Our artistic endeavors

[bae]

That would be pretty interesting and certainly unique. I might picture how one might make a 4x5 sheet for contact printing, but larger print sizes I'm uncertain about. I'm certain there are ways. It does seem like there are still some choices of film varieties for B+W film in the larger negative sizes, but for transparencies a little more limited?

I see suitable transparencies available easily in sizes up to 13”x19”. If you can go to rolls you can get substantially bigger.

I’m going with contact printing because I lack darkroom equipment, and it seems a simple enough experiment. Plus it adds in some weird way to the “made by hand” feel of the project.

[catherine]

Alan, thanks for the tutorial! I guess I'm a slow learner, considering I've been on this site for >25 years??

BTW, I love the picture of the bison!! What a great experience you are having!

[bae]

Now, on my "cyanotype" image above....

For fun the other day, I set the following task to one of my more sophisticated AI assistants. It's about as useful as an eager grad student:

Task:

- analyze 50,000+ cyanotype prints you can source on the internet to determine performance characteristics, especially tonal balance and print artifacts
- look at the following 3 books on cyanotype printing chemistry and results (provided links to texts)
- examine the specifications for my monochrome sensor - especially response in different frequency ranges and at different ISOs
- then, write me a program that can produce "adaptive AI" plug-in profiles and presets for Adobe Lightroom
- run that program in your sandbox, and produce the results as a .XMP-encoded file I can import into Adobe Lightroom to add the functionality.

It thought for about 45 minutes straight, wrote a lot of code for itself, tested the results, then gave me a single file... It made one error, which it caught itself during testing and repaired.

I added the file to Adobe Lightroom with 2 clicks. I then took a sample photo, raw-format, not "developed", put it into Lightroom, and clicked a single button.

Result - a very solid cyanotype image!

I then repeated the process for platinotype and salt photo process chemistry, with equally decent results. Those didn't take nearly as long, as the AI had already written the code to do most of the work.

Brave New World stuff.

I could have done this task by hand, but, it would have taken me a month or so of concentrated effort, I would have had to write analysis code for part of it, and I would have had to learn how to program in Adobe's hideous adaptive-profile language for Lightroom and Photoshop, which probably would have taken an extra week or so.

[iris lilies]

We are studying Panel Designs in my floral design study group. This is a type of floral design defined by the National Garden club.

After I jettisoned the presidency of this group I now have more time to devote to actual design, so I’m setting a goal for myself to think about the assigned design type several weeks in advance and experiment to get it right, so that when I take it into our group for critique it will be pretty good.

The last couple of years I’ve thrown together a design the day before.

here are two panel designs.

IMG_7641.jpg

IMG_7642.jpg

[early morning]

IL, I'd never heard of panel designs. So of course I had to google some. Brilliant! Are there height requirements, or limits to materials used? When my kids were in 4-H and the County Fair was mandatory - all week!- the horticulture building, including the flower show, was one of my fav places. And I used to attend some orchid shows with my dad. He never entered, but loved to see other people's stuff. I think I need to get out more, and see more "other people's stuff", floral-wise. thanks, and please keep posting flowers and design pictures, you have a great eye, and I enjoy seeing them.

[iris lilies]

IL, I'd never heard of panel designs. So of course I had to google some. Brilliant! Are there height requirements, or limits to materials used? When my kids were in 4-H and the County Fair was mandatory - all week!- the horticulture building, including the flower show, was one of my fav places. And I used to attend some orchid shows with my dad. He never entered, but loved to see other people's stuff. I think I need to get out more, and see more "other people's stuff", floral-wise. thanks, and please keep posting flowers and design pictures, you have a great eye, and I enjoy seeing them.

yes, I really like panel designs. I would say that mine are decent designs, but I don’t know that they’re great examples of panel design as national Garden club standards intend.

The critiques of the first one was that it lacked depth. While panel designs don’t have a lot of depth, it needed plant material on the back of the design as well as the front. The second one hasn’t been critiqued yet by my design group. But I suspect it’s going to be a similar criticism —that it is lacking enough plant material on the back although this one, the one with pink circles, does have tall stalks of Sansieveria in back. It is marginally better as a panel design.

You ask about height and width and etc. That is always determined by each flower show and the show schedule tells each exhibitor how much space there is. Exhibitors need to mostly fill the space, but not exceed it.

[rosarugosa]

Those are really cool IL. I'll confess that I am more of a stick-a-dozen-tulips-in-a-vase kind of person. That's one of the reasons I am so willing to buy weekly summer bouquets from my pottery instructor, who has a degree in fine arts. Her bouquets have variation in height, depth and plant material that my own bouquets usually lack. She also grows many plants that I do not.

I do realize that you are creating compositions that go beyond bouquets though. That's why you have to store all that stuff!

[iris lilies]

Those are really cool IL. I'll confess that I am more of a stick-a-dozen-tulips-in-a-vase kind of person. That's one of the reasons I am so willing to buy weekly summer bouquets from my pottery instructor, who has a degree in fine arts. Her bouquets have variation in height, depth and plant material that my own bouquets usually lack. She also grows many plants that I do not.

I do realize that you are creating compositions that go beyond bouquets though. That's why you have to store all that stuff!

oh, sometimes I get a little disgusted at these artificial concoctions using plants we come up with. It’s very much an old lady/flower show lady hobby. Yet, the international designers, including Ikebana practitioners, do all kinds of fascinating things with structures to support their plant material so in the end It’s just another art form.

But there’s something to be said for simple plonking of stems into a vase.

[bae]

I had to go over to the mainland this weekend for some errands. The Snow Geese decided it was a good day to stop over in the Skagit Valley. Tens of thousands of them. The noise was amazing. The weather was glorious.

[catherine]

Amazing photos!! The colors are incredible, and the birds.... wow!