K Marie Studios

Merry Christmas everyone!

Hey guys!

For this week’s post, I’d like to direct you to a good friend of mine: John-Clay Burnett of Reelcast Productions. JC is a great blogger, and I highly recommend following his blog as he’s very consistent with putting up interesting information on current events in the Christian film and arts world, as well as doings at Reelcast, and much more.

If I thought life was busy right before school started–that was nothing to how busy it’s been since classes got underway! Wonderful things going on, but I have to say it’s been a whirlwind! SO go explore JC’s site–he’s got all the updates on things I haven’t had time to blog about yet myself! lol

And, if you need a cinematographer, documentarion, editor or digital coloist, JC’s the man for you. For as long as I’ve known him, he’s always done quality work. Quality work. He takes what he does seriously and has done a tremendous amount of personal study and research to build his skills and ability to give his clients the best he can.  He’s also got a really good eye for design in general, so check in with him if you need graphic work done, or a website designed. And because JC loves what he does and loves the Lord he lives for, you can know he gives his all to the projects he takes up. You can visit his website here.

K Marie Studios is interested in not just what we can do for you directly, but referring you to the right people so you can get exactly the services you need. While we hope to offer you a lot, we can’t do everything, so we want to promote the amazing work of others, and put you in contact with these noteworthy and reliable artists. So, ladies and gentlemen, I give you Mr. John-Clay Burnett and Reelcast Productions! Go check out his sites!

And speaking of websites, the official K Maries Studios site should be up soon! (hopefully for real this time ) So stay tuned!

Blessings,
Kayleen

Ok, so check this out. I’ve been to and photographed a number of weddings, and have heard plenty of interesting stories from those who have photographed *many* weddings (including one with over a hundred attendants—no kidding), but this is a new one. Definitely a way to celebrate your big day…..

Dancing Wedding Party

(sorry—it’s not working to embed it yet…hmm…)

Here’s one of my random posts for ya! Took this while I was driving (not recommending that modus operandi though!!).

Lots going on right now—getting things ready for the upcoming school year and sending my brother off to college (simultaneous *sniff* and *hurrah!* ) are the main events right now, along with some exciting shoots! Once we get into the fall schedule and the new routine is underway, I hope to post a bit more regularly, as well as blog about some more interesting topics! lol

Hope you’re enjoying the last days of your summer!

Kayleen

So do what helps you sleep.

Today I finally sat down and took care of a bit of paperwork that’s been hanging around for….well…longer than I want to blast all over the web.

It wasn’t really keeping me up at night, but it was one of those things that would pop into my mind at a random moment—like when I was falling asleep—then, of course, wouldn’t necessarily come to mind at more advantageous times. Anyway, it wasn’t a huge deal, but it’s good to stay on top of the small things.

Cool thing is, when I was messing around trying to take a picture of my morning’s endeavors, I was reminded of a really neat photography trick you might like to try….

If a macro lens is not exactly in your budget at the moment, experiment with this little maneuver:

Turn off your camera. Take off your lens. Flip it around, and VERY CAREFULLY match up the front of your lens with the now bare hole on the front of your camera body.

Be sure it’s not dusty, windy, sandy or dirty. This is risky (but fun)—some, if not all, digital sensors actually draw dust to them like magnets when the lens is off—so do this at your own risk.

Some of you may need to open your aperture before you disassemble. You should be able to control your shutter speed and ISO while you’re operating in pieces. If not, try to set them before taking off your lens; otherwise, find you a really old completely manual, non-computerized SLR from 3 or more decades ago.

Once you’ve got your mount covered pretty well, turn on your camera again. Look through the view finder.

You won’t see anything.

Now slowly and carefully come up real close to something (DON’T smash into it!! You’ll ruin your lens!!!!) You’ve got a macro lens now! Pull yourself and the camera back and forth to achieve focus. Cool, huh? I learned that from some of my photography teachers several years ago.

Look at this image of the check mark. It’s a great illustration of depth of field. This is an example of shallow depth of field. Notice most of the image is blurry, but there’s a strip that goes across the page from roughly left to right (slightly at an angle). I hope you can see it here on the web. When you tell your camera to “focus” on a certain point on your image, you achieve focus that way. But Aperture also contributes to a sense of focus as well. If you want more to be kind of in focus, use a higher aperture/f-stop number, like f7 and up. The hole is smaller and let’s more appear sharper–like when you squint. If you’re not wanting so much to look sharp, open your aperture by setting it at a lower number, like something between f1.2 and f5.6. Anyway, similar stuff is happening when you shoot macro. Your aperture should be all the way open, therefore you’re getting an extremely shallow dof.

