Gogovivi

The View from Here: {update}

I am a little embarrassed that its been three weeks and I haven't made a single peep about the View from Here photo challenge. There is no challenge today, and maybe not for a while: I have just been too busy with my various photo projects to give THVF the attention I would like. Between learning portraiture, building my portfolio, creating a new website, and working editorial assignments, my blog in general is shifting into a lower gear, and the photo challenge fell by the wayside.

Thanks to my loyal participants. I would love to pick it up again when my schedule relaxes.

The View from Here: 24 {With Silliness for All}

Note: I am posting this a few hours early, as I am participating in the Blogger's Day of Silence tomorrow in support of From Japan With Love. I will provide more on that subject shortly.

I wouldn't characterize either Bruce or myself as particularly light-hearted or happy-go-lucky people. We don't naturally tend towards goofiness, though I often think we would be better off if we did. Its amazing how a good round of giggling and practicing silliness can be good for what ails you.

I got some new lighting gear today, ordered on the cheap from Taobao. At the first opportunity, I shamelessly bribed Vivian to sit for some photos, and within moments it had deteriorated from some serious shooting to some serious silliness. I started out as the photographer, but Vivian quickly took over shooting and elbowed me out from behind the camera. Our lighting setup clearly needs some refinement, but that's for another day. How can I be serious when Vivian asks, "can I make a funny face?"

I don't know about you, but I tend to take life too seriously. It feels good to lighten up now and then and have a good giggle. Get a laugh workout.

Its been a stressful week in China, what with the tragedy and lingering danger in our neighboring Japan, the government's tightening of the Great Firewall that left us without Internet (and thus, a link to the outside world, since we don't have TV or radio), and lingering uncertainly about where our immediate future will take us. A few moments of levity were exactly what we needed.

The challenge this week on The View from Here is to have a little fun. Grab your camera and think of something, anything, to make you laugh. Silliness is contagious and its good medicine. Share your images with the linkup tool below. The guidelines are here.

 

The View from Here: technical difficulties

The Chinese government is nervous. What with all the revolution in the Middle East, it appears that stability-obsessed Chinese leaders are putting the squeeze on liberty in an effort to keep its masses calm. In recent days, Chinese authorities have been using intimidation to try to control the foreign press. Journalists have had photographs confiscated (deleted), have been physically assaulted, and have been warned not to try to "topple the (Communist) party." The freedom of foreign journalists to move freely about the country covering the news has been repealed, and, in classic style, the government is denying responsibility.

What does this have to do with The View from Here? Well, presumably as part of the tightening of controls on information flow, China appears to be restricting the Internet more. You know that China censors the Internet and blocks access to Facebook, Twitter, and almost all blogs, right? Its not terribly hard, and not terribly expensive, though, to get around the "Great Firewall" by installing downloadable software that masks your I.P. address, effectively fooling the Firewall. But last night, suddenly, the software stopped working for me and several other people I know. China is on to us. I am only able to access my blog after a couple of hours of troubleshooting, downloading new software, and reconfiguring my network settings. 

But even though I can log on now, the situation is not good. I can barely access my email. I can barely access my blog, and I still can't download the news. I am worried because in this authoritarian country, my Internet is my lifeline to the outside world and any semblance of normalcy.

So the View from Here is on hiatus this week. I can't access the linky site, and I can't visit your blogs to view your photos, either. So wish us luck here in China, and hopefully The View from Here will be back next week.

The View from Here: 23 {color pop!}

Yes, we're in the midst of a long, gray winter and there may be an end in sight, but it seems so far away. But today, I am loving the color pop provided by these tiny little bulbs I have been forcing in a Korean celadon pottery teacup on the windowsill over my radiator.

Yes, I know that some of you, my most loyal friends, are in the Southern Hemisphere and may be thumbing your noses at my misery. You should, then, love this week's theme:

Color Pop!

