Fall

Bikes on fence- Tina Elkins photo stylist; photographer Mark Galbreath

This is a shot from a couple years ago, but it is one of my favorite fall themes- the autumn bicycle. It is probably my favorite time to ride although I get very little opportunity. Fall is pretty unpredictible for weather, and it is always such a busy time here at home just getting ready for winter. But I love riding through the glory of fall color, and the crisp air is such a relief too after the summer heat and humidity.

I've been busy shooting all season and I wish that I could share some of those images, but they will have to wait a little while. The blue bike in this photo saw some more fall action this year. I recently did a photo session with the same blue vintage Murray bike where I had a little boy riding along a country lane with a great big pumpkin on the rear rack! I love to use the bikes in every season, even winter. In a few weeks I will post a shot that I styled last winter with my own vintage Schwinn bike. (The card will be available on the market by then so I can show the image.)

This is a recent shot, another outtake, from a floral photo session. This was a bouquet of mixed flowers all in delicate pinks and corals, offset with wonderful fuzzy lambs ears. I especially love the anenome - it is so gently blushed with pink. Often anenomes come in very bright, strong solid colors- super dark purple and rich reds are pretty common. The whites are pretty common too, but delicate colors and shadings are harder to find, and this one is outstanding. These shadings are actually accidental- they show up randomly, often mixed in with solid colors. To my great joy, this whole bunch of white anenomes came blushed with pink; I always savor floral anomalies like these.

Dramatic Sky shot in the Cuyahoga Valley, May 2013

Although I have not posted recently, I am still out there shooting all of the time. I actually pulled down at least 3 posts because the images were too close to ones that I did for greeting card work, but this one can get posted. Believe it or not, I stepped out of a movie theater and shot this in a parking lot! I will admit to retouching out some annoying utility poles and the edge of a building, but otherwise this shot is not heavily retouched, Once in awhile I just get lucky!

I have been shooting a mix of things around my home for my day job, and indeed most of that cannot be posted at this time, but here are a couple that can be shared.

This is my major distraction- what free time I have anymore I spend practicing guitar. This is my new guitar, a classical cutaway by Cordoba. I love the slightly modified neck design on this guitar- just a tiny bit more narrow and a little bit better contoured to fit my fairly small hands. I put my guitars away after college and quite thoroughly forgot what meager things that I ever knew. That is until about 2 years ago. I tried to work on it on my own at first, but I broke down and started lessons almost a year ago. It's been difficult at times, but I am making progress enough to feel that I deserve a decent guitar! I am not a classical guitarist per se, but I love the mellow sound of nylon strings and I am working on fingerstyle technique so it is perfect for me right now.

Here is an item from the vast collection of things that I live with. This is a vintage pinball game that is played with marbles shot by a spring loaded pull-knob. Another board that I photographed made it into the image bank, but this one didn't. Still, I love the vintage lettering and the little pins.

My Greenhouse Cottage Fantasy

©Tina Elkins 2012;  Instagram shot from iPhone; all rights reserved.

I grabbed this shot this past week at a location shoot. We shot at a little B&B -a lovely little white on white shabby chic farmhouse located in the middle of the rolling countryside outside of Mt Vernon, Ohio. I spent an unbelievable amount of time working late on my props and getting my sets ready for my photographer! I know we got some great stuff, but I was too busy to even snapshot my sets on my phone- out of nearly 20 setups I think I snapped 3 pictures!

The is one I set up on a whim late in the evening. I was trying to get my sets ready for our second day of shooting when it struck me that if I was going to shoot anything at night it had to be right then and there. I started setting it up intending to shoot it myself, but thankfully my photographer Mark stayed up late to shoot it for me. His shot is better than my Instagram snap, but I still think it is lovely shot of candles in and around a vintage style birdcage surrounded by Norfolk pines and lemon cypress.

