidays: day 22/you are getting sleepy

2011-12-22T08:15:00.000-05:00

Now that we're well rested...

THREE DAYS UNTIL CHRISTMAS!

picture the holidays: day21/attitude adjustment

2011-12-21T18:07:00.000-05:00

Needless to say, I'm pretty stoked for Christmas.

picture the holidays: day 20/wrapped with love

2011-12-20T16:53:00.000-05:00

Because I already took pictures of my wrapped presents the other day...

I took a picture of one being wrapped. While levitating.

picture the holidays: day 19/make a list (check it twice)

2011-12-19T10:38:00.000-05:00

picture the holidays: 18/ recharge

2011-12-18T22:23:00.001-05:00

Truthfully, the way I usually recharge around Christmas (and really any time of the year) is a hot bubble bath.

But unfortunately, the bathtubs in our house are small, and since I'm pushing six feet tall, it's just not going to happen. It's something I'll save for Christmas Eve at my parents' house, but I digress.

I try to keep this blog mainly photos, but some of these prompts for Picture the Holidays deserve some narration. When Jon and I worked at our old job, we were shiftworkers. Overnights, weekends, holidays, evenings, et cetera. Two or three days off together per month, max. Such is the life of a meteorologist (or two).

It was always a little dream of ours to move on to jobs which gave us more time to spend together. We used to talk about eating breakfast together during the week and reading the paper on Sundays. (I know, seriously, we got old fast. That's what happens when you get married, I suppose.)

So after we moved to Virginia and we both started working from home, that little tiny dream of ours was realized. I usually roll out of bed around 7 on Sundays. I wrap myself in my fuzzy throw blanket, slip on Jon's work shoes sitting by the door, and waddle outside in my pajamas to retrieve the Post from our driveway. When Jon wakes up, we settle down on the couch and grab our favorite sections: the front page, business, and metro for him; travel, arts, and the comics for me (I guess I'm not that old... :).

So all of that was really my way of saying that reading the paper with my husband and a cup of tea on a Sunday morning is my way of recharging for the upcoming week.

picture the holidays: day 17/warm glow

2011-12-17T17:18:00.000-05:00

There's something special about today's image:

It moves! What you're looking at is called a cinemagraph: a photograph that isolates and shows one area of movement. There are plenty of how-to tutorials available, but make sure you have a pretty solid knowledge base of photoshop.

I liked the color version of this better, but unfortunately gifs don't have as much color knowledge as other file formats do, so the quality turned out best if I converted to a b&w.

picture the holidays: 16/the season of lights

2011-12-16T16:20:00.000-05:00

One of my favorite things about the holiday season is the wonderfully warm glow of Christmas lights. White or colorful, it doesn't matter.

picture the holidays: 15/got gifts?

2011-12-16T16:06:00.000-05:00

I love everything about giving presents to my loved ones.

Wrapping.

Packaging.

Delivering.

picture the holidays: 14/sincerely yours

2011-12-16T15:56:00.000-05:00

'Tis the season for mailing packages,

Christmas cards,

and letters to Santa.

star trail win; meteor shower fail

2011-12-13T21:09:00.002-05:00

A cool looking star trail photograph, indeed. But there's not a single visible meteor streak from the Geminids in all of the hour and a half's worth of images I used for this.

I saw one with my eye while I was setting up, and even captured it in a test shot, but just barely.

Can't see it? Yeah, it's hardly visible. Here, have another look.

Because I never had a good way of taking such time lapse images (and also lived relatively close to Boston for four years), I've still not nailed down the best method for capturing shooting stars. I bumped my ISO up tonight, but only to 800. I know. I had the aperture as wide as it could go (4.0 on my wide angle camera), and the shutter was open for 30 seconds. The culprit definitely had to be the ISO. Unfortunately, clouds moved in and now I don't have a good view of the heavens. Looks like I'll have to hold out for the Perseids in August.

picture the holidays: day 13/simply divine

2011-12-13T13:52:00.002-05:00

Full disclosure: I took a few nice macro shots of this little lady, but when I was editing I noticed copious amounts of dust on her. Oops!

exterior illumination

2011-12-12T23:20:00.000-05:00

A few more shots of the lights I strung up the other night.

picture the holidays: day 12/a whole lot of happy

2011-12-12T14:18:00.001-05:00

picture the holidays: 11/shaping up

2011-12-11T16:59:00.000-05:00

This prompt actually caused me more stress than relief from the stress, actually.

I went for a walk today and was spending too much time scanning the ground in front of me looking for something that fit the prompt.

I did spot a pothole in the street that resembled a Christmas tree, though:

But since I'm not too crazy about the image, I'll probably use a prettier picture featuring a shape in my actual book.

Maybe something like this.

Or this:

star trails: a how-to

2011-12-10T23:29:00.002-05:00

Tonight, I tried my hand at star trails for the first time. I figured I'd make a quick post with the steps I took to get this shot.

Tools:

a camera capable of shooting in manual. I used a Canon 7D.

tripod

remote shutter OR the ability to craft something to hold your shutter down, like I did, using a pencil eraser, tape, and a hair elastic

a dark, clear sky

this photoshop action for star trails

Steps:

First I took a few test shots to set the right exposures. I played around with settings and eventually came up with 25 seconds at f/10. I kept the ISO relatively low at 320, though in hindsight I could have increased it to get the stars to be more apparent. The lens I used was my sigma 10-20mm wide angle at 10mm. And last but not least, I set my camera to burst mode.

Once I got the settings I wanted, I rigged up my eraser/tape/hair tie shutter-holder-thingy and let the camera go. Or you could do the easy thing and use a remote shutter release, but I don't have one.

Meanwhile, I made dinner and made sure to check on my camera to be sure it was still snapping away.

About an hour and a half later, I decided to be done, mainly because I was excited to see the results! I loaded about 250 pictures into photoshop and then ran the aforementioned star trail action on them (read the directions on that website before running the action). I was happy with the star trails in the resulting image, but the tree was way too blurry.

So I loaded all of the pictures into the application Preview on my iMac and one by one, scrolled through to find the outliers; the ones that blurred or had a movement in the tree. Then I started over with the action and came out with this:

Much better than the first! But you can notice gaps in the star trails where the blurry tree images were deleted before (yes, the Earth moves enough within 30 seconds to make a gap in the star trail). But the trails in the first image (the one with the blurry tree) were perfect and had no gaps, so I just simply pasted that image as a layer over this one and masked over the gaps.

But I was still not 100% happy with the tree. In a still image, the tree looked sharper and wasn't as bright. So I took a good still image and masked in some of the branches and the bright lights.

Finally, I did some basic editing: sharpen, curves, and adjusted the contrast a wee little bit. I used the patch tool to get rid of those little red flares in the center of the image. I also cropped out the moon because I found it a little distracting. All of this took me about 3 minutes.

And here we have the final image again:

Not perfect by any means, and this may not even be the best way to stack images, but it's what I tried and it worked. This page also has some great tips on stacking star trail images with some advanced techniques on masking out irregularities.

You might wonder why I didn't just set my camera to bulb and leave it open for an hour and a half. That may work in locations where it's truly dark, but in most towns light pollution will be a problem. Even light that your eyes can't see, your camera will. Leaving the shutter open that long will also introduce a lot of noise. Also, rumor has it that there's the possibility of the camera's sensor being permanently damaged during exposures that long, but I don't know how true that is. Either way, the stacking option worked just fine and it seems to be what many photographers do as well.