Flowers, paint, cloth, food...bursts of color are everywhere and finding those bits of colorful inspiration can help make a long, dull winter feel shorter and brighter. Let's see what color we can come up with this week! Share your images with the linkup tool below. The guidelines are here.

 

The View from Here: 22 {fun and games}

My goodness, what a busy week its been! So busy, in fact, that I completely forgot to write and post The View from Here last night. So the challenge will be a day shorter this week, but hopefully the theme is an easy one to get yout shooting!

Fun and games. For us, this winter, fun and games means mostly two things: 1) Go Fish and 2) basketball. Vivian has been playing in the Qingdao Youth Basketball programs's Jiaozi ("dumpling") league since January. Bruce is her coach, and I have been trying my hand at sports photography.

It has been challenging. The gym is lovely, but the light is uneven, making for difficult exposures. Kids move fast, and shutter speeds have to be high to prevent blur, which poses another challenge. But it has been fun, and good practice for all of us.

Vivian practices coordination skills and teamwork. Bruce practices patience. And I practice shooting and speaking kindly and respectfully to my Inner Critic, the one who tells me just what she thinks of my photography skills. I know she is wrong: I just need more practice.

What kind of fun and games are you playing with this week? Share your images with the linkup tool below. The guidelines are here.

 

 

The View from Here: 21 {peace and quiet}

Peace and quiet.

I cannot wait.

I know you all thought that the Chinese New Year came and went 15 days ago, but in reality, it just came. Tonight it goes. Tonight is yuanxiaojie, the last day of the Chinese New Year, also known as the lantern festival. It is the day that families light candles to invite wayward spirits home, and they blow off that last round of fireworks just for good measure.

It has been a long haul: I feel like I have been celebrating the New Year since January.

Chinese New Year is loud. So darn loud my ears ache and my nerves jangle. Tonight, especially, the last night of the New Year holiday, people up the waterfront and down, on all sides of my apartment, are blowing things up. Screaming things, booming thing, swizzling things, sparkling things. They are loud, without exception.

Some people, when they have exploded the last of their sky rockets, are burning ghost money, which is symbolic money burned to fortify the spirits with riches for the coming year. I appreciate this simple observation for its quiet, reflective nature.

What kinds of peace and quiet are you looking forward to this week? Share your images with the {new} linkup tool below. I am trying this tool for the first time. Let's see how it goes. The guidelines are here.

The View from Here: 20 {smiles}

My cheeks still hurt from all the laughing and smiling I did earlier this week. I was lucky enough to spend four days in Hong Kong with my friends Sarah and Lori. The three of us met when we were expats in Korea, but we have all moved on, or will soon; I came to China, Lori went to Indonesia, and soon, Sarah will move back to Norway.  

The best part about being an expat is the friends you meet from all over the world. The worst part is when they move on, or you do.

These friends have two of the most glowing, full-on, authentic, and beautiful smiles that I know. You have seen Sarah's lovely mug before, both in Qingdao and more recently, in Vietnam. Lori's smile is new to my blog, and I am so happy it is here.

Fun smiles, en route to something even more fun. Smiles.

Goofy smiles.

Silly, "I'm with Stoopid" smiles.

This week's challenge is to show me your favorite smiles. They can be your smiles, or those of your friend, your cat, or your cousin. Link up using the Linky tool below, and be sure to link back to The View from Here in your blog post or Flickr. Read the details here. The linky will be open for one week.

I hope your week is full of smiles.

 

 

 

The View from Here: 19 {reflections}

Like a lot of photographers, I rarely, if ever, turn the camera on my self. I don't mind others shooting my picture so much, but although the idea of self-portraiture has crossed my mind from time to time, I have never followed through.

Its not for lack of inspiration, though. My favorite blogs blog about the magic of self-portraits, and about the personal journey self-portraiture can help inspire. My friends take self-portraits, and some even blog about it. There are even e-courses available here and there to help envision and make real the process of seeing oneself, in front of the lens and otherwise.