Watch out for a kind of lens flare—here I guess I wasn’t flush up against my camera with my lens. I think light was getting in the side, thus creating the redness on the left of the image. That’s my guess anyway. I must have also been shaking too much and probably got too close in the process, hence the blur. But I think it turned out neat anyhow.

And if all that aperture/depth of field stuff is blowing right past you—my apologies. Maybe sometime I’ll post again and back up a little on the concepts.

But hopefully you can at least mess around with your lens in the mean time, and have lots of fun experimenting with macro! If you need some variety in your photography, try this for an afternoon—my bet is you’ll be hooked! You’ll enjoy looking at things from a new perspective—which is what photography is all about, right?

Oh, and hey—any of you ladies wanna find out if the jeweler really left your ring in the cleaner-machine long enough? Whip out your DIY macro lens and put ‘em to the test! ;p

…..or discover that your rings are embarrassingly WAY overdue on a “bath” ….Which is why my other ones will have to wait their turn for their Internet debut! lol In the mean time, ladies and gentlemen, my Irish heritage. Anyone know what the Claddagh means, or the story behind it? Post if you do!

Have fun y’all!

Kayleen

Ran into this via John Piper’s Twitter. I’m not really a Twitter-er (or, whatever the term would be), but I do follow this one. Definitely worth it. You can read here why Dr. Piper Tweets.

Anyway, this is a good little article–it doesn’t delve into the subject, but gives us something to chew on. How often is my (maybe even subconscious) goal to prove to myself and the world that “Kayleen is glorious”? Kayleen is certainly not glorious–it’s ridiculous, even blasphemous, to say so, but how often do I sin in the subtle and silent ways of life? It goes unsaid–more than too much.

But the equally important question is this: How much of my life is spent–either directly or indirectly–in “making much of God”? Of all the things I do in life, what percentage lines itself up with declaring God to be as great as He really is? The thought that struck me was, “Ya know, photography (and filmmaking) is all about representation. You take a picture of some thing or person that exists, and portray it on a piece of paper. That photograph tells us about who that person is, or what that object is about. Similarly, our lives are supposed to represent the glory of God to the world.” What’s interesting is that God’s glory is also described by words like shine, and bright, and blinding LIGHT. The essence of photography is light entering a dark cavern and burning the information that the light waves are carrying from the source image onto a dark tablet. Once the light has done it’s searing and branding, we can turn around and print a picture of what the light did, what the light illumined, what the light itself was.

Or we can alter things before we do, such that we completely change, distort or hide the original vision.

If I took your portrait and Photoshopped a komodo dragon’s head in the place of yours, you would cancel your order, be very stern and unhappy with me, be highly offended, demand that I change it and never let another soul see it, and tell me that that “thing” looks NOTHING like you, pointy nose as you may have. Or better yet, what if I Photoshopped MY face in place of yours?? It’s not an accurate representation. Not of you. And the point is to represent you.

So the question is, How well is the photograph of my life representing the glory that is Christ Jesus?

Read  what Dr. Piper has to say about WHAT God’s glory is:

What is God’s glory?

Wow. That’s a good question, because we talk about it endlessly, don’t we? And we should know what we’re talking about. And yet it is very difficult to define. I’ll make a stab at it.

The reason it is so important is because in the Bible I don’t know of any truth that is more fundamentally pervasive than God’s zeal to be glorified, which means his zeal for us so to think, so to feel, and so to act as to make him look as glorious as he is. We don’t add to his glory.

So we want to make God’s glory shine. We want to make it visible. “Let your light so shine before men that they may see your good deeds and glorify your Father who is in heaven” (Matthew 5:16). So the goal of my life should be to so live that when people know me well enough, they would say, “God is glorious!” Not “John is glorious,” but “God is glorious!” (Which is probably why God lets us sin as much as he does. But that’s another question.)

What is it? I believe the glory of God is the going public of his infinite worth. I define the holiness of God as the infinite value of God, the infinite intrinsic worth of God. And when that goes public in creation, the heavens are telling the glory of God, and human beings are manifesting his glory, because we’re created in his image, and we’re trusting his promises so that we make him look gloriously trustworthy.

The public display of the infinite beauty and worth of God is what I mean by “glory,” and I base that partly on Isaiah 6, where the seraphim say, “Holy, holy, holy is the Lord God Almighty. The whole earth is full of his—” and you would expect them to say “holiness” and they say “glory.” They’re ascribing “Holy, holy, holy is the Lord God Almighty. The whole earth is full of his—” and when that goes public in the earth and fills it, you call it “glory.”

