Smoke and Mirrors

Today was a lovely day.
I woke up and looked at the time on my phone. It said it was 15:36.
I got up, turned on my laptop, and realised it was actually 11:36.
Ahhh it feels nice to gain four hours to your day =D
Yesterday evening, our internet connection stopped working for no reason. It used to do this a lot back when we first moved here, in July. I did not expect it to happen again since it had not happened for nearly four months. Inconvenient as it was, I'm sort of glad it did happen because I spent the day in my garden, taking photos, and by the time I'd uploaded them to edit the internet was up and running again =D.
It's amazing how much time one can burn with a camera, some flowers and a mirror though:


































































































































































































































































































On my travels about my garden I also met a froggy couple (No, I'm not being Frenchist, they were actually two frogs/toads)

Photography.

I. LOVE. Photography.
More than taking photos, more than seeing photos I have taken and thinking "Wow. I took that", I love seeing others' photos and having no thoughts. Just gasping and wanting to look and look and look. To me, that is what makes a photo excellent. Not thinking "Aww isn't that pretty" "What a fantastic composition" "Such beautiful colours" but being rendered utterly breathless at whatever is squeezed into that rectangle.

There are two types that I love. They are so similar and so very different.

The first, the one I've tried my hand at most, are the ones that tell stories because you plan them to. They SCREAM stories. You think of the story...the idea...the concept...and then you create your photo to suit it. These photos are planned and carefully executed.
Like so:


Pretty much all of Chrissie White's photography demonstrates this; you can just see her imagination overflowing into her photos.

The second are the ones that tell stories but have no planned stories behind them. They are people, they are places, they are candid. I so hope that I one day master this type of photography as, when done correctly (not that there is any right or wrong or rules in place) it just blows me away.
Billy Gomez, who writes as well as captures beautifully, has great examples of this type.
dockmaster (hm, not sure of her real name), Sean Wood, and this dude, who inspired me to write this blog, are more of my favourites

I think both of these kinds produce such unique photos and are what I think of as art. Anyone can find a pretty location, wait for some pretty light, get their pretty subject in pretty clothes to pose nicely and process prettily and end up with an "Ohh isn't that a lovely shot" photo.
I'm not saying I don't appreciate these photos, and I think that they DO take skill. I've even considered having my own newborn photography business which would mean doing exactly that, day in day out.
I'm not saying those kinds of photos are meaningless or not artistic. They document life and people and that is important.
But there is SUCH a difference between photography and just having a good camera, some nice lenses, good light and a subject.

If you come across this, whether you're into photography or not, pleeaase take a look at some of the photographers I've linked to. Their images just amaze me!

Meeee

I was a bit bored earlier and discovered one of these personality measurement thingies, I'd done a BBC one before which summed me up pretty well as a strategist but this site gives actual percentages for each section of your personality:



This makes me a craftsman!

It said my primary function (that makes me sound like a robot with only one task or something =|) is introverted thinking. I thought that was pretty spot on as the main thing I do is think..to myself...XD

But it turns out it means this:
"Thinking people make decisions based on logic, so the introverted thinking function allows a person to categorize and analyze data. Is it the ability to identify inconsistencies, know how things work and problem-solve."

I then took their multiple intelligence test, which shows you which types of intelligences (if that makes any sense) are your strongest.



I guessed which my top three would be before taking it and was pretty sure my "interpersonal intelligence" (Basically being sociable =P) would be horrible. It turns out it's so bad it doesn't even appear on this scaled down version XD

Anyway, it's all here in more detail, should anyone wish to see more about the workings of my blob of pinky grey matter or find out about their own.

London

Ahhh London.
I recently seemed to have misplaced my photography mojo and thus decided to take a trip to the fine city and see if I might find it anywhere about the place.
I looked pretty much EVERYWHERE and discovered a few things: Walking in the direction of shiny buildings is a good idea; Buying incense from Camden for a pound is a bad idea; There's a beach right in the heart of the city, by the Thames of course, but it looks and smells and feels like a beach, and it is MOST odd to see London's famous skyline on the horizon as you stand with the shore lapping upon the pebbles; People WILL give you funny looks for doing certain things but it really doesn't matter; The standard size of a Sainsbury's is purely an opinion that varies from person to person; Pavements will try and steal your shoes.

So did I find my mojo? That I don't know. Whilst snapping away I never thought "Ooh, this is it! This is THE shot." But I certainly came back with a few I now love, a gorgeous Hamleys bear, a lungful of city air (yum yum) and the huge desire to return sometime soon, for more reasons than I've mentioned here ;)






























































































































































































































































































































































































































































































I love this one; I just find it hilarious ^

It begins

So I FINALLY sat down and planned out how I'm going to go about my CIMA accounts course. It took about 2 hours to write out my timetable, which shows what I will be doing from day 1 - 38. I doubt the course will take me 38 days; I'm not going to be doing it every single day, but hopefully I'll have completed it within a couple of months, leaving plenty of revision time for the exam in November.

I've a lovely organised desk and notice board so I can CONCENTRATE (Hopefully.)









































I also pulled out the pencil skirt I'd bought in the Christmas holidays for school, not knowing I'd never return (well other than for meetings with my headteacher, trying to persuade me to)

Goths and chavs do not mix.

As we discovered today.
Had a lovely time taking photos of Immi and Lizzy, dressed quite gothicly (is that a word?!). Unfortunately our shooting time was cut somewhat short as we had to flee from rowdy chavs XD. I'm still pretty happy with the ones we got: