:walking wounded:

As October winds down, I've been mostly still sorting through shots from the last two photoshoots, but no extensive work on them yet. I finally got word back from Tiffany, she's busy as I expected, said something about sorting through 10,000 other images, so yeah, busy. Other work is going slowly as well because of events that took me out of my art space, mostly Halloween-oriented, and an unfortunate auto accident. Obviously I'm okay or I wouldn't be writing this, but I'm finding that I'm more damaged than I originally thought and some extra medical care is needed. Joy. But the insurance/car repair is going smoother than I expected. I'm going to dislike trading back my rental car for my old one, though.

Still on the road to NaNoWriMo next week, so depending on how that goes, there probably won't be much written here in the coming weeks except for small updates, unless something else catches my (camera) eye and/or I finish early. I already have a rough cover design for inspiration, though obviously not the final one since it's not my photo. I haven't gotten word back from the person whose photo inspired last year's novel concerning whether or not I can use her image, but no hurry on that as of yet.

I once again set up my "Halloween is My Xmas" illustration series as available for download over at deviantArt, mostly to see which one was the favorite. Hell, any interest at all is nice. This year's runaway winner is yet again this one:

So have a safe and happy Halloween and don't take any shenanigans from any delinquent spirits.

:back and forth:

This past week was mostly prep work on older artwork than creating new ones....going through the shots from last month's shoot and sending them off to the model. Out of 300 shots I narrowed it down to 90. I may do further things with them but they stand fine on their own for now, I think.

Also going through the shots from last week's shoot. Again, just simple clean up and color correction for now. I probably won't be able to revisit them until December, as most of November will be taken up by NaNoWriMo.

I was also selecting artwork for display in a show in Rhode Island, and because it's being held in a library, not much of my recent work can be shown, either because of slightly gory themes, or nudity. Interesting. So I had to go further back into my catalog than I had originally planned.

While I want to move forward and keep changing, I used to do a lot more layering with textures and lettering. Far back enough that when I had to go out and photograph said textures myself, I used a film camera. It'd be so much easier now, of course. I wonder what the places where I got them developed at thought I was doing. I like that my current photos stand well on their own, but I may try and revisit this style. Still need to have my work to stand out in some way not like others out there.

:in the park:

This past Monday we were blessed with wonderful warm weather in October, probably the last of it before the eventual decline into crappy sub-zero temperatures for too many months - trying to stay positive, honest - so I took advantage of it by having an outdoor photoshoot, with a model I haven't worked with since almost exactly a year ago. At least we seem to be getting in one shoot per year now.

We went to a park that I've done two other shoots in so far, and the nice weather seemed to inspire others; I've never seen so many people there at once, and many of them with cameras as well. Fortunately, unlike my last shoot there, clothing was involved (three outfits).

I'm finding that I'm learning something new with each shoot that I do, so of course I desire more. I learned a bit more about exposure settings on the last one that helped out this time around, and also experimented with a reflector too. Today's first lesson was that I'll need to get some sort of weights for that so that it doesn't keep falling over. And I also see why people have assistants to take care of such things, though I don't see that happening for me anytime soon.

I'm still sorting through the shots, of which there are roughly 100, and still have to finalize ones from the last shoot, but generally I'm happy with the results. Any mistakes, I can pretty much figure out what I did and will hopefully remember next time.

The shoot with this model was pretty relaxed as usual, getting moreso as the shoot went on, with things often getting goofier by the end, usually a sign that we've had our fill (the sun setting was another sign). She seemed to enjoy working with props more, this time a wooden skull that she actually requested that I bring. Here's hoping we don't wait another year for the next shoot.

I'm also gearing up for next month's NaNoWriMo, which I completed successfully last year, and intend to do so this year as well. I actually have a head start, an unfinished story that I attempted in 2009. Me being me, I already have cover art in mind, and will probably make a mockup of it before I begin. We'll see if it takes every bit of spare time like it did last year, leaving little room for other projects.

:los gatos:

I finished the cat banks, done in a Dia de Los Muertos style. They were made on the request of my sister, for some online auction/benefit thingy. Sometimes I need assignments to get creative, it seems. Although from this one, since I did the same design on both, I found that I generally prefer to create something "once." I don't know if I'd enjoy making the same thing over and over to order, at least not one so labor-intensive. Guess I'm more "artsy" than "craftsy," one reason I've yet to find a way to make Etsy work for me.

Looking ahead, I am actually going to attempt NaNoWriMo again in November, gods help me. I'm actually "cheating" a bit, with a bit of head start. I'm going to attempt to complete a novel I tried to write for the project before. At that time I was in an awful living situation that was not really conducive to creativity. Once again I don't know how this story ends, yet.

Okay, a few more shots from Tiffany's photoshoot in Salem from a few weeks ago. I still need to go through them all for the best ones, and send some off to her as well. As I've said before, she was great fun to work with, as you can see in the shot where she's not doing her regular "model" face.

If all goes well, I'll be doing another shoot this upcoming Monday, with my favorite model in one of my favorite places, as the weather is supposed to be beautiful, for mid-October in New England. Fingers crossed.