So God’s glory is the radiance of his holiness, the radiance of his manifold, infinitely worthy and valuable perfections.

Hey guys!

Just for the note, this place isn’t finished being set up–it’s a bit messy (as I’m sure no one can tell)….particularly when it comes to links. lol But hope exists–I am slowly working on getting most of my links moved over to the Links page, and then I’ll clean things up on the side bar. But as I add and move things around, be sure to check out the links I’ve got up! Doing the little bit I can to connect you to others who may be a blessing or of service to you is important to me, as well as publicizing the efforts of those involved in worthy causes. So while I can’t just link to every single wonderfully amazing person I know on the planet, you should check these folks out. I’ll be adding more as I get organized, so stay tuned!

Aaaannd….*shhh*…..this isn’t being really announced yet, but, the official K Marie Studios website is on it’s way too! And when it arrives, we will “officially” announce both it and the blog (’cause I don’t think anyone’s really following this right now, since I haven’t really told anyone about it lol) and get rolling with exciting stuff!   …..*Cough* *Ahem* *Back to normal voice…*

In the mean time I’ll be putting up a few posts you’ll not want to miss, so–

I’ll see you around!

Kayleen

One of those qualities we all love but find difficult to be consistent at. (Yes, there’s a slight irony there in case you thought that sounded weird.) And it’s something I’m being challenged with…..yet once again.

This last week I’ve spent a good deal of time backing up my images — and not just to an extra hard drive. I learned that one the hard way. Last year, my long-time friend and faithful co-laborer (*cough* slave) gave up the ghost. At least his connectors did. And when they did, they blew the life out of the drives (unfortunately they were not RAID). So all my images from the previous five — no, make that eight — years became history……though not the accessible kind pictures are meant to be. Ya know, it was one of those instances where I wasn’t worried about a second or third back up copy OFF the computer ’cause I was definitely going to do that…..one day…..I really was…..no question about it……at all.

Which is all fine and dandy, unless, of course, your beloved hard drive doesn’t have as much faith, and decides to move on without you. If I wasn’t listening to him while he yet ranked among the spinning, I’m listening to him now……..as he sits still and silent in the next room with a scarred remnant of my “inheritance” that I’ll never get back. Or be able to give to my family — which is the clincher.

Because pictures — though we love making them — are not about us. They are ultimately about others. (More on this some other time.)

So, in an effort to faithfully and more fully preserve the history preserved in the images we’ve made, I have spent a painful number of hours waiting for my computer to burn gigs upon gigs of pixel groupings. They’re sitting here on a spindle next to me.

And ya know what?

It’s a good feeling.

I’ve got nearly all of last year backed up three ways, and in this instance, they’re all off the computer. Three sets of data DVDs, each set to be stored in a different place (haven’t figured out where yet, but it’s a start!) to guard against the next threat — fire.

So my exhortation to you would be to do the same, whether you’re a committed photographer, or an unsung family historian (which, to me, is the same thing).

And yes, in X-number of years we’ll have to copy these same discs to new media because the technology will have changed dramatically and ’cause CDs and DVDs don’t last forever anyway……but I didn’t just bring that up and you didn’t just hear that ’cause we’re all supposed to be excited about getting THIS round done! lol

So be encouraged as you do the seemingly tedious — you’ve been faithful to TAKE the pictures for memories’ sake, now you extend that effort of faithfulness as you further preserve those images for viewing sake.

Happy disc burning!

~Kayleen

Courtesy, Dalton Photography

Hey guys! Welcome to my new blog! K Marie Studios is mainly about photography right now, but we’ll enjoy talking about all sorts of things! Art in general, filmmaking, graphic design, philosophy, theology, worldviews, reaching out with Truth and compassion, other artists you should know about, history, personal updates, and various means of communication. I’ll probably throw a few random things in for fun too!

I am not web savvy at all — both of my web designers will tell you that — so it may be a bit before this begins to look remotely spiffy……..ok, so forget spiffy….remotely interesting?…..maybe just even like a photographer’s blog….so bear with me, if you would, and hopefully in the mean time you can enjoy whatever it is that does make it up here.

My hope is that this will be a place where I can share my thoughts on the art of communication, as well as hear your thoughts. So please comment! The more the merrier! You have great things to say!

This should be a great adventure!

May we shine for Him!

Kayleen