Stunningly out of Focus

These two pictures are from Thursday, it was really cold but it felt a lot like spring and those snowdrops seemed to prove it. Two days later we've had the first snow this winter that stayed. Even today we've got the blanket of snow.

I used the fantastic weather to actually get a bit of fresh air in and went for two walks. Both with exploring and photographing it was a fantastic day.

Happy Memories for Chris and Moi: 8th post - Detail of Nietzsches Church

Since Chris asked me to post a few more Leipzig photos this week because she is so homesick for Leipzig, I created this post series for her. I hope this comforts you a bit.

Another shot from our trip to Röcken. This is a detail shot of one of the churches windows. As I said it was a Sunday with perfect conditions for photography.

Muffin Paper - What a Surprise

I found out this Sunday that I can actually draw. 'What's so surprising about this?', you might ask. Well, I've been told time and again that I can't draw! My parents and my art teachers back in school said so. Imagine my surprise on Sunday at my local coffee shop when I found that I could actually draw this picture of the left over muffin paper within mere 30 minutes or so. So I figure I am capable to draw whatever I want to draw.

I can draw! Wohooo.

Happy Memories for Chris and Moi: 7th post - Sunset over the Markkleeberger See

Since Chris asked me to post a few more Leipzig photos this week because she is so homesick for Leipzig, I created this post series for her. I hope this comforts you a bit.

The Markkleeberger See again. This time on a beautiful and calm evening in August. Chris and I just walked along the shore, talked and took pictures. Pure relaxation.

Happy Memories for Chris and Moi: 6th post - Nietzsches Backyard

Since Chris asked me to post a few more Leipzig photos this week because she is so homesick for Leipzig, I created this post series for her. I hope this comforts you a bit.

Another Sunday. This time we went to Röcken, to visit the grave and memorial of Friedrich Nietzsche. It was quite interesting and we've had perfect conditions for taking a lot of pictures. This is a way to the church of Röcken and quite literally a part of Friedrich Nietzsches backyard.

Happy Memories for Chris and Moi: 5th post - Engineers Photographic Playground

Since Chris asked me to post a few more Leipzig photos this week because she is so homesick for Leipzig, I created this post series for her. I hope this comforts you a bit.

Again one of our Sunday bike tours. Riding along one of Leipzigs many rivers we found huge water pipes and muffs waiting for the construction crew. Chris and I took the chance and took a lot of pictures.

Happy Memories for Chris and Moi: 4th post - The Crouching Photographer

Since Chris asked me to post a few more Leipzig photos this week because she is so homesick for Leipzig, I created this post series for her. I hope this comforts you a bit.

I think this was in February 2010, I had just bought my Lomo Fisheye2 and learned how to use it. Chris and I went to the Markkleeberger See and there we took a lot of pictures. In this picture you can see Chris crouching to get a certain picture.

Happy Memories For Chris and moi: 3rd post - Bad Dürrenberg

Since Chris asked me to post a few more Leipzig photos this week because she is so homesick for Leipzig, I created this post series for her. I hope this comforts you a bit.

For the 3rd post I chose the salt refinery in Bad Dürrenberg. I didn't know it until I went there with Chris and we've had such fun. Photographing, listening to the story of the refinery and just enjoying this very day.

Happy Memories For Chris and moi: 2nd post - Vertigo inducing Windows

Since Chris asked me to post a few more Leipzig photos this week because she is so homesick for Leipzig, I created this post series for her. I hope this comforts you a bit.

For the second post I chose our night photography tour. It was such fun and I learned a lot about my cameras. For these shots I wished I had a tilting display or any display at all on my F90. But I didn't so I had to contort my body into a really uncomfortable position to get these long exposure shots, for which I used a tripod.

Setting Sail for a new life

Ladies and Gentlemen, I proudly present my brand new 360°-bag called "Paula" in the floral design.

The reasons for this buy were manifold. This bag is off-white (a little ray of sunshine in the currently very dull world). It is extremely light, because it is made of sails that have already powered a ship, reusing stuff is cool. Every bag is unique because of the sails that have been used. And it has exactly the right size for me.

The bags that I used before:

I don't want to use my Deuter backpack anymore. Even though it's still in great condition and really practical, I just don't like to use it anymore. Since for me it belongs to my student era and it doesn't fit my new style and even more important: you can't go to the city without seeing someone having a Deuter backpack in use. For about 2 1/2 years now Deuter is everywhere. Reason enough for me to use it only for sports and grocery shopping for the weekend. After all it is a bike backpack not one for the city.

