TBT: Philosophical Shopping in Art Museums

Kind of a sequel to my previous post, today's post has more photos featuring the creative decor of certain stores, Club Monaco being one of the previously mentioned ones.  The "bird" and "tree" are actually not from Club Monaco, but from Call It Spring, reason being that I wanted to save the Club Monaco photos for today's post.  I wanted to use these photos for a Philosophies - Part 2, two thousand words of wisdom captured in the photos below:

Mirrors on the wall

Cages and wings

If a picture = 1 thousand words, 2 pictures = 2 thousand yes?  Math seems to check out.

Shopping Shenanigans: Summer Fashion Trends

Thank you everyone for the overwhelmingly positive feedback on my last two posts! 

I had/still have a lot of reservations when it comes to posting photos of myself so it really means a lot to me to have such great support for this project.  I'll have to try to remember to dress nicer more often so I can have more photos for The Other Side.

For today's post, I wanted to go back to one of my most comfortable themes - Shopping Shenanigans.

If I don't travel outside of the city, two of my common places to hang out with my friends is either at a park (enjoying the sun) or at a mall (enjoying the sights).  I'm a pretty visual person so being at a mall isn't just for the simple purpose of buying things, but to also appreciate the pieces in the display windows.  I definitely consider clothing, shoes, bags and jewellery to be pieces of art; its design and execution is a result of someone's creative vision, the same way a painting or a sculpture comes to life.  Furthermore, clothes aren't just thrown onto hangers or mannequins; how things are paired together is a creative process as well.  I like the feeling of wandering the mall as it's also a way for me to gain insight to the current fashion trends while getting some light exercise, which wouldn't be the case if I were just browsing Pinterest (all I would get is carpal tunnel...)

Long strapless dress from Jacob

I'm loving the maxi trend!  This would be perfect for a cruise or a trip to Cuba.

The Other Side: Mustard Skirt for Practical Purposes

As mentioned in yesterday's post, today's will be featuring the photos from the Mustard Skirt photo shoot (see below).

This set of photos was actually taken the same day as Carlie's park and blossoms set, just a couple hours after and at a different location.

Featuring this skirt
(in case you've forgotten)

The Other Side: A Moral Dilemma

Occasionally, when I have very specific ideas for the content of a photo, I'll end up on the wrong side of the camera.

Buffalo Military Park and Marina, NY

TBT: Roots

Warning: lots of lame plant-related puns below 

Even before Anita and I decided to play dress up, I had a budding interest in photography.  One of the two things I mainly took photos of were the flowers in and around the house.  My mom's pretty into gardening, so along with all her roses and tulips, she planted the idea of photography in my brain.  

My earliest ones are what I like to call the "Windows Desktop Background" Series:

Pride

Thank you to everyone for your wonderful feedback regarding my last post!  I was filled with mixed emotions, mostly a blend of happiness and embarrassment, with a smidgen of pride.

  

Pride as an emotion has pretty negative connotations, but it's because most people think of hubris, which actually refers to being overly prideful and arrogant for no reason (think source of Shakespearean heroes' downfalls).  Pride on the other hand, is a basic human emotion that is even displayed by young children.  It is natural and yet so misunderstood.  Though I know this now, it was not always the case.

Pride is/was a difficult for me to admit.  Growing up,‎ I always felt like pride was only warranted if someone else was proud of me first, or else it'd be called arrogance.  There is definitely some cultural influence, as most Eastern cultures highly value being humble and humility as great virtues.  For me, this meant that I had to do well on an objective measure, such as a test or an exam, and then I'd be praised based on whatever number I achieved.  Although I tried to go along with this game plan, part of me knew it alone would never be enough, and as I got older, I began to see that my own creations, rather than some intangible achievement, was what brings me true happiness.  And sure enough, when I look at what I've created, my photos, my writings, and other artwork (I also draw, maybe I'll share those in a later post), I can't help but smile and in a way that I've only recently understood as pride.

And so, as part of me accepting and acknowledging pride in my work, as well as the noticeable issue with my last, Super-Post, I've added various galleries to this blog to feature my different types of photos.  They are on the top bar for easy navigation and will be more populated as time goes by (takes longer than I expected!)  It'll also serve as a nice timeline to see the progress I'm making, as the photos are captioned with the corresponding dates and locations.

I hope you'll check them out and continue to check back for more!

Kingston Mills Scenery

Brace yourself: This post has 4x as many photos as usual.

In the past, scenery has always been my least favourite thing to shoot.  No matter how beautiful it looks to my eyes, I've never managed to accurately translate what I see on to a photo.  I've tried and tried and have always been disappointed, and it only takes so many disappointments to become discouraged.  And to be honest, portrait shots seem to be more rewarding, since you can physically see a person's happiness and hear their thanks.  That's why even if I find a good landscape, it'll always just become background to a model.

This weekend, we were taking a family trip out of the city and naturally I brought my camera along.  It was about 2/3rds into the long stretch of the highway when we stopped for some gas, and heading back on pointed us towards the setting sun.  I'm not sure what I was thinking given my track record, but I picked up my camera anyway and snapped up a few shots, this one being my favourite:

TBT: Gratitude

I decided to do another throwback Thursday post to thank someone very important to me as well as to my photography journey.  It's almost blasphemous that I haven't mentioned her yet but I wanted to make sure the post I write does her justice.

Here is a shot of the cutie in question:

:)

Photoshoot: White Umbrella and Pink Blossoms

My meeting with Mr Moth was actually quite critical in my photography journey.  I went home that and excitedly recounted the story to whoever would listen (sometimes more than once, but in my defense, the second time I had visual aids).  That was when I realized that in addition to taking photos, I love to tell the stories that go along with them.  And so the moth story really strengthened my desire to start a blog.

The next day, I had planned a photoshoot session with Carlie, who happened to be back from Waterloo that weekend.  Humbled by my encounter with Mr Moth, I told myself to try my best but not to expect too much too soon, especially since I had never photographed Carlie before.  It's always a little more daunting when you don't know what your model is going to be like, because they can really set the tone for the shoot.  Luckily for me, Carlie was very enthusiastic.  Not everyone is gifted with the model gene like Amanda, but I really appreciated how receptive Carlie was to my suggestions, and I left that day with approximately 100 or so shots from the short span of an hour.

Classic Carlie, so elegant yet casual

Park Day

Shortly following the successful shopping outing, I called up my friend and neighbour Laurel, who recently came back from Waterloo, to hang out.  I felt empowered with a new sense of motivation and was eager to get more photos.

Unfortunately, not everything always goes as planned.  It was a lazy, sunny day, and both Laurel and I were in whatever shorts and t-shirt we found lying around the house.  We headed to the park to sit and catch up and naturally gravitated to the swings, and then the see-saw (we're grown adults, we can sit on whatever we want).

I snapped up this shot:

Look at this cutie patootie