Hopefully this helps you give star trails a whirl - even without a remote shutter release!

picture the holidays: 10/twinkle twinkle

2011-12-10T22:58:00.002-05:00

With a subject like 'twinkle twinkle', I could have taken another picture of my tree and called it a day. But I've already taken plenty of pictures of my tree, so I wanted to do something different.

And then I had an ah-ha moment:

star trails.

My first attempt at shooting star trails, and I think it turned out pretty well. 215 25-second exposures stacked (but more on that later).

I had an extra string of lights that I played around with for awhile and then strung up on this tree off of our back porch. I wanted to keep them in the frame to add to the Christmas-y theme of twinkle twinkle.

If you're interested in the how-to, check out my post here.

picture the holidays: 09/it's a sign

2011-12-09T17:19:00.001-05:00

The good thing about living in a small town is the ability to go for a walk and run errands at the same time.

I stopped by the market for a few things and then made my way into old town.

When I spotted this mailbox across the street, I thought it was my sign.

Until I looked up.

Merry Christmas.

Edit: I went back later that night to get a better shot of the sign lit up:

Scents and sounds of Christmas time

2011-12-09T17:03:00.002-05:00

(John Denver and the Muppets)

picture the holidays: 08/ reflecting on the season

2011-12-08T20:27:00.003-05:00

The picture I set out to take:

The reflection that I caught afterwards:

It was cold out, but the sun felt warm and nice. Cold enough to wear my funky long-armed colorful striped gloves:

picture the holidays: day 07/ express yourself

2011-12-07T20:08:00.002-05:00

Christmas dreaming.

Today, take a few moments to be still. Breathe in and out and just allow yourself to be and to feel.

I felt creative, pretty (c'mon, I actually did my hair and put makeup on), and relaxed today. I had a day off with no real work to do (the house is clean!), so I put on a dress and played around taking self portraits (I really hope Santa brings me a remote shutter release for Christmas).

And later, while I was making dinner, I found a literal way to express myself:

In other news, self portraits are my Everest. I used the end of a Swiffer to set the focus in some of my shots. For the last one, I set the focus on the tree, switched to manual and brought it in a teeny bit from there.

picture the holidays: 06/every little thing

2011-12-06T21:51:00.002-05:00

Today, I spent $62 at the post office.

Today, I spent at least four hours making small boxes out of corrugated cardboard, then packaging and wrapping a dozen boxes of cookies.

Today, bought $17 worth of stamps to mail out my Christmas cards.

Even at the most ordinary time of day, while doing the most mundane tasks, little moments of enchantment will reveal themselves. Find some small delight today.

Making boxes out of corrugated cardboard, then packaging and wrapping a what seemed like a hundred boxes of cookies got to be rather tedious after awhile. And then I got a phone call with some potentially sad news about my childhood dog. But that's another story. I desperately needed to focus on the here and now. The happy. The holiday.

I printed pretty labels to affix to some of the boxes, and I found joy in that. A simple thing for a mundane task of boxing and wrapping.

Outside was rainy and dreary, one of those dark kind of days that, even at 3 o'clock in the afternoon, lights need to be turned on inside the house. After single-handedly keeping the post office in business (hah! I mean really, $62 is a lot), I returned home to do some work. I tried keeping my eye out for more small delights, but I didn't take pictures of them. I just simply enjoyed.

picture the holidays: 05/the view from here

2011-12-05T21:52:00.005-05:00

Sometimes it's nice to stop and take in the view.

A macro view:

Sunrise this morning from my porch

Not my home's view:

Sunset at a Christmas tree farm

Early 2011 view:

My porch on a snowy January morning

picture the holidays: day 04/you hold the key

2011-12-04T22:50:00.002-05:00

They key to staying in the moment.

Baking dozens of cookies to mail to 12 close family and friends is not entirely relaxing or calming, but then again, it does keep me in the moment of Christmas. It's not the holiday season until I am elbow deep in flour and dough, after all. So consider this moment savored.

Luckily I got it all done in one day (seven hours!) so tomorrow I can do this:

picture the holidays: day03/all you need is love

2011-12-03T17:56:00.001-05:00

One more for kicks?

picture the holidays: day 02/reframing the season

2011-12-02T23:26:00.003-05:00

I couldn't decide which I liked better. So you get two. Bonus!

When I went to take a picture of this print framed, I noticed our tree reflected in the glass. Kind of what this project is all about, isn't it? Noticing the little things about the holiday season. I love it. La la love it.

p.s. The top picture was taken this morning. The bottom was taken tonight. This is why I shoot RAW.

i love you

i do

i love you

all i'm saying pretty baby

la la love you, don't mean maybe

all i'm saying pretty baby

-la la love you, the pixies

Looks great. Little full, lotta sap.

2011-12-01T22:26:00.002-05:00

"We're kicking off our fun old fashion family Christmas by heading out into the country in the old front-wheel drive sleigh to embrace the frosty majesty of the winter landscape and select that most important of Christmas symbols."

I spent the Thanksgiving holiday with my husband and his family in upstate New York. And on Black Friday, while the masses were hitting the malls, we piled into the ol' rig (well, a Ford Excursion) and drove out to the country to pick out a Christmas tree.

Gather round, kids, while I show you a few pictures.

Alicia's frozen from the waist down.

That's all a part of the experience, honey.

Which brings me to another point: wouldn't this make a fun photo session? I think it would be so neat to go with a family and do a photo session while they pick out their Christmas tree. Maybe I can work on that for next year.

picture the holidays: day 01/holding onto gratitude

2011-12-01T15:31:00.002-05:00

I have so much to be grateful for: a loving family, my health and the good health of my loved ones, great friends, the best pets a girl could ask for (even though they live a few hours away with my parents), a suitable place to live, et cetera.

But I got married this year. And it rocked.

So! How to photograph that? It's a little hard given that he's working in the office today, so I had to get a little creative:

My Mrs. mug. My rings. And tea, oh how I love tea even though it has nothing to do with my marriage except that Jon and I both enjoy it. Now of course, I did have other ideas in mind this morning, but with Jon working out of the office today I wasn't able to photograph them. Hopefully when he gets home I can try one of them out.

See you for day 2!

Alicia Bruce: lifestyle photographer?

2011-11-30T15:39:00.003-05:00

Over the past ten years I have gone from first-time digital camera owner (2.1 megapixels! Silent video recordings!) to full-fledged photographer. Though sometimes I still hesitate calling myself a photographer and say "I enjoy photography" instead. Nomenclature aside, for the past decade I have learned the ins and outs of the five digital cameras I've owned, outgrowing one before upgrading to the next. After owning my 7D for over a year and a half, I'm still learning new things about it.

And photography in general.

By my very nature, I am a learner. I love to educate myself and learn new things. I love to try new things. I like to experiment with my camera and try techniques I didn't know existed until I read about them on a blog. Through all of this educating and experimenting, I am working on finding my own style of photography. What is it that I want to shoot? I take pictures of everything, of course, but what is it that really gets my heart going?

Landscapes?

Macro?

Long exposures?

All of the above? Pretty much.

But, you know, I'm not too experienced at shooting portraits of people. It takes more than just a super good camera to capture something like that. You've got to know the camera and how it works to be sure you'll get the shot when you press the shutter. You've got to have an eye for composition. And you've got to have a heart that can capture emotion.

