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.

Stir Crazy

More stupid stuff ... well because... I'm still going
Stir Crazy...

I got these mini-robots as a gift in the mail. They are cake toppers and only about an inch tall. They actually are about Lego minifigure size. When I opened the package I just had to set them down on the gravel road and take their photo...

Invasion of the MiniBots!

Sort of cute and ugly at the same 
time.

I imagine that they must have come to me because they found a way to escape a future world and wanted some peace and serenity...

See how my mind works? Why would these minibots or robots come?

Where did they leave from? A future? Another world?

Here the mini-bots decide to
jump into a Time Machine and
get transported to
somewhere else...

For anyone wondering how this was done, I set these 1 inch robots on a reflective surface on my laptop and brought up an AI generated scene I created and snapped the shot. I did this on the kitchen table with no special lighting other than what came through the windows. 

Similar to this set up I did earlier this year:

Maybe they'll find Squatch and the Brothers Odd, maybe they'll find a peaceful home in the forest. Who knows? 

Maybe I'll get out for a walk and get a break too!

This morning we are getting freezing thick fog. That should make for some incredible scenes outside on the plants, trees, and anything else frost can cling to.

It is so hard for a wander-er like myself to be stuck inside!!!!

Happy Almost New Year's Eve.

ON1 and Legos Imagination

Photography can be

the art of

what you 

envision...

ON1 is a photo editing program that I started to use a few years ago. I ended my relationship with Photoshop once they requested a monthly ransom for the use of their product. I purchased Corel PaintShopPro which allowed me to do some of the fun things I could do in PS.

ON1 kept developing their software. And truthfully the cost was much easier to take than the PS costs. The program has great tutorials on line and it is always adding new features.

One of the best things is not having to learn all about layers. ON1 makes layers for adjustments for you. You can use layers too.

The program seems geared towards Landscape and Portrait photography. They have cool things like textures presets, color presets, and something newer called Sky Swap. Oh the horror of Sky Swap! If you don't like your scene as you took it, add an aurora borealis or perhaps a magnificent sunset?  Okay. I am not into that at all.

However, I do like mixing things up and see exactly what I can MAKE the program do that it wasn't developed for. Pushing the edit envelope is a fun brain exercise for me.

Here is a shot of some of my Lego people. I set the figures on a black plastic board used generally for photographing items like jewelry. I set the works on my laptop and used the flat black of the laptop screen as a back drop.

Not very impressive, but with a bit of a touch up of the blacks and the highlights along with a crop and straighten, it is better. I totally love the reflections in the black plastic. Wicked...cool.

This was rather boring. White plastic for the back and black plastic for the figures to stand on.

But wait. 
What if?

I could change all of that?

How about cutting the backround out and replacing it with something else? With the old photoshop program this was doable but it took a lot of time.

I chose to color the figures green for keeping and the other areas red to get rid of them. This is done in a simple masking mode.

Once I had the figures isolated, I added a layer of clouds and then used a fun little thing called Sky Swap and added an Aurora Borealis to the clouds. I mixed up the opacity and went from there.

There was a bit of brightening to do and then I was done.

Why not make things easier on myself and set the figures up with an image in back on the computer screen?
Oh duh, who forgot to move their cursor???

Easily fixed!

ON1 edits of cropping, resizing, and some adjustments to bring out the figurines. Add in some cracked brushes to the edges to cover up mistakes and....

Note:

Experimenting with photography and graphic programs is my hobby. Think of it as a huge empty canvas that I can paint on or make my own strange art.

PS~ Did you know that there are actually Adult Lego Groups out there? 

LUGNET ~ Lego Users Group Network

AFOL ~ Adult Fan of Lego

I had Legos as a kid but they were the hard stiff bricks that only came in red I think. We made buildings for our toy soldiers out of them. And the Kitty Hotel, a home for eraser animals. 

I doubt I will become a Lego collector, but it is fun combining them with photography while stuck inside!

Meanwhile

 ~~~~~
Who ordered snow and rain stuff? April showers/snow squalls bring May flowers.

Mother Nature has her own mind. However the moisture is welcomed.

Yesterday was one of those days of rain then fog, then mist, then rain and then winds. I started to clean up the upstairs rooms and got totally sidetracked.

I came downstairs with an old wooden box. This old wood box used to be some sort of box for apples that were shipped from a company called Yakima Valley.

The box after so many years looks like this:

The original label would look like this:

I inherited this wooden box from my Aunt's house, it was filled with rolls of fabric that I intended to crochet into a rag rug.

I repurposed it for my hand me down toys and figures. Basically it is a Toy Box. What on earth am I doing with toys?

I thought it would be a fun day to try some more photography using my laptop monitor to make a suitable backround. Last year I fretted about getting one of those fancy little tabletop backround sets that click together and provide you with a beautiful backround for still life photography.

Ouch. The prices range from $79 to $99 just for the boards. I got some craft paper last year and taped it to some wooden boards and set it on the old trunk. It works well enough for tiny things but not for larger items. 

I thought I'd look in the toy box and see what I could do. Surely it would only distract me for a few minutes from the pressing chores of cleaning out 'stuff' from the bedroom upstairs.

First I set things up on the old trunk and messed around with different arrangements.

I intended to remove the white backround and replace it with some sort of cosmic scene. That was a failure. tea cups, monsters, Jack Daniels, and space dudes. I found it rather amusing. I love mixing up the characters from different genres. 

I moved to the laptop and set up a Predator on a box. He kept falling down 

It became a game of being able to make him stand on his own and balance. Here is the original shot:

He is standing on the box he came in. The day was overcast so the light coming in from the window highlighted his face.

I edited it to this:

I did a closer shot here in a slightly different pose.

The picture on the laptop is a fractal I created in Mandelbulb 3D. 

I did a couple of more figures. Storm Trooper:

Mandalorian. I just looked this guy up and I guess I should watch the show on Disney+.  I'm not perfectly happy with this shot, but that is the fun of being able to create a scene rather easily.

How it is done.
Get a box an set your character next to the screen then simply shoot a closeup and be aware of your light and shadows.

And finally I got the room picked up and tidied. But on the way, I ended up taking something to the bathroom and remembered to pick up something from the living room and then thought I should vacuum, and ... Charlie's blanket needed washing...

and then....

well, you get it.

Sometimes I can be so scattered. I tell my husband it is the result of a creative mind.