Hot Weather and building stick houses

The weather for this Sunday is going to be very steamy and dangerously hot again through Monday.  

I've scrubbed water tanks and refilled them along with making sure the mules and pony have access to good shade already along with an area where they can stand under trees and catch any breeze that might come through.

I'm bummed. I was hoping to go camping in our woods for the weekend.

I got all my work done by 10am yesterday and then worked in the gardens. 

I decided to return to the stick house and see what I could come up with.

My helpers were all ready and raring to go.

The roofing is supposed to look haphazard and rough with bits of bark and moss. 

The next part was to paint and decorate the cardboard it is on. I'll 'make' it into a diorama I can use indoors or outdoors. [Not weather proof!]

This is my version of 'Free' building. Otherwise I'd want to purchase a set of Legos to build. If I had room, I'd build a whole set of these 'forest' huts and lay it out on my 5 foot craft table as a tiny forest town.

So as it turned steamy in the afternoon, I decided to finish my project.

I painted the cardboard to look like dirt.

Then I added chunks of decorated bark and roots that I had made last year. 

The bark chunks came from a downed tree and the pine cones came from our pine trees.

I don't glue down the other bits of roots and bark I am using so I can change the look as I need to. 

I also don't draw out plans or think much of what I am doing. I just punt it because that's how my creative juices flow.

If I add something and it looks neat, I keep it. If it doesn't, I toss it.

Cardboard. Moss. Bark. Glue. Craft Paint. Fake Mushrooms. Some fake moss.

Railroad model flowers. 

Imagination.

I added two of my favorite minifigures who are very much at home in the their magical forest.

...and then,

I set up my first scene to photograph.

I can use this stick building for so many things. The structure will fit a number of toys I have. The sides of the building can provide an interesting back drop for all sorts of scenes.

The best part about the whole thing is that it was built mostly from things I picked up in the yard at no cost!

Other Stick houses I've made:

Here is an old stick village I made and used for some scenes out in the woods. It was fun and when I left parts of it out in the forest to use again, some wild animal thought it would be great to pull it apart.

No harm done, I can always find more sticks to build with!

Today looks like a good day to beat the heat and enjoy some time reading and doing some Still Life Photography.

Lego Photography, Saran Wrap, and Cotton Balls

Yipee! I finally got around to these wonderful space 'cadets' from Aurora! Since the theme for the gifts were about spring, I had to use the gift packet of Zinnias along with another seed packet for a background.

Just behind Bugsy and Charlene are Lego flowers from the Botanical Collection.

Flowers
the universal language of
love....

When I saw these two I knew immediately that they would fall for each other. After all, it is my social statement for these times. We don't have to look alike to like each other!

The cold and rain has descended on us Sunday with icy conditions overnight and then 45 degrees and sunny on Monday.

While doing medications for hubby, I had to pull out some long cotton wads from a script bottle I opened.

I walked over to where Rich was having coffee and grabbed the Green Lego Dragon off the shelf and proclaimed that the Dragon Will Breath Fire!

I dropped the cotton wads next to the Dragon.

Rich shook his head and said, "Your cr..aa... your not right.. and ... they said I was crazy!" He patted my hand and gave me that look that said he was so sorry for me.

I went back to sorting and replied. "Just wait! I'll make him breath fireballs with that cotton!"

[No, I did not light the cotton on fire!]

 Rich gave me the roll of the eyes and then stated: "The guys with the white coats, um...they will get straight coats for you...and take you away." He chuckled. He is always amused by the way my mind works.

When I get into a 'creative' mood with an idea in mind, I can close off the world around me. He went to take a nap. The rain came down in sheets outside and I proceeded to get into the 'zone'. 

Creating a project requires that I have everything else in the area cleaned up and prepped. So I vacuumed, dusted, and cleaned the downstairs so I wouldn't have any further distractions.

My little table is in a spot that also has the oxygen concentrator so I have to step around that and deal with the oxygen tubing. However... it is how things are in our tiny house, so I deal with it.

Just so you know. I don't have a 'studio' for doing my photography. My creations are done at our table...

Dragon drinking water in the forest....amazing what a laptop can do...and what some saran wrap can create for an illusion!

result:

 

or done in the living room....

This is what the set up looked like. Cotton wadding from medicine bottles stuck with sticky tack to the dragon and castle.

 

I put a Ulanzi Light behind the drawbridge door and pointed it with a snout at the cotton wadding.

 

I turned off the overhead light and used another small Ulanzi light to light up the dragon's face.

 

Both photos were shot with a Lensbaby Sweet 50 with an f stop of 4.

 

 

The cotton 'fire' was enhanced slightly with dynamic contrast in DxO labs.

 

How many times did I do this before getting a successful shot?

 

About 20!

 

I learned about using cotton balls while pursuing Lego photos in both Flickr, Instagram, and FB Lego photos.

 

The end result:

And off I go to face another week.

And the animals come in....

I believe this herder was supposed to be taking care of his small flock of critters. However, it looks like he had a bit too much wine and didn't properly put his farm animals away...

In the early morning, it seems they pushed open the door and decided to help themselves to whatever the herdsman had in the house.

This is a building was from FunHole Wood-Cabin set. It is a Lego like build with the same sort of bricks. It was the very first 'build' I did over a year ago. It has two floors and came with lighting that integrates with the bricks. 

