Bloopers!

Some may argue that the bloopers at the end of a movie or show is the best part of the whole movie or show, right?  I totally think so.  If I ever get the chance to make a movie I will be sure to have a blooper reel while the credits roll.  How else do you get people to stick around to see who gets credit for the lighting and craft food services on set??  By showing bloopers of course!  Granted people might not actually see the craft service people's name scroll across the screen because they will be too busy laughing at the outtakes, but still, it's nice to know that people may have caught a glimpse.  Anyway, the bloopers from my 30 Day Photography Challenge this year aren't nearly as entertaining as say watching Matthew McConaughey (while shirtless) screw up his line for the 10th time in a row, but I'll show you anyway.  Like I said in my last post, through this 30 day challenge, I took about 400 pictures in total.  400 pictures and I only picked out 30 halfway decent ones??  All signs point to me not making a career out of professional photography.  Anyway, here are a few bloopers in all their glory.  Some could maybe call them creative (like in the first one, I could have totally played it cool and acted like I meant to cut half my face off while shooting my self-portrait), but I'm being real here...shots shown below were not supposed to happen; hence why I call them bloopers.  Enjoy!

 Why yes, I totally meant to cut off my face in the day 1, "self-portrait" shot.

This "from a high angle" shot on day 5 would have been cool if it hadn't been taken out of a car window while going  50mph and getting the bottom half of the picture all blurry.

Half my face and apparently Rizzo wanted the toy of his that I was borrowing.

A bad habit from day 8, or a nice shot of my pale knuckles??

Do not adjust your monitor...this picture is blurry.

The ghost of silhouette's past.

Ironically, this is how my head feels after being on hold with Comcast for 20 minutes only to finally get someone who barely speaks English and is able to fix your problem with the simple click of a mouse.

I hate to even admit that this was an attempt at a "bokeh"(crisp foreground with blurry background) shot on day 20 .  It would maybe classify as a cool picture if not for the fact that it wasn't supposed to turn out like this at all!

One of the many attempts of trying to get the perfect "close-up" shot on day 26 of that delicious cookie!

 

30 Day Photograhy Challenge - Days 29 & 30

That's a wrap!  407 photos, 14 blog posts and 30 days later, my 2012 30 Day Photography Challenge has come to an end.  Thanks for stickin' around.  I hope you enjoyed it as much as I did!

Day 29:  Black and white.

 

Day 30:  Self-portrait.

30 Day Photography Challenge - Days 27 & 28

Day 27:  From a distance.
 

 

Day 28:  Flowers.

30 Day Photography Challenge - Days 25 & 26

Day 25:  Something pink.

Is it Day 4 again???  Nope!  I just got new gloves!!  Ironically, on day 4 of this years challenge, I photographed my green dish-washing gloves.  Remember when I told you that I had duct tape on one of the fingers because it had a slice in it?  Well they were replaced almost two weeks ago and cross my heart, I didn't even remember when buying these pink gloves that Day 25 was "Something pink" and that on Day 4 I had photographed my green gloves.  It just happened to fall that way.  You know I was excited though when I checked the Challenge Schedule on Day 24 to see what Day 25's photo was and saw that it was "Something pink" and then happened to look over at my dish rack and see the new pink gloves in there, right?  Yes, you know it's true.  I am dorky like that and proud of it! 

 

Day 26:  Close-up.

Not to toot my own horn, but this may be my favorite picture of this years challenge so far.  It could have something to do with the subject I chose for the close-up, I'm not sure...Either way, here she is in all her glory.  A home made chocolate chip cookie made by my friend & coworker Scott.  Seriously, he should be a baker in his next life; look at how perfect that is!  He brought me two cookies today at work and I saved them both for an after work treat.  I opened the baggie on my way home and as I downed the first cookie and started plowing through the second one, I had to stop mid-cookie and put it back into the bag.  It dawned on me that this chocolaty goodness would make a perfect close-up shot for today's photo.  Was I right?  I think so!  And in case you care, after I got the shot I liked, I shoved the remaining goodness in my mouth in one bite.  So much for savoring. 

30 Day Photography Challenge Days 23 & 24

Day 23:  Sunflare.

So I am totally bummed about this photo.  Last year on day 23, the Sunflare turned out to be one of my favorite photos of the entire challenge.  I must have really bad luck this year because on the day I needed clouds, there was hardly a cloud in the sky and the day I needed sun there was absolutely no sun to be found.  Don't get me wrong, I know the sun was actually somewhere, that's why we were able to see in daylight without having lights on, but there weren't any sun rays.  The sun was hidden behind rainy clouds all day long.  So once again, I had to improvise.  You have to look real hard, but looking up at this light in the ceiling, you can see what may look like a representation of a sunflare.  It's kind of like tanning in a tanning bed rather than tanning outside; you get the same effects, but you are just inside looking up at artificial light instead of the sun.  Ok, that probably made no sense whatsoever, but you get the idea, right?