I found this little house to be really inspiring; it indulges a fantasy that I have about living in a greenhouse cottage. Although styles come and go, the shabby chic thing has had real staying power because it is adaptable, comfortable, and easy to work with on any budget. You don't have to be a designer or stylist to understand the appeal of white on white or chippy paint. 20 years ago it looked all lacey and Victorian, but recently the look has been reinvented with a more sophisticated French farmhouse/Scandinavian vibe.  Check out the terrific hardbound book The New French Decor; Living with Timeless Objects by Michele Lalande. I have been drawing much inspiration from this book over the last 4 years or so. If only my real life looked anything like this!

Winter Photography

Lantern on gatepost, shot on iPhone- Tina Elkins;  all rights reserved

My job has kept me super busy this past month! We haven't had a lot of good snowy winters here along the south shore of Lake Erie for awhile, but this year has seen something of a return to the kind of winters that I remember before global warming. As you can imagine, the demand for snow scenes for Christmas cards at American Greetings is huge, and we haven't been able to shoot very much outside for the last several years. So, given the snowfall this year, I decided to concentrate on outdoor scenes for awhile.

I have been wanting to shoot at Hale Farm and Village now for many years, and this year turned out to be my opportunity. Hale Farm and Village is an open air historic village of early 19th century buildings from the northeast counties of Ohio (known as the Western Reserve). It is a splendid collection of classic New England style early Ohio architecture, and the setting includes wonderful gate posts and a variety of fences. So I hung wreaths, tied bows, swagged fences with garland and set candle lanterns around the village in some seriously cold but snowy weather (the first day we shot the temperatures barely hit 17 degrees F- mighty chilly when you are out in it for 8 or 9 hours!). We had a tough day on day 1, but crazily the weather broke, so I revised some of my decorations while traipsing through the rain and mud in 60 degree weather the following week! Day 2 of shooting was back to winter in 20 degree weather but with more lovely fluffy snow- just perfect for Christmas cards.

I worked so hard that I took very few phone pictures to document what we did, but wait for the cards to come out- I think they will be wonderful. This is one of several lantern shots that I staged.

Lantern and fence line, iPhone snapshot by Tina Elkins, all rights reserved

This image of a lantern on a stone gate post was taken strictly as a reference on the first shooting day so that I could tweak it for a final photo on the second shooting day. It is actually pretty similar to our final shot so I have put a big "red flag" message on it, but I think it illustrates how being in a unique environment (like an historic village) can give you that instant "magic" that makes a shot a greeting card shot. I know that there are places out in the big world where scenes like this can still be found, but they sure don't fall into your lap! There are fewer and fewer views like this one, so I dearly cherish these places when I find them.

Conneaut Beach in the headlights ©Tina Elkins 2013

I started the new year out right on the usually frozen beaches of Lake Erie! We had a freak 60º day a couple of weeks ago, soon after New Years day, which allowed my son to do a science fair project on microplastics found on Great Lakes beaches.

Whatever, it meant I spent the weirdly warm day in my shirtsleeves wading in the cold lake water in my rubber boots. (My son eventually took off his leaky boots and went in barefoot- not recommended). I took the pictures of course, and at the very end of the day of photographing sand and beach debris, this was my reward. I love unusual lighting as well as the dramatic skies of sunset so I guess this was a bit of a two-fer. Shot with my ASA cranked all the way, balancing my camera on the hood of the car, it's not that bad. Might actually have been good if I had a tripod, but such is life.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Conneaut contrails ©Tina Elkins 2013

This was the sky shortly before dark. The jet contrails are unavoidable so I simply embrace them as some kind of emblematic writing or markings. As a painter I make a lot of these kind of marks on my paintings. They serve many purposes both in terms of the content of the art and as formal art elements. I use a lot of science and technology based ideas and imagery overlayed on top of beautiful color fields. I guess you have to look no further than this to figure out where I draw some of my inspiration from!
I'll post this on my long neglected art blog too (www.tinaelkinsart.blogspot.com) My hectic life keeps me out of the painting studio for long periods, but I usually go back to it refreshed and ready to make new art. That time will be soon; here in the dead of winter I will fire up my encaustic tools, torches, hotpots and hotplates in my unheated attic studio. You'd be amazed at how the tools, hotpots, lights and my space heater can make it pretty tolerable temperature wise.