Maybe I have an inkling of these things hiding down inside of me. I'll never know if I don't try, right?

So off I went in search of people to photograph; four families of my husband's coworkers. They all agreed to be my subjects in return for some free family photographs. I had quite a variety of families to work with:

Large.

Small.

In between.

Older kids.

Younger kids.

And a baby.

I've certainly got a lot to work toward, but I think I'm off to a decent start. I need to become more comfortable with directing people, for one. I also need to learn how to pose subjects and how to encourage natural smiles. But that will all come with time.

As I finish editing the family portraits, I'll be sure to post some of them here.

picture the holidays

2011-11-30T08:48:00.001-05:00

I'm so excited to be participating in Picture the Holidays with Tracey Clark this year. It's a 31 day photo experience in which there are 31 prompts (one a day), and the participants are to photograph something that relates to the day's topic. It's an exercise meant to slow us down for the holidays; to help us enjoy what is around us instead of getting caught up in the madness.

Stop by tomorrow for day one!

Dear Santa,

2011-11-20T20:14:00.003-05:00

This.

Merry Christmas,
Love, Alicia

New website!

2011-11-18T19:29:00.003-05:00

Ladies and gentlemen, I've got a website.

Having a blog on its own is nice, but I decided it was time to make a website to host a portfolio and contact info. I've started what's referred to in the photography world as the 'portfolio building' stage in my work. Recently I've been doing photo shoots for my husband's coworkers and their families (who were kind enough to let me bring them out into the chilly November weather!). Portraiture is such a difference from what I normally shoot; mountains don't move and flowers don't blink. Just incorporating the natural movement of people gives me a lot more to think about at the same time as trying to compose the photograph. And that's part of the fun of photography, but it is going to take practice.

Post-processing also poses its own differences from other types of photography. When I shoot landscapes or travel photography, I like to process the image so that the colors are close to what they looked like in person. With portraits, it's all about emotion. I'm finding it a little bit difficult in a way to make that change from keeping colors and lighting 'as is', to getting creative to express emotion. Don't get me wrong - I love being creative. There are certain shots I take with a specific mood in mind, and process them accordingly. With portraits, I think it's because I haven't found my style yet. So basically I'm using this portfolio building time as my chance to experiment and find my style when it comes to post-processing. It's nerve-wracking, but definitely a lot of fun.

This was my long winded way of saying 'Hey! Check out my new website!' Soon I'll be registering a domain name, but either way, you'll be able to find it here: http://aliciabrucephotography.blogspot.com/

Happy (almost) Holidays!

2011-11-11T14:26:00.000-05:00

I told myself I would wait until Thanksgiving to post this... but I couldn't. I'm impatient in most aspects of my life, but especially when it comes to Christmas. That's why I am offering a free download of the above picture (without the text) for your personal use as a desktop wallpaper two weeks early!

Click one of the pictures below (the top is for widescreen monitors; the bottom is for standard monitors), then click the 'Actions' tab and then 'View all sizes'. Ctrl+click (right-click for PC users) and save as. Enjoy!

happy, happy halloween!

2011-10-31T15:03:00.000-04:00

As promised, here is my 'Halloween color day'.

Have a safe holiday!

there's children throwing snowballs instead of throwing heads

2011-10-29T17:07:00.002-04:00

Last November when my husband and I left New England for Virginia, we did not expect that two days before Halloween this year we'd see snow.
But oh, lest we forget that Mother Nature is one tricky lady; she didn't let us escape the New England weather totally. I was a little mad that we were actually going to get snow in October, but once it started I was as giddy as ever. SNOW!

(by the way, my post title is a line from What's This from the movie The Nightmare Before Christmas)

brown

2011-10-21T14:10:00.000-04:00

It's the final day in Poppytalk's color week, and I'm sad. It's been fun routing through my old pictures to find some not based on subject, but rather color.

Here's hoping that Poppytalk will do a winter color week in a few months.

I've been enjoying autumn color week so much...

2011-10-20T19:17:00.001-04:00

that I'm going to have to hold my own Halloween color day. On Halloween, I'm going to post pictures of the following colors:

red, brown, {bright} green, purple, orange

My goal is to get out and shoot some of these colors in the next few days so I have some new work to post. If anyone actually reads this and wants to join, go for it and comment me your link!

Gray

2011-10-20T19:00:00.004-04:00

Appropriate color for a gray day.

orange

2011-10-19T16:34:00.001-04:00

It's orange day during Poppytalk's autumn colors week - the day I was most excited for! I can't wait to see what orange photos people post to the flickr pool.

yellow

2011-10-18T09:08:00.002-04:00

It's day two of autumn color week! Today we celebrate the color yellow:

it's autumn color week!

2011-10-17T12:04:00.004-04:00

I'm so excited to participate in my first Poppytalk color week! Each day this week will have a different autumn color theme to it. Today's color is red, and photographers are encouraged to post any photo with a predominately red subject to the autumn color week flickr group, as well as on their blog. The rest of the week's schedule is as follows:
Tuesday, October 18th - Yellow | Wednesday, October 19th - Orange | Thursday, October 20th - Grey | Friday, October 21st - Brown
Join in by posting your own autumn color photos to the group. And now, for some red:

One of my pictures was featured on Poppytalk's page! Super!

AB's guide to iPhoneography

2011-09-20T15:48:00.004-04:00

Who doesn't have at least one photography app on their smartphone right now? Everyone I know seems to have some sort of faux-vintage app, at the very least. Even my mom has Instagram. And why not? They're cheap (most even free) and fun, and while it's still nothing compared to the quality of my 7D, my iPhone's quality sure beats that of the first digital camera I owned ten years ago, so it's good enough for daily snapshots that I like to take.

Vintage/lo-fi photography is a ubiquitous trend nowadays, so Instagram is hardly alone in its class. And it's not the only class of app out there either; there are hundreds of photography related iphone apps that allow you to shoot panoramics, send yourself postcards from the road, and yes, even Photoshop has its own app.

Below I've got a few examples of my most-used photography apps:

As I already mentioned above, the app that receives the most attention lately is Instagram (free). Take a photo within the app (or upload one from your camera roll), crop it to square, and select a filter to apply to the photo. Instagram also doubles as a social networking/photo sharing app, though you can turn that option off and simply save to your camera roll.

Photosynth (free) is an easy-to-use panoramic app. Just tap the screen and start moving, and Photosynth snaps photos for you. It takes a few seconds to stitch the photos together and when you're done, you can view the photo within Photosynth (as a moveable panoramic) or share through email and Facebook.

Camera Bag ($1.99) is another in a long list of lo-fi, vintage inspired apps. Take any photo from your camera roll, upload it and simply begin scrolling through the filter options. Options include poloroid, holga film, and cinema style.

If you can't get enough of shooting with toy cameras, you'll want to try Hipstamatic ($1.99). It essentially turns your iphone into a Diana or Holga camera, even allowing you to choose from different film types.

Got a few related pictures you want to show together? Get Diptic ($1.99). Choose from multiple 2,3,4 or 5 photo layouts, and upload pictures for each spot in the layout. Export to camera roll or share on Facebook. (date label on left picture via labelbox)

Just like the real thing, actioncam (free) snaps a series of pictures which can be viewed in several layout styles (above, 4x1). The app can be set to take photos manually (like I just did above) or timed, which works best when your subject is moving.

