biscuits (and an orange)

having kids is teaching me to let go of the need for things to be just so, the urge to always be in control. it’s not my strongest point but there are times when i can just step back and see what happens, no right or wrong, helping without guiding. and guess what? it turns out that sometimes more is more.

it seems that keeping my playback display on the nikon set to highlights is reaping rewards. it entails a bit of extra work at the photoshop end, but i’m much happier with the results. both of these pictures gave me unpleasantly blown areas when exposed ‘correctly’ according to the camera’s meter. it’s easy enough for me to assess the overall exposure without the histogram, but the flashing alert is great to remind me to look closer at those fragile highlights. i compensated way down so the highlights were correctly exposed, then tweaked the levels to bring back the midtones. there’s a bit of extra noise in the shadows, but i can live with that.

orchid

two fingers up to logical number sequences! lol, i thought i posted this already. i was given two beautiful orchids as new baby presents. the person who handed one to me with a stern entreaty that i would look after it wouldn’t i shall remain nameless…

disguise

it’s a privilege, a renewal, to share in M’s childhood. it’s so much fun. the simple joys of cheap plastic disguises, advent calendars, eating raw biscuit dough and keeping pet hailstones in the freezer

it’s swiftly becoming apparent that - especially at this time of the year - any time to myself during daylight hours is a rare pleasure. i’m going to find it hard to be happy with the aesthetic side of my pictures, so i guess i’ll have to concentrate on trying to tell the story.