Snow- Skulls- Paint

Yesterday was one of those totally yuck days. Overcast, cold, dreary, and snowy. I woke up with a killer headache and that sums up my morning after trudging through the weather to feed the critters.

Mules and horse hanging out in the woods.

I finally decided to disconnect and just listen to music which got me in the mood to mess around with two coyote skulls I'd prepared a while ago. All three skulls are in excellent shape and the 'yotes have most of their teeth. I let mother nature do most of the work and then cleaned the bones with hydrogen peroxide. To keep the bones from cracking and separating I use an Elmer's glue mix and apply it to the areas that will crack with age. 
With age the skull will crack and fall apart unless 'treated' properly.

I felt a 'creative' streak hit me after I got up from the headache. So I gathered some of my craft paints and started to work. I had no plan of what I was going to do. That is the way I do things. 

Once painted I seal them with Polycyrlic by Minwax. It cleans up with water. I can also coat them with some spray when the weather warms up a bit.

I'd heard of something called an Acrylic Pour and thought I'd try it.  I learned of another method later called HydroPainting for skulls which is really cool. I may try that when the weather warms up.

It takes about 24 hours or so to dry, but it was pretty neat looking. I like how it looks almost like a swirled marble! The coverage wasn't complete so I have to think about how I want to do the parts that didn't get covered. I even may just leave it as is and seal it.

The other two?

I've had an offer on the blue coyote skull and a message on the green drippy one already. I don't know if I want to sell them, there was a lot of work involved in getting those 'yote skulls. 

Uffdah. It is snowing and sleeting again. I guess I'll be doing some cleaning indoors again.

Another dull day? 
Maybe I'll bring in the little rocking chair from the porch and work on the doodle design for the seat.

Here is a doodle I did for the stairs landing because Rich still cannot decide what to put on it. I thought the plywood was rather ugly. 

Looks like I lean towards the blue green colors and variations. Hmmm. 

Distractions

My son sent me a quote which I felt was very thoughtful and needed to be shared here.

Once I read it and after we discussed it, I decided that this indeed was very appropriate. It also explains the 'why' I have toys and why I experiment in photography and graphic art.

"The opposite of play is not work - the opposite of play is depression." ~Dr. Stuart Brown, founder of the National Institute for Play.

Okay, so I knew this in the back of my mind. Play and exercise in some sort or another is what helps the mind get out of a rut. Well, it does for me.

With the Pandemic this year, the isolation, and ... well hell, the politics, 2020 through 2021 so far has been awfully trying. Endless days of fog and overcast weather can make things even more depressing.

So what does that mean? Not much. But I decided not to let all of that bother me. I took out my newly arrived Dragons and had a go with them. 

I spent most of my time while on the hike looking for spots along the creek that I could get good reflections. So I had to look for rocks to add to the creek bottom so the toys wouldn't be too submerged and they would stand up instead of falling over.

Yep. I crouched in a creek and arranged figurines. The whole time I was doing that my mind was clear of all intrusive thoughts. It was like going on a Mind Vacation.

Seeing as that I have Dragons in my creek, I wasn't surprised to see the Unicorns in the forest.

I amused myself by trying different methods of processing the photos. I use DxO's Photo Lab 4 for most of my processing. I dipped into Analog Efex Pro 2 for these shots.

It is interesting to try out different film effects.

The photo below is what I call a failed experiment. A fun one just the same. In camera double exposure. I did this indoors. The first shot is of this dragon, the double was of some 'fake' leaves. It sort of turned out with an interesting Bokeh effect but it took me down another path.

So I looked up 'how to create' a double exposure effect. And thought I'd give it a whirl.

There I am with my funky hat [bad hair day as usual]. A shot against a blank white wall. This took a long time to get the look I wanted. Don't look too close. You will see my wrinkles. I have decided that I am okay with that look too. 

I'm going to work on a few other things.
Yesterday I took Charlie for a long walk on the cropland on the ridge. I took my point and shoot Infrared Camera. Winter and IR usually don't produce great results, but I think the Creative Challenge will be a good thing.

Now to finish my errands. A trip to the butcher and we will be set again until some time late February except for milk.

Dull Days of November

Welcome to that time of year that things to photograph are utterly ...

un

inspiring.

I call it November Yuck. When things are sort of brownish icky-ish, the weather is cold and windy, or cold and rainy. Or

just

dreary.

The fun of hiking seems to be on hold. Well, that is, unless I can convince some other soul to join me in a walk/hike in the muddy dreary weather.

Charlie is always up for it as is Dixie.

See? Charlie is always happy now to lead the way...and come back when I call him!

Truthfully I do get bored of the sameness of the grey skies and the dull colors of November.

So I sometimes modify it.

Here is a photo of the forest run through an AI program called Deep Dream Generator.

Then there is the meadow photo run through DDG:

During the rain and windstorms on Monday, I went back into JWildfire and composed some fractal flames, then combined them just for fun.

I get tired of the lack of color before winter really sets in. November is a transition time for me. I am coming off the glorious short lived colors of fall and jumping into dark days of winter.
I seem to need a bit more rest these days and my urge to get out and hike is also dulled by the slate grey toned skies.

CrossFit is still going strong. Today I did something called muscle ups along with Calorie Rowing. I did a modified Muscle Up per the coach. I watched Josh do them and was amazed.
These Muscle Ups were things I did easily when I was in High School gymnastics.
So the coach modified my Muscle ups into two steps...

I did something called Ring Rows, they almost seemed too easy and the coach said I did I great job... [I was pretty tickled with that!] I did another thing that was pretty cool. Don't ask me what it was. It was similar to me placing my hands on a high log laying across a trail and sort of pushing myself up and over it.

When I finished those I told him that next time we'd have to make them a bit harder for me.
He smiled and said that he wanted to make sure that I didn't hurt myself doing a new WOD, however any time I felt I needed more of a challenge...just ask.
Oh... WOD. What the heck is that? I looked it up.
Simple.
Workout
of
the Day.


Thursday morning, I am meeting up with a camera club pal and we are going to venture out and take sunrise shots over the Wisconsin River. Well, that may be the plan. If it doesn't pan out, I'll be doing CrossFit.

I spent an hour the other morning in a bow hunting blind a friend of ours put up facing the meadow. I spent an hour this evening out there too.
Deer watching was pretty fun.

I got some really nice photos too.

So I guess my November is not as Dull as I thought it was.
More about the Deer Blind later...