{picture via itunes store/popbooth}

Popbooth (free + price of print) brings the convenience of your iPhone and the fun of a photobooth into one app. Use your phone to snap a series of photobooth pictures, apply a filter, then share via email or facebook. Want a real photobooth strip? Simply buy a print to mail to yourself! Buy credits in bulk and use "party mode" for fun wedding favors.

{picture via itunes and postagram}

Ever go on vacation and snap a postcard-worthy photo that you want to share with a friend? Sure, you could upload it to Facebook, but why not give them something to hang on their refrigerator? Postagram (free + 99 cents for print) is the app for that: take a photo and upload to the app, decide who you want to send a postagram to, and for just 99 cents, your friend will have a postcard of your photo in 2-5 days. Feel free to send one to yourself so you can relive your vacation once you return home!

I hope this helped make sense of the hundreds of photo apps out there. The best thing you can do is download as many as possible (there are tons of free ones if you aren't interested in spending money), try them out, and just delete the ones you don't like. Have fun!

fall preview

2011-09-16T16:18:00.000-04:00

in denial

2011-09-16T15:44:00.001-04:00

I know I've mentioned it before, I'm still in denial over summer being over. I mean, it's not officially over, or so my calendar says. But I know the truth. Fall is here. I pulled a hoodie out yesterday and have been wearing it all day today. Last night I had to dig out my slippers because my piggies toes were freezing. Here they are enjoying warmer days on the beach:

Admittedly this is not a good picture. I don't like it at all except for the color of the umbrella, so I thought it was worth posting.

Anyone else having a really hard time letting go of summer? I promise I'll stop whining about this really soon!

wordless wednesday: summer's end

2011-09-14T10:16:00.000-04:00

Ten Years Later: Never Forget

2011-09-11T08:44:00.001-04:00

{photo of JFK Museum, Boston, MA}

It’s September 11th. I don’t think a year will go by that I don’t wake up on this day and remember exactly what happened and what I was doing. Later today I’ll be enjoying some time with my family, but I can’t help but think about all those who lost their lives that day ten years ago.

On this day in 2001, I was just waking up in my college dorm room as a freshman. I logged onto yahoo to check my email and while it loaded, I glanced at the top news stories like I always did. When I read that a plane crashed into one of the WTC’s in NYC, I turned on the news. Just then, the second plane had crashed. My roommate Amy returned home from breakfast just then and I told her what was happening. Together we worried and speculated about what might happen next.

Classes were being canceled and students were being ushered into the theater which had the national news being played on the big screens. I tried calling my parents repeatedly, but phones were busy. We all cried, we all prayed. I’m not a religious person, not in the least, but I prayed so hard that day to some higher power, somewhere. I was in the middle of nowhere in Vermont, but at this point I don’t know that any of us truly felt safe. Anything could have happened.

It was only the second week of school, so us freshmen were in a tough place. We were away from our families, uncertain of the near future, and barely knew each other. I’ll always remember sitting in the lounge of my dorm with this tall, quiet guy. I’d never seen him before, but the two of us sat on either side of the room watching the coverage on TV in complete silence, though sometimes remarking to each other how shocking it all was. For the next four years, every time I saw him, I thought of that day.

I can remember watching in horror as the two towers fell to the ground. I can remember a candlelight vigil around the pond that night. I can remember the overwhelming sense of patriotism that spread around not only our campus but the nation. I can remember it was the birthday of someone I started to become friends with, and I wished him the most somber “happy birthday” I’ve ever wished in my life. I can remember hearing that a boy from my hometown was working on the 89th floor of one of the World Trade Centers. I can remember hearing that he called his mother after the first plane hit and that he was going to get out. I can remember later finding out that he never did.

That day, an entire country made a promise to those whose lives were taken. We promised to never forget. And we never will.

September 11, 2001-2011.

2011-09-09T08:51:00.000-04:00

Well it would seem that summer is over. It's been awhile since I've felt temperatures in the 90's, which is something that surprised me when I moved to Virginia. I had high hopes that summer weather would last well into September, but lately it's been dreary and mild.
Not that that's a bad thing. While I was so reluctant to let go of summer, yesterday I decided (with nary an 85°+ day in sight) to embrace the upcoming fall season. I decorated my living room and kitchen (photos to come later) and started on some fall crafts.

But since it is still technically summer, here are some summer flower macro photos I shot a few weeks ago.

Ooohh, that creamy background.

Small, smaller, smallest.

My favorite of the bunch.

The colors are so vibrant.

Nothing says 'photographer' like laying on the wet ground at 7:00 in the morning trying to shoot dewdrops.

A bug's eye view.

A little sparkle.

Such a teeny, tiny depth of field.

A hydrangea puff. What's not to love?

This flower needs to be tucked behind my ear.

It's just begging to be picked.

Sometimes the background is more interesting than the foreground. Look at that beautiful bokeh.

just a fine and fancy ramble to the zoo

2011-08-04T21:07:00.004-04:00

A few weeks ago I drove up to New Jersey for a training session with my brother (more on that later) and I went to the Philadelphia Zoo with him and his girlfriend, Melissa.

RAAAWWWWR

A little nuzzly lion bonding.

Ronnie Bruce in action.

Somehow I got to swap my brother my Sigma 17-70 lens for his behemoth of a lens, the Canon 70-200mm f/2.8L.

This lens rocks.

I took this photo to reminisce over the time that Alyssa and I took my cousins to the zoo, and my younger cousin climbed into the giraffe area. Right through those rails in the lower left of the picture. And she says to us "Hey guys, look!" Who trusted us to take a 5 year old to the zoo?

It's about to get a little bit graphic here.

Yes, it's a giraffe... peeing.

It's nature, you guys.

Look at the cutie zebras! I love zebras.

This guy was so funny. He tried to get into the orangutan play area, but since they share it with another primate (I can't remember which), and couldn't be in there at the same time, he turned away, dejected. He grabbed his little He-Man/BattleBot/Power Ranger (whatever) sheet and walked away, feeling (and certainly looking) homeless.

Gravity-defying penguin.

I leave you with a picture of Mufasa taking a snooze deep in the savannah of Philadelphia.

house tour

2011-08-04T16:10:00.001-04:00

Sometimes I forget how wonderful the Canon 50mm f/1.8 lens really is for being as inexpensive as it is. I got it a few years ago and used it that night to shoot photos of the Jack's Mannequin concert I was on my way to. I couldn't believe how well it shot in low light!

Today I decided to pull that lens out, given that it's not used very often, and take pictures around my house; mainly in the kitchen where I've been working on a few DIY projects. So without further ado, I give you a tour of my house (or really my kitchen with a few other pictures thrown in for good measure) as seen through the eyes of the "plastic fantastic*".

*I kind of dislike that nickname, but oh well.

I finally got around to arranging the kitchen shelves in a way I find visually pleasing, at least for now.

Does anyone else enjoy cookbooks as much as I do? Aren't they so inspiring to look through? They make me want to cook up every recipe I come across.

I painted this bowl a few years ago, and I think it looked a lot more impressive as just a pencil outline. The continents lost a lot of their coastal detail once I started to paint. And to top it off, I forgot to paint Sri Lanka! I still love my world fruit bowl though. (It's usually not this lacking in fruit. In fact, it's almost always loaded with produce.)

