We Are Family

Hey, Tim!  Can you please sit on the bench while I figure out how to get this camera on the tripod?  (This is Tim's "Uncle Rico" impersonation from the movie Napoleon Dynamite)

OK everyone.  Don't move.  I'm gonna push the timer and I'm gonna run over with you.  Whatever you do, make sure you don't take your eyes off of the camera!  OK?  Now smile! 

Ooops.  Forgot to push the timer.  Lets try this again.



Oops, forgot to push the timer again!

I'm such a goof ball!



Smile or else!



OK!  Kids only!  Who wants green and who wants orange?

Last one to finish...

Grandfather Leo Howard Oswald

I'm in the final stages of designing a photo book of my Grandfather's WWII photos.  I am so in love with this book!!  When my Grandfather took these photographs and wrote their significance on the photo backs before sending them home, I don't think he ever imagined that he would, in the year 2010, have written his own book!  This photo book is penned in his own hand.

There was minimal photo editing involved.  I didn't want to do any restoration.  The distress of the photos helps to tell Grandfather's story of long ago!  Unfortunately, the deckle edges of most of the photographs had to be cropped out.  I tried to work with them, but no matter what I tried, the bed of the scanner was impossible to minimize against the black background.  The handwriting on the back of the photographs required quite a bit of editing.  Magic eraser made it a breeze, but still, it was necessary to enlarge to the point of pixels in order to remove as much of the photo paper as possible to allow the handwriting to overlay the photographs and black background and still maintain legibility.  There is no added text, other than the text that my Grandfather wrote on the back of his photographs.

The title of the book came into being while I was working with a spread of two photographs of my Grandfather.  On the backs of these photographs he wrote  "Just me." and signed his name "Curlie."  On the back of the second, he wrote "Just me again." and signed his name "Howard."  As I tried to imagine how he must have felt while entitling the photos, in the middle of a war so far away from family and his "honey," with all of his thoughts towards home, I was struck by his modest proclamation of "Just me."  I imagined the excitement of loved ones getting his letters with the photographs and how they must have been shown to everyone back home!  And I began to imagine all of his posterity today who will soon be able to own his book, and how excited we will be, and how we will likely show these photos to everyone who will care to see!!  So my Grandfather's modest "Just Me" is what it is to be entitled, as this is just his story!

As I've gone through these photographs, I feel like I know my Grandfather a little bit more!  I'm especially in awe and grateful to him for his sacrifice in serving our country. 

Robin's Egg

Pretty little egg!

Dramatic little egg!

Its still  pretty though!

This is a lonely soldier looking across the ocean..

... that separates him from home...

Leo Howard Oswald. My Grandfather, and so significant in the hearts of all those who also belong to him such as Mother, Father, Wife, Brothers, Sisters, Sons, Daughters, Grand Children and Great Grand Children.

I never had the opportunity to know my grandfather while in mortality. I was born on March 20th, 1972, and he died on March 20th, 1970. Mom says that he loved his children dearly and looked forward to his own grand children.

Mom is working on a wonderful project! She has asked me to help with the formatting and design of a keepsake book about my Grandfather Leo for our Oswald family! She has spent an enormous amount of time scanning WWII photographs that Leo took and collected during his service to his country.

I've had a chance to play a little bit this evening with some of the photos and have come up with two pages. These are trials since I am using an uncalibrated screen. I'll upload these to the company that I use to create my photography related keepsake books and and request prints so I can calibrate my screen and then I'll go from there!

The handwritten notes are scanned from the back of his photographs and have been used as overlays. I'm so excited to see how this book evolves! It's incredible to see these photographs and especially to see notes written to home in his own hand!

Latest in Film

I developed a couple of rolls of b&w film yesterday. My latest adventures in film weren't up to par! I was a bit disappointed with all of my mistakes, including these rare captures of her Royalness. I didn't meter very well and wound up underexposing. I couldn't help myself with all of the great backlighting from the sun (can be a challenge to meter off of), and being extremely out of practice, I failed the challenge! What a bummer, since it doesn't happen very often that one of my kids decides to cooperate when I have a Kodak moment come over me!! These are extremely doctored up and a few artistic filters added to fudge up on some seriously bruised pixels. The rest of the shots are straight scans from film, no dust spotting, etc.

Look at her tease me!! She's thinkin' "if mom only knew how off she was on her shutter speed...!"



Oh! and look at this one! Sweeter than sugar!
She's really good, isn't she! LOL



How priceless is this one! It is screaming for a big frame over the piano... Even the CEO and President of the company seems to know that these shots aren't going to end up wall worthy! Look how sweetly he is looking at his baby sister! A short moment of peace in their rivalous relationship! LOL I'm afraid the only way I can preserve this one is to pull out some art paper and pencils and give it a whirl... Only problem is I'm extremely out of practice in the drawing and painting department! And the last time I managed, I drew a bunch of flies... Which I should at least be grateful for - at least I could draw something! LOL

Sigh! The sun going down on a lovely fall evening!

Ely's hack is full of pumpkins! This one screamed black and white film! Lighting wasn't so challenging.





Couldn't resist the close up on all of the pumpkins either!

And here's a fun one! I've been working on some senior pictures for friends. Focusing seems to be a problems among other challenges (time to see the eye dr.?), but I think I can safely say that if you want to comission me to take some pictures of your shoes and your books, I might be able to pull that off! LOL

Practice makes perfect! I need to load up my cameras again and play some more!

First Newspaper Ads of the Season

Its time to get serious about selling apples! So this morning I'm working on my ads for the paper. I have a 12:00 deadline and I've just submitted my ad for review!

To rally up the apple crew was not exactly an easy task. First, I told them what they had to wear. Of course there was much negotiating on the part of the Attorney on why a plain white T-shirt just won't work. However, I took courage and told him it was the way it was going to have to be! He may start faxing out his resume to other corporations, however, I think it won't take long for him to realize that no other employer will offer a sweet benefit package like ours! Free living expenses, Free meals, Free education, and an abundance of Free time! Second, they were required to smile on demand, as if they were truly happy. I'm sure that the crew will file a complaint with their union reps for having to complete tasks that aren't listed in their job descriptions. I can deal with that, since I think I got what I wanted, and I got it with in a realistic amount of time!

After getting the crew ready for the photo shoot I realized that I was short of fall harvest paraphernalia. After a quick jaunt to the neighbors in the golf cart, not only did I manage to come back home with some fabulous ears of indian corn, but I made it just in time to go home with a handful of half-moon pies. Zook's have Sunday Church at their home on Sunday, which means that they have been cleaning every last little corner and window pane of their home. It also means cooking for a congregation. A big soup is on the menu, along with other homemade yummies like cookies, and half-moon pies. Fannie and her daughters Anna, Susan, Verna and daughter in law Ada, will all be baking today over their wood burning stove. The married daughters have brought a long their little broods and so Grandma and Grandpa's home will be full of the sound of sweet children!

The Apple Farmer sees the half-moon pies!

Photo shoot snipets!

Now, as I wait for a phone call from the paper, I need to clean up half-moon pie crumbs and try to figure out a way to get the Apple Farmer to fire me from the orchard so I can do whatever I want this weekend!

Photo 'Phun!'

I've had the opportunity to spend some time with Camille! These photographs are from Tuesday of this week. Camille is the daughter of some friends of ours and she has just finished her first year at BYU. She is home for break and while home was hoping to be able to compile a portfolio so she can apply to BYU's art department. She really enjoys photography so she has asked for my help!

I'm really thrilled she has asked me for help and it has been inspiring for me.

I really need to get my cameras out again.

It is Camille's first time working with black and white film. She is shooting with a manual Japanese version of the Nikkormat FT2 (I have the US version of the FT2, which dear Uncle George gave me)! She is doing a great job and we are both anxious to develop her films to see what she got!

Play Time!

My Kitchen Sink is clean and shiny - so I played Photographer (and lost track of time)! ;)

I opened my original image up in photoshop elements and experimented with some fun and new things! The results are comparable to a vintage photochrom postcard from the late 1800's.

Our Butterfly Adventure

(The Story Behind the Photograph)

On the day that this photo was taken, about this time two years ago, this lovely specimen had just emerged from her chrysalis. We found her when she was a hungry green caterpillar. We put her in a jar and she made a really neat chrisalys the very next day. About 2 weeks later the crew came shrieking into my room. They excitedly shared the news of her emergence and could hardly believe that this orange and black creature was once a fat green worm! She never minded being handled, and as soon as we had all had a turn to hold our sweet little Monarch, we took her out to our zinnia bed and let her be on her merry little way.

Yay! Scanning Issue is fixed!

I just learned how to fix my scanner's bad habit of scanning what ever it wants when the negatives are really thin. Here is my first attempt using this method. This is an image from a roll of Infra-Red film. Kinda fun to see how little my photo subjects were before they landed their fabulous careers as the Attorney, the President and Human resources. My how time flies!!

Kitchen Chemistry

This post is especially for Kyle and Carli! First, I will apologize for procrastinating the develpment of these pictures! It was a bit more involved since I bought a developer that I had never used before and was unsure of the effects it would have on our already seriously underexposed film! So without further adew, this post is for you ;)

First thing was to research the developer. In the case of the HC 110, it appears that many suspect that kodak used the wrong dilution for one of their recommended development time. Unlucky for me. More research is necessary to find a general consensus for a starting point. After a couple of hours studying several development charts and a couple of good forums, I have found a starting point which two users are pretty close on. All of the other recommendations seem to be all over the board. I don't want to try this time and technique out on Kyle and Carli's film so we will try it out on a couple of rolls I shot of Her Royal Highness.

Chemicals all at 75 degrees and ready to go - I can't waste much time because our kitchen is pretty chilly this afternoon and I don't want the temperatures of my chemistry to drop!

I hope no one was planning on sitting down for lunch anytime soon!

Once one roll is completed, I find that the negatives look properly developed. I will test the same time and methods on a second roll to make sure that I get the same results. Here's what I got!

These lighting conditions were pretty similar to the lighting conditions we had when we were at Empire Mine in Grass Valley, CA - so I am feeling pretty confident that we should see similar results. The whites have texture in them and the darks have detail in them. Here goes nothing!

Here, two of the four rolls of film are getting their final rinse!

If you look closely at the negative you can see Kyle's mug shot ;)

Here are couple of the images we got (please ignore the dust spots in the pictures - I haven't had a chance to dust spot. Don't worry - the dust does come off of the negatives and when you have them printed your pictures will be perfect: