More Stuck In..side

 -18

The mules are officially out of water and today will be the high of zero, dammit.
I'll get it done though. I will carry them water this morning and put it in pans and this afternoon when the temps rise, I'll fill the large tank. Where there is a will, there is a way.

Yesterday I 'played' with the converted Full Spectrum camera. I found that I can get interesting colors that are slightly strange if I use the camera without the Infrared Spectrum filters. 

I did this photo with a 665nm Filter.

The shot below is where I took all the photos using just the light from the back door which faces north.

Behold the mess. Old antique boxes stacked with a piece of plywood and a lid to an antique box for the back stop. Paper for any textured back grounds.

My dear friend from Alabama sent me some darling little toys via Amazon. I can't wait to take them to the woods for some adventures. Charlie is perplexed with the wind up toys and will take his nose and tip them over while they are walking.

The shot below is with no filter on it. 

Okay. When converting a camera a clear filter replaces the one inside your camera that blocks IR light. A camera converted this way is also used often in Astrophotography as it picks up light differently. No, I haven't tried that yet, but I may  try it when the temperatures are much nicer outside!

The tiny fake flower in the little brown bottle is actually bright red and the colors in the paper below should be a bit more orange. If I put the 'hot' filter on the lens, the camera would see the light as any normal camera would.

Next up, my wooden toys sent to me by a childhood friend. 

The marbles in back are actually clear and the paper is black with white grunge markings on it.

Bored yet?

Infrared is considered an artsy, non traditional, and way out there type of photography. The scenes that can be shot are pretty neat. However there is a lot more work to the final product depending on how a person wants it to appear. Post processing can be hard. Everyone argues over white balances and RAW files along with how to channel swap...or not to. 
My take away is this. I consider Infrared to be a license to do odd and beautifully strange photography. 

This is a place I am comfortable with. I have so many trials and errors that I am grateful that I have a digital camera and not film.

On a good note. Tomorrow we are supposed to get UP to 12 degrees! I'm considering putting on shorts and flip flops.
Yeah.