The colorful placemats and napkins came from my mom (via Target) for one of my bridal shower gifts. I love the burst of color they give to our white-walled kitchen (one word: renting).

My newest cookware acquisition. I seriously can't wait to cook up pasta sauces in this sucker.

Our Scentsy plug-in warmer and awesome knives.

A few gratuitous pictures of the shade I DIYed for the kitchen window. Also, forgive me if DIY isn't a verb in your house. I'm pretty sure it's made it to that point by now for most people, though.

Alyssa gave me the aloe plant there on the sil. It's a little limp right now, so it's propped up. I have a knack for killing plants, so I'm really trying to keep this one alive.

Oh, Pinterest. Have you heard of it? I'm addicted to it, as is everyone else I know who has used it. Pinterest is where I first saw these zinc letters (from Anthro, of course), and Pinterest is also where I found the tutorial to make them myself at a fraction of the cost.

Another shower gift: latte bowls from Anthropologie. We received two sets and decided to keep both. They are a great size and look super cute in photos.

Hey, look! It's the window shade again!

The colorful cabinet.

A Ribba-framed graphic I made when we first moved to Virginia (right), and an ode to my former home-city.

Another DIY project I worked on this morning. I picked these two frames up from Ikea and didn't know what to put in them at the time. The print on the left is something I just whipped up today to incorporate navy blue into our bedroom color scheme (coastal seaglass kinda theme). On the right I used a piece of cardstock leftover from my bridal shower (the girls had the guests write marriage advice to us on stamped cardstock and I still have the blank cards). After the wedding I had snipped a few blooms from my bouquet in order to frame them (a Martha Stewart project, obviously). The bigger blooms didn't take too well, but the hydrangea petals came out perfectly. I arranged them, put a dab of Elmer's on the back of each, let it dry for about ten minutes and popped it in the frame. Two easy ways to bring some color to our room!

An unmade bed. And do you see that big, blank, white wall above it? That's my next project.

2011-08-04T15:18:00.001-04:00

After taking far too long to make plans to do so, Jon and I drove up to Baltimore to visit my maid of honor Alyssa. It's not like it's a far drive, but work and chores have always been in the way.

As soon as we arrived, Alyssa took us to the Baltimore Farmer's Market.

Tomatoes everywhere and I had no problem with that.

Alyss buying tomatoes.

Finding a perfect tomato is the highlight of summer. Just a little drizzle of olive oil and shake of pepper (and if it's a really good tomato, you don't even need that!)

Look at these beauties.

Giant blackberries!

It may have only been 10:30 or so, but when my eyes see food that my stomach wants, my brain says go and my hands make it happen. Two of the best chicken tacos I've ever had.

Snausages.

Have you ever seen a yellow watermelon? Neither had we.

My inner child insisted I pick up a hula hoop and start hooping. I obliged.

For a little history lesson, we visited Fort McHenry, the site of the United States' victory over the British Navy, and the site of the Star Spangled Banner. Apparently Francis Scott Key was chilling aboard a British ship before the attack (not being a traitor, but actually quite the opposite: he was trying to negotiate the release of some American prisoners), and wrote the song on his way back to Baltimore when he'd seen the American flag still proudly flying.

Alyssa and her beau, Gus.

Everyone associates Maryland blue crabs with Maryland (and I wonder why?), but really most of us from the coastal Mid-Atlantic have an affinity for them. Alyssa and I grew up in South Jersey and picking crabs was very much a part of summer. It wasn't summer unless you picked crabs covered in Old Bay on a brown kraft paper covered table...

...with a delicious adult beverage.

Crab-topped guacamole? Yes, please.

Hello, old chap.

Remnants.

Hot day + sprinklers = the photo below.

Nothing feels better on a hot day than standing in the way of a cool sprinkler.

Alyssa's dog Lola in the shadows.

Let's hear it for New York

2011-07-21T23:06:00.004-04:00

For our wedding, one of the presents I gave to my new groom were tickets to see the Mets (his team) play the Phillies (my team) in New York. Citi Field is a few years old, but he'd never been to a game there yet.

Because our friend Jessie lives in NYC, and because our friend Amy lives not far from NYC, they (and Jessie's boyfriend Art) graced us with their presence for brunch and hanging out before the game.

First stop: Brunch at Westville in the West Village.

What to do when you can't decide between two meals? Get both and share!

{Breakfast burrito and challah french toast - I had no idea what challah was or that it's not pronounced chah-lah but actually hah-lah, but it was delicious nonetheless. Holla! (Or should I say challah?)}

I watched the window like a hawk through our entire meal (you can see Jessie there just in the doorway), waiting for people to vacate the chairs. As soon as they were empty, pow! Out the door.

Steamy hot dogs.

I've always been fascinated by record stores, but even more so now that we have a record player. I've been bugging my mom to see if her old records are still at my pop's house. I wonder if maybe someday when I have kids, they'll be bugging me to find my old Hanson CDs from the '90s. Or maybe not.

If there's one thing you have to understand about me, it's that I used to be (and still kind of am) in love with the show Friends. Amy and I roomed together our freshman year in college and watched it constantly. To this day we still quote lines from the show (that we both watch often on DVD). So visiting the apartment building which was used for exterior shots of Monica's apartment throughout the show's 10 seasons was like a pilgrimage, of sorts.

Coincidentally (or not), there is a coffee shop on the ground floor. {For the record, this building is on the corner of Bedford and Grove}

And since we were in the area... our next stop was the Magnolia Bakery. Look, I'm going to be honest - apparently this place was featured in Sex and the City, and although I had a brief affair with the show in college, I really couldn't remember it. But I would never turn down a trip to a bakery, no siree.

But do you know what I just realized?

"Let's hit up Magnolia and mack on some cupcakes!"

"I love those cupcakes like McAdams love Gosling."

"Two, no six, no twelve, Baker's dozen! I told you that I'm crazy for these cupcakes, cousin!"

Yup. This is the same bakery from Lazy Sunday.

We took our cupcakes (and lemonade) across the street to the Bleecker Playground. I picked a vanilla cupcake with pretty yellow frosting because it just looked summery. I think I really like this way of visiting New York.

Amy enjoying her cupcake!

We planned to steer clear of Times Square, but then we decided we wanted to see Jessie's office. I can't show you pictures of it, but all I can tell you is that I got to sit in the chair that Steve from Blue's Clues used to sit in.

Jessie and Art had to leave us to leave for a cruise, but suggested that we check out The High Line, which is a walkway/park on a former elevated train track. Amy snapped this one of Jon and I (oh, so squinty!)

At this point we had to abandon Amy and head for the ballgame. Off to Citi Field we go.

Have you ever had Box Frites? They're the epitome of gluttony but seriously, if you ever come across one (try Citi Field or Nationals Park) order a box with the bacon aioli. Just do it.

A guy in our section desperately wanted the wave to catch on. After several tries, it finally did.

One happy boy.

Post-game we avoided the crowded train and went into the parking lot so Jon could see the plaques where the old bases were at Shea Stadium. Because as the song goes, they paved paradise and put up a parking lot.

Taking the 7 train back to Manhattan.

And so ended our day in the Big Apple. We walked back to Penn Station to catch our bus and had a milkshake at the Tick Tock Diner before heading home.

