My Coat Wept Fake Blood
I’m obsessed. It’s crept into my blood. My perception is altered. I’m fixated on light. I’m fixated on dark. I’m fascinated with painting patterns of light in the night. Now it’s in the rain.
It’s been at least twenty years since an art form incited an insatiable hunger in me with such ferocity. I’ve had a lot of loves. I’ve done many forms of art, crafts, and a plethora of creative endeavours throughout my life. I have already accomplished my creative goals, which is why I left the fine art world behind over a decade ago. I had no expectations of falling in love again with a new way of creating. Especially now, when I’m rapidly running out of time and resources.
I’m self-indulgent when it comes to anything I wish to create. I’ll take all the steps necessary to facilitate the process. I love to create. I need to create like I need to breathe. It’s always one of the primary driving forces in my life.
So I have a new love in lightpainting, coupled with limitations of circumstances beyond my control. My camera is old by today’s standards. I need a new one. I need additional lenses. I need lightpainting tools. Most of all, I need to meet others in my area who are also involved with lightpainting. From what I’m seeing and my own dabbling, it’s best explored with a team of at least one other.
Limitations. Between a rock and a hard place. Giving up is never a card in my deck. I just have to get creative in my approach to working with those limitations. This is my solution whenever I meet any hurdle in life. I get creative. I figure it out. I find ways to overcome obstacles and move beyond them. It begins and ends in creativity because creativity is not limited to art and craft. Creativity is a crucial aspect of all problem solving. It’s a way of seeing, thinking, and being.
Hours of rain pouring down. I was chomping at the bit to go do a shoot. I waited. I waited for two hours. Maybe the drenching downpour would let up enough. Nope. Screw it; I’m practically dying to get out there with the camera.
Guess what @dandays? Epic Wet Fail. Your kind suggestion of, “take an umbrella” for rain photography does nothing to protect a camera or me in rain, especially a downpour at all angles. I skipped the blooming umbrella. Threw on this extra-large jacket I made a colour collage on of dye, paint, and then waterproofed. Best time to test the waterproofing (or so I thought). Even better, the camera nestled safely inside the jacket, protected from rain, unless shooting.
I’m quite taken with combining water and light in any form when I do photography. Call it a bit of a fixation. It’s so wet. Icy cold water raining down. I ducked into wherever I could to shoot without the rain landing on my camera too much for as many shots as possible. Lots of puddling on the street, cars going by, distortions from rain coming down, and these strings of shifting LED lights reflecting in the puddles, created the patterns in the next three images.
It’s close to midnight. I take off across the street and land under where the lights are strung. No shelter for the camera. It’s never going to forgive me. What a thing to try and time, position and move in a meddling maelstrom of rain.
Worse still, there are a few homeless/addicts/I don’t know what near the dumpster bins twelve metres from me, clocking me. I hear one say not in a good way, “She’s got a camera! She’s taking pictures!” I make some made up on the spot gesture to get them to chill out and that I’m not taking photos of them doing a deal by the bins.
I keep shooting. I speed it up. I stop being fussy and hustle. Either I get the shots or I don’t. Too many things to juggle on this spot. At least I’m dry. Bang up waterproofing jacket job.
I’m ready to pack it in. My camera is complaining too much rain. On the way I spotted lights strung on an iron fence entrance. One more shot. Camera cuddled in zipped up jacket. Why do I have blood on my hands? Searching for a source, my eye catches what looks like red raindrops nested on the outside of my jacket. It’s probably my imagination. Almost home. I’ll deal with whatever this is then.
Decided to stop at a store with far too much white…floors, walls, blinding bright ceiling spotlights. Halfway into the store I notice I’m dripping what looks like blood on the floor. I freeze. I stare at my jacket. It’s weeping blood out of every fabric pore and running down onto a too white floor.
I move. Keep going. Move along. Nothing to see here. Everything is normal. I’m not dripping fake blood all over the floor. It’s not all over my hands. I hope the cashier doesn’t see it. I tuck my hands mostly into the sleeves. He doesn’t notice. No one notices. No one says a word. I’m not sure if that’s a good or bad thing. I mean, what if I was wounded and bleeding? Who am I kidding? No one in this city gives a crap.
I get home and in the door. I have a good look at my jacket. One of the colours I used on it, a reddish brown dye, didn’t hold. I forgot to use a mordant after dyeing it. Years of dyeing fabrics and I forget this simple rule in the throes of some creative storm.
The next day, I leave to go out. I’m locking up when I see there’s a fake blood smear across my door and part of the wall. Back into the apartment for a rag to clean that up asap. I can’t have my neighbours thinking I have dead bodies stored in my apartment. I keep that on the down low.
All photos taken by Nine with a Pentax digital 35mm camera.
Welcome to the world of light. 😎 Nice to see that others are also "infected" with it.
I really like the pictures with the reflections that you have created. Have fun with your new addiction. 🤗🔦🔦🔦
Love it! It's put me in a position of moving out of my comfort zone and changing how I see light. I've begun to see it from a different perspective, even in daily routines, I find it's catching my eye, causing me to think about what I could create.
Thank you @stepko! Those ones made me think of a "light slick". I'm having fun alright 😂, also driving myself a little nuts with some inside experimentation before I set up to do a proper shoot.