I may even start the Subaru and go to town for some groceries. Meanwhile, stay warm and safe. 

~~~ 

Late afternoon Update: I laid out the hose on top of the snow and used the sled to transport about 50 gallons out to the tank. What a workout! 

Be Chilled My Heart

I don't do Valentine's Day. But that is okay, I don't have a grudge against it, I just don't buy into it anymore.

So everyone loves to talk about weather. -15F translates into -26C? I never understood why we don't all use the same measurements. But that is for another day.
I know others are much colder. And I looked at the forecast for us. -17 tonight and Monday? Oh bother.

I measured the temp in the shed yesterday, because it actually felt a bit colder. It wasn't but it was out of the sun so that made it feel so much colder inside.

This is how the girls spend their afternoons. I get obsessed by worrying if they are warm enough. 
Everyone gets about twice the amount of hay during this cold spell. And thankfully, no one is showing signs of cold. 

When I had a place in the flat lands of Kenosha, I had to have a run in for my horses. There was no place for the equine to get out of the wind. 

I am literally going stir crazy inside. It is too dangerous to go hiking even if I get out of the winds. I'm wearing a mask, over the glasses goggles, and a fur lined hat. The secret of keeping warm hands?

My Grandmother's hand made knit mittens with a pair of little knit gloves underneath.

Grandma's Secret Weapon
Knit Mittens

I tried the insulated gloves that are called HotShots and every other high tech glove. Nothing. works like mittens. I've even been able to open gates with them on. If I have to put a halter on someone, I do have to pull the mitten off.

Watering has become a nightmare. The hoses work well and drain from the top of the hill at the outside hydrant. In the past, when we had these cold temps, Rich would help me drain hoses after disconnecting them. With subzero temps and one person, the draining doesn't work as well.

[Yes, one time the outdoor hydrant froze up. That was once in 30+ years. A year when we had no ground cover but subzero temps for an extended period of time.]

Mittens crossed that I don't have to fill the tank until Monday afternoon? With a high of 3 degrees, I may be able to get 'er done. 

Oh and for the curious. The mailman DID show up! His huge Jeep with knobby snow/mud tires could handle just about anything thrown at him. So now that he knows where the house is, I wonder if he'll make deliveries next time. 

I spoke with him this summer at the post office and he told me he couldn't find our house. True Story.

So for those who celebrate, Happy Valentine's Day.

For me? Just a daily outdoor chore challenge and then a day of walking about this tiny cottage waiting for a chance to get out and hike.

Stir Crazy.

Stuck inside

 Normally if the outside air temp gets to zero or just above or the wind is not too severe, I would be out and about. At least exploring the frozen creek. In fact I was looking forward to it.

Instead I pulled some lower back muscles and kind of mucked myself up. I think Grandma had a different word for it. 'Stove up.' Not sure where that comes from but dang it is how I have felt for the past few days.

Chores are a work of agony in a way. I have to use a hay fork and pile up hay in a huge sled and drag it out then toss it around. Thank goodness for the heated stock tank, but draining the hoses after filling it was another interesting experience.

Rest, Ice, and reading have been my new companions. Also getting yelled at gently by my hubby. 
Today I have to drive him to the Madison VA for his shot. Good, at least it will be in a facility that can help if he has a reaction. [My biggest worry]

So, because I'm going stir crazy, I decided to get out some items and follow an instructional video on specular lighting and Still Life.

Charlie has been doing his best to deal with no daily walks. I think he is doing better than I am!

So the Video Dude said to get out a bunch of things that would throw off light.
Check...

So the gnome doesn't throw off highlights but in the back of my mind I wanted to mess around with the gnome and the paperweight anyway.
The Video Dude said to 'sketch out' Still Life set ups. Pfft. That never worked for me at all. I just start placing stuff here and there and go with it. Video Dude said to follow the Rule of Thirds, to use the L shape for interest and leading lines. 

Um.

Then he went on to close all the light from HIS windows and then brought out a Light Stand with a Soft Box diffuser on it. 
Oh.
Granted, he was using HIS dining room table in an apartment, but he was using lights I didn't have ...and a flash tethered to his camera. Um. Not stuff I have or am going to invest in unless I become a person who sells my stuff.

I stopped the video. I'd thought it was going to present me with some ideas on how to do some Still Life without the fancy lights.
Poo.

So I got out my scrap piece of felt and draped it over the laptop, a chair and across the table. Then positioned the Gnome and the glass paperweight.

The idea was to get reflections off the glass orb and light up one side of the Gnome's face. So I sort of did a low key shot with specular highlights. That sounds like a mouthful. Basically I moved things around with the felt cloth until I could 'control' the light. No flash, no soft box. Just the kitchen table and felt.

I was happy with that and decided to try something else. I placed a board down on the old busted chair and draped the cloth over it. I'd put a sheet up to tone down the sunlight coming in from the porch and to keep the afternoon sun from shining in on Rich's face while he was watching TV.

The poster board was supposed to reflect a tiny bit of light on gnome and dragons for highlights.

The shot before darkening the black.

The shot after darkening the black felt and highlighting the beard and dragon faces.

I have some more 'polishing' to do on the black, but here are the first drafts.

Next up. 

The sleeping dragon and the Wizard Gnome.

Before.

After.

Oh yes, should I include the grumpy guy on the couch? I kept walking back and forth in front of the TV while setting things up and shooting. He kept sighing.

I set up some more dragons and items but I'll save that for another time.

I did shoot my English Ivy plant but was so disappointed in all the reflections on the pot.

The fix? Easy. Crop the sucker!

I'm still going to figure out ... I hope, how to take glass objects and figure out how to control the light and reflections. It will take sheets, felt, windows, and creative thinking along with a lot of mistakes.

But I may as well make use of my time while I am stuck inside.

The Big Chill

I know it was cold very cold.

Cold enough to keep me from catching my breath when I went outside if I pulled my second scarf down.
There was a wind chill on the first day that was brutally cold, it cut through my two layers and my heavy coveralls.

But the hay needed to be put out.

I went out as soon as they cleaned up their morning hay and gave them more. The water in the heated tank steamed.

Later on I looked out the window and saw mules relaxing in the sunshine. They were sound asleep.

Not a great shot, but there you go. Siera and Sunshine sleeping in the sunshine during a Polar Vortex.

This morning was absolutely beautiful, the snow sparkled with little reflections of white.
The treeless pasture in front of the house had been windswept.

This morning's temperature was supposed to be something like -32, but there was no longer a wind.

I bundled up and took Mica her morning warm water. She drank and snuffled for her morning grain. Everyone has frost on their eyelashes.

Somewhere in the distance I heard a loud pop. I recall hearing that trees did that in super subzero temperatures. A little later I could hear the neighbor's vehicle driving up the gravel road from nearly a mile away.
The snow sparkled, the sun topped the trees...
and the morning was spectacular but cold.

We'd made it through the worst.