Me, though, I just stay behind the lens, only bold enough to snap myelf in the frame if I happen to see a reflection somewhere. Even though I often have a big lens in front of my face, and my cheeks are all squenched up, I am beginning to love these reflection shots. They anchor me in a time and a place as few other of my shots do.

I found this pretty, antique mirror in the office of a rural school I visited in Yishui only yesterday. Yishui is a village about 4 hours drive from Qingdao. I was there with a charity group, on my first "official" assignment as photographer. More on that later.

The shot below is from a year ago, and was taken with my Lomo LC-A+ on film. I love how this one places me squarely in China, with the national flag flying the the red lanterns up for Chinese New Year. I will always remember exactly where and when this shot was taken.

This last one I shot for an online course I took last winter, the course that launched me into a year of serious exploration of photography. I love this moment. It was a Wednesday with Vivian, before the "Wednesdays with Vivian" blog series existed yet. She is playing in the sink, pretending to wash dishes, while I am fooling around with my camera. Vivian's forehead is distorted in the pot lid, making her look like she has some kind of huge frontal lobe. Which, thankfully, she does not.

The challenge this week is to step in front of the mirror, camera in hand, and capture a shot of you capturing a shot of yourself. Bonus points for including a sense of place and time.

Link up using the Linky tool below, and be sure to link back to The View from Here in your blog post or Flickr. Read the (newly rewritten and hopefully clearer) details here. The linky will be open for one week.

 

The View from Here: 18 {small things}

In honor of my friend Annette, this week's The View from Here theme is Small Things.

Annette's thoughtful husband bought her a macro lens for Christmas, and she is dying to give it a go. Do you have a penchant for up-close shots of little things? I know I do.

100mm macro | f/4.5 | 1/60 sec | ISO 500

Like these rose berries. Last week we had a early morning dusting of snow, and I (who, despite my history of mountaineering and back-country skiing, really don't like the cold) ventured out with my macro, bound and determined to capture a shot before the snow melted. I have really enjoyed capturing these rose berries throughout the progression of summer into autumn and winter, and I think the dusting of snow really captures the feeling of a dormant season garden.

But if you don't have a macro, you're not excluded from this week's theme. Shoot and share any of the small world around you. The concept of small can be captured with a regular lens, with a little creative perspective and framing. The shot below is an old one, from my Dog Days project last summer, of Vivian and her Playmobil. 

50mm | f/3.5 | 1/160 sec | ISO 800

This week, take a moment to appreciate and capture the small things around you. Small people, little food, small treats, your mini-me. Small is beautiful. Link up using the Linky tool below, and be sure to link back to The View from Here in your blog post or Flickr. Read the details here. The linky will be open for one week.

The View from Here: 17 {your best of 2010}

2011 did not start off well for me, as far as photography is concerned. I mentioned previously that I outgrew my hard drive and moved into a new one. But I did it completely wrong and just spent the last three days figuring out where I went wrong (that was easy), how much worse I had made the situation by trying to fix it, and ultimately, how to really solve the problem. It was a learning experience, and I will share what I learned:

If you use Lightroom never, ever, move your photos around on your hard drive except from within the program.

Or you'll wind up like I did, with all my files intact, but more than a year's worth of work selecting, rejecting, and editing out the window.

Heed my warning, friends. Learn from my mistake. My problem is solved but three days of my life were lost plumbing the depths of Lightroom.

But there's a silver lining to every cloud, and here it is that I got to review an entire year's worth of shots and choose some neglected favorites.

Kashgar, Xinjiang Province, China. April 2010

Qingdao, Shandong Province, China, July 2010

Qingdao, Shandong Province, China, September 2010

And that's this week's The View from Here challenge: look over 2010 and find some new favorites, some shots that maybe you overlooked, or that you thought weren't good enough then but have some new appeal now. Choosing a favorite means perhaps not choosing the "best" shot, but the one that speaks to you the most.

If you want to play along, post your shot on your blog or your Flickr, grab the URL, and come back here to link up with the Linky. Don't feel like you have to choose just one favorite photo. I couldn't.