 

Day 24:  Animal.

This is getting ridiculous.  Once again, I had to make something up for the photo today.  I guess I shouldn't feel too bad...this is in fact my challenge and I really don't have to follow the rules if I don't want to.  I still feel kind of bad though.  Anyway, since I wasn't around any animals at all today (yes, some may argue that humans are in fact animals, but that's a whole other subject that we won't discuss today) I had to resort to this.  This is actually a photo that I took today, but I wasn't actually in the presence of this peacock today.  This is a photo taken of another photo.  The peacock photo was taken during my San Diego trip in March of '11 and I took the picture tonight of my computer screen while I had the peacock photo window open...hence the pixels that you may be able to see on the picture.  Either way, it's still a pretty sweet picture that I should do something with rather than just having it stored on my computer for years on end.

30 Day Photography Challenge - Days 20, 21 & 22

Day 20:  Bokeh.

Once again, bokeh is a pretty technical term.  Way too complicated of a word for my vocabulary.  It means the object in the foreground is in focus and the background is out of focus.  This shot is almost as difficult to capture as the Long Exposure shot on day 16.  But, after many, many attempts, I got one that's close.  Here's a flower in focus and its vase out of focus.

 

Day 21:  Faceless self-portrait.

Sunday night couch time.  Ignore my painting sweatpants--I had been working on a computer room-related project earlier that called for these pants.

 

Day 22:  Hands.

 

These hands belong to my mom.  Who knew that just a couple short hours after taking this photo, that right hand would bowl a 500!  Way to go Mom!

30 Day Photography Challenge - Days 17, 18 & 19

Day 17:  Technology.

So many buttons...so little time to care about what they all mean.

 

Day 18: Your shoes. 

 

Day 19:  Something orange.

Coming straight from PANTONE®, the King of Color, you don't get any truer Orange than this!

30 Day Photography Challenge - Days 15 & 16

Day 15: Silhouette. 

Since I have to be glued to my office chair for 8 hours of the day, wouldn't it be just my luck that the evening I needed some sunlight to take a silhouette picture, the sun would say goodbye before I got home?  That's what happened so I had to improvise.  I had my friend Kristi over and with Thomas Edison's help (and a little Photoshop work), we were able to get this shady photo in.  Not the best in the west, but it'll do.

 

Day 16: Long exposure.

Unfortunately I had to improvise a bit on this shot too.  As I stated last year, this photo challenge was probably meant for people with mad photo skills and have big fancy cameras that allow you to control basically everything.  I unfortunately don't have the pleasure of having a camera like that so I had to wing it.  I did turn the camera to "manual" mode but I couldn't control the exposure time, so I just did what I could.  This was the scene on my kitchen table when I got home from work today.  The sun was shining so nice on my fall table that I just felt it needed a good picture.  I love the shadow that the flowers are casting.  It feels like the perfect blend of summer and fall, don't you think?

...and in other news, congratulations to my friends Kari and Miguel who had their adorable baby boy today!

Cruz Delgado came into the world today at 3:08 pm.  Congratulations Kari & Migulel!

30 Day Photography Challenge - Days 11, 12, 13 & 14

Day 11:  Something blue.

Pretty fitting since I still am still laying on the floor typing on my computer, meaning my computer room isn't put together yet.  I used this stuff to tape off baseboards, etc. while painting the room, only to realize I dislike the color and have taken all my baseboards off so I can replace them.  Long story.

 

Day 12: Sunset.

This is by far, the worst picture I have taken for the Photography Challenge to date.  I blame myself and the fact that I totally forgot about taking the picture until about 7:30 at night.  I was lucky to pull even this off.  It's dark, it's blurry, it's all around bad.  My apologies.

 

Day 13: Yourself with 13 things.

I had a couple ideas in mind for this shot.  One was pretty lame and one was OK.  In the end I decided this was the most random.  I posed with 13 of Rizzo's toys.  The most fun was gathering the toys and making him "stay" while I positioned HIS toys and took a picture of myself in front of them.  He must not have had his listening ears on a couple times because he actually got into one of the shots while the self-timer went off, stole a toy and ran with it.  :)  Oh and no, that's not my long, dark hair hanging down my shoulder, it's part of his skunk toy.

 

Day 14: Eye(s).

Yes, yes, this is technically supposed to be an "eyes" (plural) shot, but I thought this shot with just one eye in it turned out so much better.  If you look real close, you can see the trees from outside the window reflecting in the eye.

30 Day Photography Challenge - Days 9 & 10

Day 9:  Someone you love.

 

Day 10:  Childhood memory.