It was a difficult build and the bricks don't fit as tightly as Lego bricks do, but I enjoy using its detailed inside once in a while to have some fun. It has a kitchen, a wood stove, and a bathroom complete with a tub, sink, and mirror. The upstairs has a bedroom and a desk. There is a ladder that goes from the first floor to the loft.

I've used the outside of the building and porch for other photo scenes and I've taken this room apart and rearranged it several times. My favorite part is the wood stove that actually lights up. Most of the wiring and the contacts do work on this build but to my dismay or ineptitude, not all the ones do.

I took the roof and the upstairs off. Under the first floor, there is a circuit board with wires that runs through the bricks and lights things up. The porch lights, stove and bathroom lights work in this shot. There is a battery box in the lower right side of this photo.

I used a warm light [which actually looks green in this shot] to shine on the partially open front door.

I used another tiny Ulanzi light in a warm color to light up the interior.

And lastly, I stuck the face mister and turned it on so it would make the open door glow like morning sunlight. It also made the wood stove light glow. [I put it in the bathroom and opened the door!]

The herder kept falling off the couch so I had to use a tiny piece of sticky tack to hold him in place.

I had several tries before I was partially satisfied with a shot. Contrary to popular belief, this isn't so easy and it takes a lot of adjustments!

This was another idea I had just pop into my head Sunday morning while I was waiting for our company to show up. I couldn't go out in the heavy rain and winds to work on Princess Sara's story, so I had to fill my 'waiting' time with something else.

I ended up using a 30mm lens with a smaller aperture to try and get all of the animals in focus. 

It was not a one and done. I had to really experiment with settings and lights because I kept getting things too dark, too light, or too many harsh shadows. I had to be careful with the mister also especially when I let it run too long and everything in one photo had droplets on it!

And then! Yesterday the sunshine in the morning was brilliant and beautiful. So I could take Princess Sara out....

and begin another part of her wandering story...

Princess Sara and the Frog's Quest

Ideas sort of start out randomly. I had this partial building that the grandkids had left me and wanted to try and do something with it.

I took out Princess Sara and her stick horse and set her in the building. I added another character and then just messed with ideas that bounced around in my head. [My husband says it is an echo chamber inside my brain!]

Some time ago, while bored, I watched a video about how you can extend a building for photography by using a mirror. I thought I'd try it. 

To create an optical illusion, I added flowers to the back where I took the wall down. If seen 'in' camera and slightly out of focus, the flowers and bricks seem to be part of the set.

The kids had left some holes in the walls of their build so I thought I'd try putting lights through them to make the scene a bit more interesting. These are some Ulanzi lights I purchased on the cheap for some other still life work.

What it looks like from above.

What it looks like from behind the camera.

I wanted to add a bit of atmosphere to the scene. There are all sorts of ways to add atmosphere. Photographer's Atmosphere [very pricey atmosphere in a spray can], fog machines [very pricey, but now they make hand held ones], and a simple battery operated face mister. The face mister has an arrow pointing to it....

To add the mist, I simply turned it on and lay it on its side next to the open space that the light was shining through.

The scene as it looked in camera.👆

I kept moving minifigs around and finally decided to have Princess Sara talking to a tiny frog. I mean all good stories have a Princess and a Frog right?

I swapped out the Acorn person for a Knight. Not just any Knight, I chose one female knight I call Joan. 
In this scene Joan holds Princess Sara's stick horse while she meets in the castle garden at night to speak to the Magical Frog.

I mean, why not? 

The mirror did its trick the castle garden seems to extend in the background forever. The lights and mist add mystery and Joan's eyes are watching over her Princess carefully.

The final shot:

For me, it was important to see Joan's eyes through her helmet. It seems silly that she is holding both an weapon and a stick horse, but that is the fun of toy photography. Anything you desire can happen.

After shooting this photo, I decided that perhaps Sara and Joan should go on the Quest that the Frog sent them on.

Do I know what their Quest is yet? Nope. I imagine if I follow them, I may figure it out eventually.

It looks better through the lens...

See?
This is the spare bedroom now. And I thought I'd take a photo of how I set things up.
I had to use a tripod because the day was so overcast and gloomy that very little light was coming in the west window.

But the result turned out well.

Gourds and rocks on an old shipping box from Rock Falls, ILL USA!

Here is a shot of the room as a mess. When I get in the 'creative' mood, things are dropped all over as I try things out.

I was doing a very nice family/memory/things of the past photo and decided to grab a dinosaur and use the pearls...

Sometimes silliness wins the day.

However I did complete the serious shot I had been thinking about.

The elements are a photo of Rich's father's brothers and sisters. A doily, pearls, and a page from my Grandmother Pearl's diary.

This morning I went out to the woods and found that the rapid temperature change had done some neat things. I detoured with my blaze orange on from the trail camera to a place further downstream.

Well I had no tripod and the light was not very good.
So I put the camera down and steadied it with rocks. I put the timer on a 2 second delay and shot the ice and water.

I think it worked well. Improvising is a good thing.

I then wanted to see it as it was ... cold. So I made it black and white.

Programs used SilverEfexPro [free for download].

So there you have it.
I also used ON1 for editing.