I keep forgetting to mention this, but every time I see you pop up I'm reminded of how much I like your avatar.
when i was looking for my first digital camera (it was a small compact) the reason why i picked canon was you could set up shutter speed up manually up to 25 seconds :)
it is fun even when results are not that great.
not sure did i mentioned zoom lenses. that is also fun with lights. Just zoom in or zoom out while taking the photo.
and always play with movement and shutter speed. sometimes you change shutter speed for just fraction of a second and you get something totally different.
I can set the shutter speed manually on mine in the same manner. The problem is I don't trust myself in the dark not to crash everything to trash yet, LOL.
You did mention zoom lenses and the lens I have has some extra capability that way. I took your suggestion and ran with it, which gave me more options. Thank you for that.
You're right, very slight changes create completely different effects. All of this has made me start to think out of the box and to see light in a completely different way when doing photography. It's a great opportunity to play around.
just check what the settings were and start playing with it. making it a bit faster maybe gives you strait lines or making it a bit slower gives you full photo of light, or maybe an option to zoom faster and get less shake.
and seeing what changes is fun :D
Thanks, I'll have to go back and look at the settings I used. I tend to feel my way intuitively, so I'm not thinking much when I'm shooting, unless I'm running tests or experimenting. I love seeing the changes when I shoot several of the same subject, while altering what I'm doing.
Beautiful. It is amazing what you will see if you just give yourself the opportunity to look.
I love the neon colours and the rain really adds the sparkle.
Thank you @ammonite! You're so right, it's a matter of doing that. This playing around is training my way of seeing in new directions. Exciting stuff.
Glad to see you addicted to Lightpainting. 😁
Haha, well, to give credit where it's due, you and several others, all the work you create, your attitudes towards the process, your willingness to answer questions, explain your process, show it in all the great posts.....that's what did it. It's been a very long time since I felt that sense of awe at something new to me.
😊
😁
Time is something that we never know how much of that we have left... Could be seconds or decades.
I guess that could attract some unwanted attention! And a few officers...
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#VYB isn't even in-PostCuration-Project.Oh, I'll try to get a hold of @calumam about that, thanks :) I know that progress has been temporarily halted, but the project is still active, with curators being assigned delegations and voting trails. Is there anything I can do as a curator?
!PIZZA
Absolutely. It certainly makes every moment of life be of value, when one is aware of that.
Only if you don't know what you're doing and choose to take the hands on approach, which isn't my style at all.
Thank you very much!
I'm glad you're having fun, did your camera ever forgive you??? I'm pretty sure the newer ones wouldn't, unless you buy a waterproof case 😂
!PIZZA
Creating is always fun, even when nothing works out. My camera has given me the order that two shoots in rain like that are all that I'm allowed. The shutter button is a bit ceased, so I have to tend to that issue. I did try wrapping it in plastic, but that interferes with the sensor.
There are waterproof cameras, but, alas, that's out of my reach at this time. 😂
I hope you can fix it :( ... Maybe you could create a custom case??? It's worth a try :)
!PIZZA !ALIVE !LOL
@nineclaws! You Are Alive so I just staked 0.1 $ALIVE to your account on behalf of @wrestlingdesires. (2/10)
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I checked it. I'm going to have to open it up and take a look. No more rain for it.
A case isn't going to work because so many parts would have to be not encased that it defeats the purpose of even attempting that. There are weather sealed cameras, but those aren't foolproof either. Probably better to buy one of these. They look even better than the ones I looked at in 2011.
Yeah, tech just keeps improving. Imagine that what fits in an area the size of a fingertip once took up an entire building? And that it really wasn't so long ago.
!PIZZA !ALIVE !LOL
Yeah, tech just keeps improving. Imagine that what fits in an area the size of a fingertip once took up an entire building? And that it really wasn't so long ago.
!PIZZA !ALIVE !LOL
Stellar use of maelstrom.
Bang up, is that Canadian for dope ass? Cuz I have a dope ass jacket. Wondering if they're the same.
Hello.
I like your images so much I wish I could do it.
I think I might like your first two the best but don't quote me.
Umbrellas are a helluva accessory. In the rain, of course. But you're right, they do have their limits. England, for example, it rains sideways and snows from the ground up.
😂It came into my mind out of nowhere, as is often the case.
Uhhh, no, eh. Might be the same type of jacket if it knows how to bleed fake blood in the rain. If you're thinking of another kind of jacket, it's actually a hoodie, vest, baseball style cap combo that works best. Oh 🤦♀️good socks also.
Hello indeed. ✅
If it must be an umbrella, it must be a quality golf umbrella with a longish pointy metal end. You need to spend time in northern Canada, then you won't be so sensitive to snow coming at you from the ground up. Tsk, Tsk. Must be a California thing.
Oh and thank you, sorry, got caught up in the jokes. It's not hard. you could try with your cell phone camera. You just need to use the manual shutter setting and find a place with lights at night, areas that are darker.
Hey I resemble that remark!
😂Can you rock black eyeliner like that?
Love it! it looks like an abstract painting.
Thank you@ramon2024! I do like doing abstract work like that.
I gifted $PIZZA slices here:
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