May 24, 2009

Merrily we Roll Along

What with the trip to the farmer's market, the purchase and subsequent fiddling with the camera, making dinner, and cleaning, I didn't get much chance to stitch yesterday. Today the chores can go whistle--I'm working on a case of advanced stitchy butt with Heartstring Primitives' "1763 Sampler." I'm stitching this project on 34 ct. Oaten Scone Legacy Linen from the yard I bought last week, using AVAS threads instead of the called-for DMC. I pulled the DMC colors and then tried to find a close match to each of them; the blues are a little off from their DMC counterparts, but no less pleasing color-wise, I think.
9:30 a.m.

11:30 a.m.

1:00 p.m.

I've even put the needle to a couple of other projects--Alphabetissimo and Peaceful Paradise.
Diana asked how the camera is handling the pets, and here are a couple of examples. This is easy: daylight, a small amount of movement. Scratchy moves very little except to change positions during naptime. This is a cat who basically eats and sleeps. Here he's contemplating dinner.

More challenging: incandescent light, no flash, fast-moving bunny. I played quite a bit with the settings. I don't love the results of low-light action shots, but it does much better than my old point & shoot. I'll still use my DSLR for low light, which means eventually I'll have to pick up another zoom lens. I still have a zoom for it, but it's very large and very heavy, and can't manage macro. I'll take a look at B&H Photo in New York (online) at their used equipment. Once I'm through with this degree, I'd love to take some photo courses. I'd like to be a better photographer and use my equipment more fully. By the way, something I learned yesterday from the photo lady: don't just plop your new memory card into your camera and start shooting. Take the time to properly format it for the camera (it's in your camera settings under "menu") and it's less likely to fail (don't format a card with photos on it in your camera or you'll wipe out all the pictures on the card, and also, from the photo lady, in horror: "why do you have 500 photos on that card!?" And don't do as I tend to--just toss the memory card in a drawer when you're done. Save the case the card comes in, and put it away so it doesn't get dirty or scraped. Who knew!
Pink: "Gotta dash."
See you soon!

12 comments:

Theresa said...

Ha~~ The bunny shot is so funny~~ It's always so difficult to get a decent shot on pets.... I tried with my pet fish, they move so fast its always a blur...
Great progress on your WIP!!

Deb said...

Love the progress pictures on your WIP. It's going to be a beauty.

quiltcat said...

The south-end of the north-running bunny is hilarious! Scratchy is very cute...looks like he's definitely thinking about his next meal.

I highly recommend B&H for used equipment...the 28mm lens that i used all the time to take pictures at quilt shows with my Minolta SLR fell apart from old age (the glue holding the inside pieces of the lens in place dried up). My local camera shop sneered and said they don't make lenses for that camera anymore and Minolta won't fix them and i'd have to replace the camera body and all my lenses. B&H found me a replacement lens that was newer, hence lighter, than my old lens, for a very reasonable price.

I'm envious of your progress on your sampler...i must do some sewing and cardmaking this weekend!

grace said...

Your WIP looks wonderful. It's so fun to see the progress you made over the day. :D
Love the gotta dash photo!

samplerlover said...

Your WIP is wonderful. It is lovely to see your progress during the day.
Love your bunny shot.

Margaret said...

I love your WIP! You picked wonderful AVAS substitutes. Gorgeous! Love the action shot of the bunny. Great stuff! :D

Melissa said...

Well, that design is looking more enticing with every post you do! Nice progress.

Love the pet photos!

RG said...

Oh the digital photog world is so broad!! I sort of just aim, do a bit of telephoting if the scene is too far away, and push the button!

I am happy that it is so much easier to take and share pictures, even if they aren't the best.

Great work on the stitching ..

Anonymous said...

Cute tongue & bum shots! I can't get decent photos under incandescent lights either.. bump up the ISO too much and it gets noisy, lower the ISO and everything's blurry. Sometimes I use the built-in flash, but I generally dislike the harshness of colours when flash is used. I'd love to take up some photo courses too.. lots for me to improve on, lol!

P/S: Great progress on the design :)

Annemarie said...

Had to laugh when I say thw pics of the furry creatures. Very sweet.
Your stitching looks mighty scrumptious, Ma'am!

d. moll, l.ac. said...

The WIP is growing and growing! Nice fur face on the feline and Pink's dash, wOW, lots of bum lift there....

Ann (bunnygirl) said...

I love the action shot, blurry or no. It looks like mine.