Headlights & Tail lights

2011-06-12T22:37:00.001-04:00

Some more beauties from yesterday's vintage auto show.

To market, to market, to buy a fat pig...

2011-06-11T23:39:00.003-04:00

...here are my pictures, jiggity jig.

I'll be making fried green tomatoes later this week, thankyouverymuch.

Does anyone else get giddy when they see tables full of fresh produce?

My handsome model showing me a delicious juicy tomato.

Peppers, galore!

Potato, po-tah-to.

More berries. I can't get enough of those blues.

We took it upon ourselves to go for a drive. Isn't our town beautiful?

I am not one to pass up the opportunity to walk around a farm and pick my own flowers.

For the record, these are not my arms.

When I found out that a vintage auto show was scheduled for this weekend, I jumped for joy (literally) and told Jon that we just had to go. Vintage cars are one of many reasons why I am borderline obsessed with the mid-twentieth century. Look at the fins on this Bel Air!

Can you believe this color? eeeee!

I mean, seriously. Sparkles. Cars just don't have sparkles like this anymore.

2011-04-24T12:05:00.000-04:00

A delicious bread-like loaf of carbs, butter, sugar and cinnamon.

A manly Easter basket.

And so begins the breakfast portion of Easter brunch, or as I like to call it, "Br".

Mini egg frittatas

I realize this plate says Je demande du boeuf (beef), but if you take off the B, it says oeuf, which means egg. So it works.

Onward to 'unch'.

Capital Bound

2011-04-21T22:37:00.000-04:00

When you live near a big city, naturally when family and friends come to visit you make a trip to said city. Luckily for me I see it not as a nuisance, but rather as a chance to explore and be a tourist. Here on this fine April day, we had the opportunity to visit our nation's capital, dine on fresh local food, and walk a whole heck of a lot.

The National Air and Space Museum at the Smithsonian may be my favorite one.

A relatively quiet afternoon at the Capital Building.

Dinner at Founding Farmers on Pennsylvania Ave. We started the meal with Old Bay seasoned popcorn. Any self-respecting Mid-Atlantic resident (Mid-Atlantan? What are we called, anyway?) knows and loves Old Bay on almost anything.

Skillet cornbread.

Sweet tea. I feel I can call it that now that I live below the Mason-Dixon line.

No trip to The District is complete without a stop by the nation's most well-known address: 1600 Pennsylvania Avenue.

2011-04-01T22:54:00.002-04:00

When I became a resident of northern Virginia, one of the first things I got excited about was the Cherry Blossom festival in Washington, D.C. I practically forced my mom and my nan to come visit me (although if you ask them, I'm sure they'll admit they needed no force) and the three of us spent a lovely spring day in DC.

A news crew spotted us as we settled down for lunch in the grass and interviewed us!

We went just days before my mom's birthday, so she deemed this day her birthday celebration. "Take pictures of me and my birthday celebration!"

Slainte!

2011-03-17T09:50:00.000-04:00

How about a few pictures from the land of St. Patrick to start off this lovely day?

Breakfast in Dublin

I love that Irish men wear lad caps and sweaters over collared shirts.

If I had to choose only one town from our trip to revisit, it would be Killarney.

The color of the water!

The bright blue sky as seen on the cover of this book was not something we saw very often on our trip. The scene below is, however.

The sun did peek out for our views off the Dingle peninsula!

If you didn't know, this is Heaven for your mouth.

Drinks at Tig Coili in Galway

Happy St. Patrick's Day! I wish you the luck of the Irish, and hope you find good craic to celebrate today.

[See more Ireland photos on my flickr account]

Project 365: Days 8-14

2011-01-19T13:54:00.001-05:00

Day 8: January 8 - Snow!

Day 9: January 9 - Ale Mary's Thankful Turkey sandwich, Baltimore, MD.

Day 10: January 10 - One of my closest and oldest friends is a teacher in Baltimore and I got the chance to visit her on Day 10.

Day 11: January 11 - It's snowing again!

Day 12: January 12 - Tiny, sparkly, fluttery, snow.

Day 13: January 13 - Interview shoes.

Day 14: January 14 - Snuggle Bear.

Project 365: Days 1-7

2011-01-07T20:20:00.001-05:00

At the end of 2010, Jon and I decided we would each start a project 365 starting January 1, 2011. I'd tried starting one last year and I quickly abandoned it. If you're not familiar with Project 365, Photojojo has a decent summary in their newsletter archive. The short version: snap one photo per day for an entire year. You can start at any time, but January 1st seemed to be a logical starting point. It'll make for a neat way to remember each day of the year.
So without further ado, I present to you days 1-7 of my Project 365.

Day 1: January 1 - Starting the year off right with mimosas.

Day 2: January 2 - At the car wash.

Day 3: January 3 - Night falls over Hawthorne* Drive.

(*Not my real street name, you stalkers)

Day 4: January 4 - The contents of our refrigerator.

Day 5: January 5 - Alka Seltzer. For the first time in three years, I've gotten a cold. I'm officially sick.

Day 6: January 6 - Snacktime.

Day 7: January 7 - Homemade French bread pizza.

LensHero.com

2010-12-13T15:30:00.004-05:00

Every so often, I get emails from family or friends with questions about what camera lens they should purchase for their dSLR. I'm always happy to help, but unfortunately I can't always get back to them right away. That's where LensHero.com comes in.

LensHero.com is a new site whose goal is to help DSLR owners easily find their next lens. Not that I have money to spend on another lens right now ('tis the season, and all that jazz), but for kicks let's assume I do. I've entered the name of my camera body and set my budget on the slider bar.

Users have the option of searching by lens style (macro, wide angle, and so on), by entering their current lenses and having LensHero.com suggest a lens for them (as seen above), or by visually selecting the desired zoom range using sliders and a sample picture (below).

For my example, I went ahead and selected "fisheye" under the style tab and clicked GO. The next page brought up a list of all of the lenses that matched my selections. You can see a picture of the lens along with a list of basic specs and an approximate price. Clicking on the name of the lens gives you even more information as well as a comparison to similar lenses, and a link to purchase. Not happy with your results? You can also adjust your requirements in the sidebar on the left.

Clicking around the site, I also saw options to browse lenses by brand, camera, lens mount, and style.

I give LensHero.com two enthusiastic thumbs up! Who couldn't use a little direction when searching for a new lens? There are so many options available and it can be overwhelming, especially for someone searching for their very first lens to buy. I still recommend doing a little research after getting your LensHero.com suggestions; nothing beats actually getting your hands on a lens and taking a few test shots. But to get you to that point, LensHero.com really does the trick.

Visit them at -what else?- http://lenshero.com.

Disclaimer: A little good news/bad news situation going on here. Bad news: I didn't decide to write this review on my own accord. My brother recommended I check out LensHero.com and upon doing so, I was presented with a notification that because they are a new site, they would be giving away prizes to some of the bloggers who choose to review the site. Good news: Everything I wrote was completely honest here, and whether I get a prize out of it or not, I will be using LensHero.com when it comes time to buy another lens.

First Wedding!

2010-09-08T19:17:00.002-04:00

Last summer, I had my very first ever job as a photographer. Friends of mine (Keith and Paula) insisted that I do their engagement photos, and even though I was extremely nervous, we had a blast and the pictures came out pretty well.

A few weeks ago, Keith and Paula got married. Well to be fair, they really got married back in May in Italy, but they had a vow ceremony and small reception for family and friends in August. And thus my adventure into wedding photography began.

It was scary!

I rented a lens from Calumet (Canon 24-70mm f/2.8 L) and ended up using it for most of the night. I mainly used my 7D with the 430 EX II external flash, but I did take a few shots with the 400d and Sigma 10-20mm.

And now... a sneak peak!

By the end of the night, my wrists felt like they were broken because my cameras were so heavy, but they felt better after a day (or two). So anyway, my first wedding is done and I learned a lot! I still need some practice with using my external flash, but it'll come with time.

2010-08-18T18:44:00.000-04:00

I've been experimenting in Photoshop with making some really pretty, dreamy images. Pictures like this seem to be very popular, and I've really come to love the happy feeling they give off.

I love rounded corners on pictures.

I took the Dreamer picture and added some heart bokeh and a TtV frame.

I took this picture in the spring when the trees were full of blooms. It's such a pretty picture on its own, but it takes on a dreamlike feel in this version. This would look good with rounded corners.

And the same picture again, cropped into a TtV frame and I added some pretty bokeh hearts.

A little frame around the edge with some more bokeh.

This effect only works on certain images, in my opinion. But when done right, they can take me out of the real world and bring me into a dream world where things are colorful, bright, and happy.

I'm going to order prints of a couple of these and if they look good, I'll add them to my shop.

Summer

2010-06-27T12:02:00.003-04:00

It's officially summer! And it has been for a few days, but I'm a little late to the party. To celebrate, I've given the blog a little makeover. It's still a work in progress, but I like it so far.

Pictures? I've got 'em.

Look ma, no tarballs! Destin, Florida - pre-oil disaster.

Carousel in Downtown Disney

Flight delays.

Almost 99% sure I'm going to add this one to my Etsy shop soon.

Self portrait.

Another self portrait. More interesting would have been a picture of me taking this because of the way I had to bend to get it.

Ireland, Revisited.

2010-04-04T18:55:00.004-04:00

One year ago today (well, not exactly today, but last Easter), I was not worrying about errands, or what I would make myself for dinner, or trying to get to work in time. No no, I was in Ireland.

We arrived at the Dublin Airport ridiculously early Easter morning, having left JFK around dinnertime Saturday. By the time we left the airport and arrived at the hotel, it was just about 6:30 and still too early to get into our rooms, so we wandered around Dublin for a few hours, despite nothing being open.

There was some sort of parade on Easter Sunday! These guys were getting prepared.

Jon's father has a cousin who lives in Dublin, and they had invited us to spend Easter with them. After finally checking into a room (early) and catching a nap, Brendan picked us up and took us on a ride around Dublin. We came to an area known as Kilakee in Dublin 16. From here there are great views of Dublin and the Irish Sea.

Back at the house, we met Jon's father's cousin, K.C. (Brendan is her husband) and their family. This Easter dinner sure beats what I'm having tonight - Lean Cuisine!

The week in Ireland was spent traveling in a loop, beginning and ending in Dublin. This is Blarney Castle, home of the Blarney Stone. I absolutely kissed it, though unfortunately there's no photo evidence!

Jon and I discovered Club Milk at a convenience store in Urlingford, Co. Kilkenny. We went through two packages in Ireland, and Jon's parents surprised us with a pack when we arrived back at JFK. I've since ordered more from foodireland.com. They are so good!

This was on the side of Sammy's, a bar/restaurant on Inch beach. The owner's name is not Sammy though: it's Mahmood Hussein.

Cottage Pie in Killarney.

Writing in our travel notebook in Killarney.

Cabra Castle

I took a flower and a shamrock to press in my travel journal. When I got home, I 'laminated' them (using clear packing tape!) and there they remain.

I would love to go back to Ireland someday, hopefully sooner rather than later. I absolutely fell in love with the Emerald Isle.

The Happiest Place on Earth... really!

2010-03-13T07:47:00.006-05:00

I just got back from one of my favorite places in the world... the magical, nostalgia-inducing Walt Disney World. As a kid, our family vacations were usually to Florida, either to visit my grandparents, to go to Disney, or both. Because of that, I have a nostalgic, child-like love for Disney World. It's one of those places I can go and forget about real adult life and become a kid again.
This particular trip was for Disney's Princess Half Marathon weekend. The Princess race was my first half marathon and I couldn't have picked a more fun race to do! Not only was it an excuse to go back to Disney, but running into the Magic Kingdom and through Cinderella's castle was quite an experience.
Anyway, this was my first trip back to Disney with a dSLR and a wide angle lens. It's tricky trying to balance photography with a theme park visit, especially when walking around with other people. I didn't get the opportunity to take many night time pictures, so I think next time I go (hopefully next year!) I'll actually set aside a night for just picture taking.

Mickey waffles!

I'd definitely like a bear cape, as seen at the Hoop Dee Doo Revue in Fort Wilderness.

Disney's new parade is the Move It, Shake It, Celebrate It parade to celebrate their guests. I moved, I shook, I celebrated.

I braved Big Thunder Mountain Railroad with my camera.

Courtesy of the Flower and Garden festival in Epcot. This would look good on my front lawn (if I had one).

Does anyone else really want to live in Cinderella's castle?

On race day-night, we watched the Wishes fireworks show.

Snowy

2009-12-08T07:33:00.007-05:00

We had our first real snow this past weekend! It was a nice wet snow that stuck to everything. I woke up in the morning and looked out the window like Ralphie on Christmas morning in A Christmas Story, grabbed my camera and extra lens, bundled up and ran outside. I spent an hour wandering outside taking photos and enjoying how quiet and beautiful it was.

Yours truly.

What's a snowfall without some snowballs?

First E-Session

2009-10-16T20:14:00.008-04:00

I was recently honored with the opportunity to take engagement photos of Keith & Paula, two good friends of mine from college. The three of us (and Jon) went into Boston, taking pictures in the Common, the Public Gardens and by the aquarium. We had a fun time, and being friends with my first "clients" made it that much easier.

They wanted a few posed shots first, you know, for the parents.

I took a few candids as we walked around Boston.

They're a super cute couple and we had a fun afternoon together. Thanks K&P!

2009-10-16T19:03:00.007-04:00

Some photos from the second half of summer...

Oriole Park at Camden Yards, Baltimore MD.

Lola.

Destin, FL. I just want to jump into this picture, don't you?

Look at that water!

Doak Campbell Stadium at FSU in Tallahassee, FL.

Cocoa Beach, FL.

Running in Cocoa Beach, FL.

Downtown Disney.

Oh, and while I was in Cocoa Beach...

Jon & I got engaged! Kind of the highlight of my summer life.

Independence Day

2009-07-05T11:42:00.003-04:00

Happy 4th of July!

I had a wonderful day yesterday, and a bunch of photos to document it. Jon & I woke up early to go to the 5K race he was running.

After the race, we spent some time walking around the town common, which was set up with food and crafters tents, and enjoyed the patriotic atmosphere of the day.

Since we had such a late start to summer, weatherwise, our 4th of July dinner was made up of all of our summertime favorites. Homemade burgers, corn on the cob, watermelon...

...and berries. On top of cheesecake. Not necessarily a summertime favorite, but really, who can pass up homemade cheesecake?

Of course, the perfect end to any 4th of July is a good fireworks display. We plopped ourselves down in the perfect spot.

