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I know I have said before how much I enjoy strumming my guitar. It makes me smile to think about the first time I held it and wondered if it was too big for me. I wondered if my fingertips would ever not be so sore. I wondered if I would be able to actually play a tune that people could make sense of. I am happy to report the guitar fits me nicely, my fingertips have recovered and I can play music that people enjoy. I am so glad to have this instrument in my life.
I was looking through my Flickr photostream and noticed the colors I shoot most often. One of them is red. I love the fire and vibrance of red in food, flora and clothing. It constantly inspires me.
I have a challenge for you.
First, pick a color. Now, for the rest of the week, go around and shoot everything you see in that color. What I like about this concept is the inspiration it has for future projects or series of work. So, go ahead, get to shooting and please share a link to your color inspiration in the comments.
I am trying to stay on track with the Diptych project, but this month has proved to be rather demanding of my time. Even still, I have been enjoying the inspiration coming from the Art Slam Flickr group. The diptych above was created using my Lensbaby Composer. I also have the Macro Kit filters which allow me to focus from 2″ to 13″ from my subject. I love them to pieces and I am really enjoying shooting manually again.
I love these two images together. Bokeh is the theme and I think it fits the diptych theme perfectly.
Passion and love…they go together so well, don’t you think? My theme for this diptych is red. When I think of both of those words; passion and love, I think of the color red. Passion and love are full of energy and warmth. I did not think this when I created these two pieces, but seeing them together, they have a certain vibe that covers quite a few areas of my life. I will take that feeling any day!
I have been going through my extensive archive of images and selecting ones that would be good examples of diptych for participants of the Art Slam project. While I have gotten better about organizing my images, I realized something…I do not order prints of most of my work.
Honestly, I used to only order prints of my photographs when I was scrapbooking. Now, if I am doing a digital scrapbook page, then I don’t run anything off. After reading this post on Shutter Sisters today, I am going to order prints from now on.
I had forgotten how much I loved looking at pictures from the albums my mom used to put together and my kids enjoy looking at pictures of themselves and me when I was their age. Looking at pictures always sparks a conversation. You can not help but want to find out what someone was doing when the shot was taken, what were they looking at or do they always do that?
Another of my goals with the diptych project is that it helps me to be a better digital storyteller. My partner has an amazing way of telling a great story with her images because she follows NO rules. I have always loved her free flowing style and approach to being creative.
So, tomorrow, the project officially starts. The goal, creating something daily for 30 days; with a partner, if you choose, to help keep you motivated. Most importantly, you can not go on about sucking or falling behind or sucking. I won’t hear of it! It’s the process we are going after of cultivating and nurturing your creativity. I think that is a great way to start off a new year.
What do you hope to gain from participating in the project? I would love to know. If you do not already, there is a group dedicated to the Art Slam on Facebook and Flickr. You can also subscribe to the Art Slam blog by clicking that big orange button in the menu bar.
I am excited to see so many people selecting a partner and participating in this project. Even if you choose to do this solo, and you can do that, I believe it will be a great experience and help you grow creatively. Now, I started thinking if this would be easier to stick with if there were specific themes and I can not say yes or no to that just yet. For those of you who do better with some kind of guidance, I have compiled a list of suggested themes you can use during the diptych project. I find suggested themes can be helpful when you get stuck in the middle of the process, so I hope these will be of some help and I can not wait to see the first round of collective creations.
Suggested Diptych Themes
I can always use a good excuse to shoot a photograph or create a little art everyday. Twice I have attempted the 365 portrait projects, and those lasted no more than 33 days both times. So, that got me to thinking. How could I reap the benefits of projects like this without a year long commitment? What could I do to keep me motivated and not give up when I am just getting started?
How about a month long project with a friend? One month is just enough time to build up a pretty nice body of creative work and doing it with a friend keeps you both motivated to keep up with it after the 30 days is up.
So, here is the plan:
First thing you need is someone to do this project with you.
Second, you both select a medium to create something everyday. For example, I am going to shoot a picture everyday. Your partner may decide to do a daily card.Or you could do a scrapbook page or a journal page or a combination of any mixed media.
Now, for the fun part…you or your partner are going to send an image of what you created to the other partner to create a diptych of your daily creative as one collective image. Your team can decide to have a daily theme or you can just go with the flow. Diptychs seem to work better when there is some kind of common theme, like color, perspective, common relationship, etc. Seriously, check out the Diptych group on Flickr, there are some great examples.
So, that is the first Daily Creative for 2009. You can post your team diptych at the Art Slam Flickr group and leave a link here for others to check out what you and your partner did.