This isn't really a "memory" per say, but this was my dinner tonight--a baked potato.  I remember my mom and I would eat baked potatoes once in awhile when my dad wasn't home for dinner or whatever.  I loved them then and I still love them.  But I also remember that one day in 8th grade, my friend and I were talking and I told her that I had a baked potato for dinner the night before.  Her response was something like this: "A baked potato??!!  We have baked potatoes with steak for dinner."  She obviously wasn't in tune with our gourmet potatoes that looked something like this bad boy.

30 Day Photography Challenge - Days 7 & 8

Day 7:  Fruit.

 

Day 8:  A bad habit.

Warning:  This photo is super embarrassing and pretty disgusting.  I wish I could claim these bit off nails as not mine, but I can't do it.  I admit it, I am a nail biter.  I go in spurts where I will go for months and months without biting them and then one day, BAM!, something hits a nerve and I'm off biting again for a few months.  After seeing this gross display on my computer screen, I think it's high time I put this bad habit to bed for awhile.  As of right now I am going to stop biting, picking and peeling my nails and let them grow for awhile.  I'll try to give them a nice paint job when they're grown out and update you guys on the status.  I know you'll be anxiously waiting another close-up of my beautiful nail beds.  :) 

 

My apologies for those of you who happen to see this photo while eating lunch at your desk...I hope I didn't ruin your appetite.  I can't say I didn't warn you that it was disgusting!

30 Day Photography Challenge - Days 5 and 6

Day 5: From a high angle.

Given that this photo was taken from a moving car is kind of impressive to me.  We went up to the sailboat on Friday to get it ready for winter.  It was really neat to see all of the colors up north.  You can't really see great color in this picture, but I thought it was a cool shot anyway.  This was taken while crossing a bridge in Duluth going over to Wisconsin. 

 

Day 6:  From a low angle. 

30 Day Photography Challenge - Day 4

Day 4: Something green.

You probably don't see these puppies everyday.  Yep, these are my dish washing gloves.  When you don't have a dishwasher, these guys can come in handy when washing four days worth of dishes in scalding hot water.  Not that I ever let my dishes sit for 4 days...no, not me.  Never.  Anyway, this is a typical scene on my counter top.  I don't bother hiding the dish drying rack from anyone nor do I bother hiding the gloves.  It gives the counter some character.  Oh and you can't see it, but one of the fingers on one of the gloves now dons some classy duct tape.  It must have gotten one too many rubs of the scratchy side of the sponge and wore out.  I was starting to get hot water down my hand one day and noticed some tiny holes had started to wear through.  Looks like I'll have to spend another four bucks and buy a new pair when the tape starts to wear off.

30 Day Photography Challenge - Day 3

Day 3: Clouds.

There must be something about October 3rd.  Last year on October 3rd when I went to take my "clouds" picture, there were none to be found.  Today was hardly any different.  There was one single strip of the faintest clouds out but they barely qualified as clouds in my eyes.  I took one picture of them but as the sun was starting to set, the faint, white strip started to show a little bit more personality so I got out my camera again and took a couple more shots.  I decided I preferred the "sunset clouds" over the regular, white clouds.  Plus, the silhouette of the tree doesn't make the picture look too shabby, either.

30 Day Photography Challenge - Day 2

Day 2: What you wore today.

I don't think this outfit showed up on the runway at Fashion Week in NYC a few weeks ago, but I suppose it'll do for me.  The fancy cardigan and gray tank top for underneath are both from Kohl's.  The pants are from Express and I've had them for going on six years.  The socks are Gold Toe brand, also probably from Kohl's.  And the owl necklace was a gift from my grandma and grandpa last Christmas.  Oh and in case you are wondering why the socks look disheveled and the cardigan sleeve is wrinkled, I took this picture when I got home from work, not before I put them on in the morning.  So the socks had been stuffed inside shoes all day and were a tad on the damp side and who knows how sleeves get wrinkled down by your wrist...beats me.  Anyway, there you have it!

30 Day Photography Challenge - Day 1

And so it begins!  The month of pictures.  To recap for you in case you are new on the block, for the second year in a row I am doing a 30 Day Photography Challenge.  I found the challenge on Pinterest last year and couldn't wait to try it.  There are a few different versions out there, but I decided to keep the list the same as last year to see what different things I can come up with to photograph.
I will do my absolute best to capture a photo a day.  If I accidentally forget a day I promise I will tell you.  I probably won't post each picture every day (as some of you may or may not believe, I actually lead a life outside of this blog), but I will post every few days.  I know the suspense will eat you alive, but try to stay with me.
Here goes nothin'.  Cheers!

Day 1:  Self-portrait.

Photography Challenge '12

Stay tuned!!  First picture scheduled to post later today!  Same thing as last year...I probably won't post daily, but I will definitely post in small groups!  I hope you are as geek-ily excited as I am for this!

*images from flyer found at vecteezy.com