Gotta love the wide angle lens.

All in all, it was a fantastic holiday. I hope yours was as well!

A

The Only Sun in June

2009-06-26T15:20:00.003-04:00

Before the month of June decided to turn into April here in New England, we did have a handful of lovely sunny days, which luckily I took full advantage of. Today's batch of photos will hopefully help you remember what summer is like, at least until the season graces us with its presence once again.

The ocean in Maine is still too cold to swim in, but it still makes for a nice scene. Off the Marginal Way, Ogunquit, Maine.

Don't ask me why, but for some reason I've been cooking like crazy this month. One of my creations was a "light" strawberry tart. I felt like a country mama as it sat next to my window in the kitchen.

I'd mentioned before that I'm fascinated by the time period between the 1950's and 1970's, so I tend to take photos and alter them so that they appear to be taken during that time. When Jon and I went to the Milford Drive-in a few weeks ago, I brought my Diana+ camera with me. But until I get that film developed, I also took this photo with my digital SLR and gave it an older look. How much did I want to join that family in the Thunderbird?!

Apollo Night with the Boston Pops and the Northeast Naval Wind Ensemble. This was a fantastic show and it was super patriotic. Symphony Hall, Boston, MA.

It's hard to take a bad picture of the ocean. 1st St beach, Ocean City, NJ.
-A

Cheesy, Oozy Chicken.

2009-06-01T19:03:00.008-04:00

If you decide to stick around to read this blog as I start to post more often, you'll likely start to see a trend - food. I love to cook and I love to take pictures, which should come as no surprise to anyone who knows me well. And while this is technically a photo blog, I figure it might be fun to throw in a few recipe ideas with the photos, considering I tend to photograph all my new meal endeavors anyway.

For whatever reason, today at work I was extra hungry. I don't know, it could have been the food blogs I was browsing through, I suppose. I'd previously come across a recipe for chicken cordon bleu at Omnomicon (one of my favorite food blogs) which looked delicious, except for the ham. There aren't too many foods that I won't eat, but ham is - and has always been - one of them. So the question of the day was: what to stuff in my chicken besides ham? I pondered this for awhile until I remembered these frozen stuffed chickens Jon & I ate in college before either of us knew how to cook. They were stuffed with broccoli and cheese, and while packed with fat, were so tasty.

I figured out what kind of cheese was stuffed in those (swiss and american), then using the techniques from the cordon bleu recipe, put together my stuffed chickens.

I sliced the (low sodium) american cheese into rectangles (as in the cordon bleu recipe), placed a rectangle in the center of the (reduced fat) swiss, piled on a bit of broccoli then wrapped it up.

Following the recipe, I wrapped the chicken breasts around the filling and toothpick-pinned the seams together, placing the stuffed chickens seam-side up on my stone.

25 minutes later these babies were cooked to perfection! The cheese oozed out just enough to make it look pretty.
Oh my. It wasn't a terribly hard meal to make, but definitely one to add to my repertoire.

As for the photos (this is a photo blog, after all), I used the Sigma 17-70mm f/2.8-4.5 macro lens. I do have a dedicated macro, but when I'm photographing while cooking alone, it's a little easier to use this lens. I think the photos came out okay, but to be honest I was far too hungry at this point to really worry about it!

Don't forget to...

2009-05-30T15:24:00.004-04:00

The other day I took my sidewalk chalk outside (I'm a big believer that sidewalk chalking is an ageless pastime) and drew some happy little pictures and words and of course, a hopscotch court on the street/sidewalk. Later, when I was driving past on my way to run some errands, two women were walking with a little girl along the sidewalk. When I was stopped at the traffic light, I saw out of my side mirror that the women and girl stopped to play a round of hopscotch. Sitting there in my car, it put a huge smile on my face. I’m thinking of sidewalk chalking more often, in hopes that it puts a smile on someone elses face as well.

A photo for a rainy day.

2009-05-28T16:08:00.001-04:00

Photoshop - Vintage Seventies Style

2009-05-23T15:20:00.012-04:00

For the most part, I prefer to keep my photos as natural looking as possible - that is to say, after post-processing, I don't want them to look much different than what I actually took the photo of. This is especially true of landscapes, photojournalism and nature photography. However there are some photos that look perfectly fine as crisp, untouched images, but might look even better with a little photoshop magic.
The topic of "photoshopping" can be quite controversial, and I plan to go into my own thoughts on that at a later time. But controversy aside, the use of photoshop to change a modern, digital image to look like something that came out of a film camera in the 1970's, for example, can completely change the feeling of a photo. The viewer is transported back to a time and a place, maybe given a sense of nostalgia from their own past. Usually when I take a photo, I already have an idea of what feeling I am trying to convey. Take this photo (SOOC-straight out of camera) I took out west, somewhere on the road between Colorado and Utah.
The open land, the tractor, the big blue sky, all give you a feeling of being on a road trip across the American West. But after a few tweaks in photoshop, I'm able to transport that same feeling back in time. Now the viewer likely gets the feeling they are on a road trip across the American West, only 35 years earlier.
For this I used Pioneer Woman's seventies photoshop action, which I downloaded from her site. Keep in mind that the vintage style photoshop actions may not produce the same sense of time if your photo has a piece of modern technology as its prominent feature. For all I know, the tractor could be brand new, but it's small enough that it doesn't take away from the scene.
Have a look at a few other photos I applied this action to.

Note that all of these photos looked good initially, but by making a few changes it completely transformed the feel of the image. The key is to start off with a good photo - a bad image to start with will still be bad to end with (trust me, I've tried).

There are plenty of other techniques and styles I like to work with in photoshop, but I wanted to highlight the vintage seventies style first. For whatever reason I have a real fascination with the 1950's, 60's and 70's. If I could pick any decade to live in, I'd choose one of those. So using photoshop to transform my photos from 2009 to 1970's is a fun way to let me pretend I'm living back in time, if only for a second.

Also, if you like the vintage seventies style, download Pioneer Woman's photoshop action sets free here. Her actions are my favorites!

[Small plug: All of these images are available for purchase as prints in my Etsy shop.]

First Post - Irish Cupcakes!

2009-05-21T08:28:00.005-04:00

Back on St. Patrick's Day, I came across the most amazing recipe for cupcakes over at Smitten Kitchen. That afternoon I whipped up a batch and they came out looking as delectable as they tasted. I ended up with some of the most drool-worthy food photos I've taken thus far:

Because of time restraints, I had to forego the 'from scratch' recipe and use cake mix. I chose reduced sugar Pillsbury boxed cake mix. The recipe calls for Guinness instead of water - part 1 of 3 in 'Why are these cupcakes Irish?'. The chocolate filling inside is made with Jameson Irish whiskey - that's part 2.
Again, I had to make a substitution by using store-bought icing. I went with buttercream frosting and mixed in part 3, Bailey's Irish Cream (okay, I might have used a bit more than the recipe called for...). The frosting was my favorite part!
I jazzed them up with green sugar sprinkles. Note the Irish additions in the background.

I seriously recommend this recipe any time of year, not just St. Patrick's Day.

Oh and perhaps I should note (this being the first entry and everything) that this is my photo blog which I will use to update with some of my favorite photos and my newest sets. I will also post about updates to my Etsy shop which can be found at http://aliciabruce.etsy.com.
A