My Crumpler bag is wayyyyyyy too heavy. I love my Crumpler, it has been to Hawaii and the Mauna Kea with me. It has a lot of inside pockets and this is what makes it soooo darned heavy, even when it is completely empty. And it is black. Now being black on the outside isn't exactly bad, but when you go to your city the next time look at the bags of the other people around you. What is the color most often used for the bags? Black, right. What do most people wear during the winter? Dark colors.
Depressing and a bit too big for me (I look like an adolescent wearing a bag that I still have to grow into.)

My slightly depressing "zwei" bag. It looks big enough, but it's a bit too small to fit my MacBook Pro or a normal A4 paper in it. And it's dark blue. sigh.

So, yeah. I love my new 360°-bag.

Happy Memories For Chris and moi: 1st post - Lollipop Trees

Since Chris asked me to post a few more Leipzig photos this week because she is so homesick for Leipzig, I created this post series for her. I hope this comforts you a bit.

This picture shows a part of Chris and my favourite bycicle round. These Sunday tours always contained the happiest moments in 2010 and 2011 for me. I would say we definitely do this when you come back to Leipzig in March, but chances are that by then I will have left Leipzig. Life is crazy.

Leipzig a different point of view

Today is my Offline-Sunday. I'll enjoy it thoroughly. Hope you enjoy your Sunday too, even if your online.

Nightshadows

The illustration workshop is fantastic, just what I needed and soooo inspiring.

Geometric landscape and Illustration Workshop

OuuUHHH, I'm so excited in a few hours I'll attend the first part of my first ever illustration workshop. Today it's a talk and tomorrow it's hands on. But first I have to get some other stuff out of the way. Tonight I'll meet with a friend for a nice little chat.

And by the way I just love my new haircut. Very Aeon Flux and it is perfect for me and my hair. I LOVE IT.

Footsteps and Creative Commons License

This picture was inspired by many other pictures of many other people. I'm against piracy, but I'm for a culture of sharing. This is why I switched my copyright to a Creative Commons License.

Some companies are currently trying to strangle the freedom of speech and creativity that the internet enabled. They want to go back to the dark ages when they controlled the news and the media with SOPA and PIPA and whatever they call it in your country. But you know what: I like my voice and I like to use it.

So there you have it, Creative Commons for my creations.

A no worries castle

My father at the beach of the Baltic Sea

I have my first wedding photography assignment, the wedding party of friends in June. Which provides me with several challenges. First camera wise, I'll have to buy my Canon 600D on 30th April latest, to have a full month to test and get used to it. Photography with sun and artificial light, how long does the battery last, how many memory cards will I need, etc And secondly it is a challenge dresswise. I want to wear a really beautiful dress, the challenge is to get one with enough freedom to move to do my photography.

Thank you for all your nice comments to my last post

Colors are fun in the winter

Ouuuuh, it's finally getting cold in Leipzig, there might even be snow. Since there are mostly "non-colors"* to be seen outside, I crave every bit of shiny color. Even yellow roadblocks are a welcome difference to the boredom of the rest of the world. What kind of colors do you crave currently?

*non-colors are "colors" like beige, camel and mudbrown and the uninspired tones of grey.

Pinewood light

As I've told you pinewoods are my happy-place and the light is fantastic there.

I hope you have a wonderful Sunday and a great start into the next week.

My way

This picture (without my hair ;-) symbolizes my current way of life. I now know where it is leading, since I can see a bit of the pinewood (pinewoods are my favourite woods, the light and walking in them is always amazing) on the horizon, the weather is nice, but the next stretch is beige = boring, ugh. So this is probably the reason why I stalled this last week. I know exactly what I want, where I am headed, but this next stretch of my way is just ...
Well, today the sun shines, which is always something that puts me into the mood to get going and doing and making my way. Okay, I switched the music to something pushing me forward. Let's get this beige stretch get over and done with!

I wish all of you a wonderful weekend, let's make the best of it.

Outside

Have you ever had such days on which you can't fully wake up, but neither sleep to get rid of the tiredness? Yesterday was such a day for me. Even though I've been out and about, I couldn't shake off the tiredness or take a refreshing nap.

Today is much better and I will use it to finally cross off a lot of items from to-do-list.

One thing was good yesterday, I realized that the changes I made at the of 2011 are starting to really make a positive difference in my life.
For example I finally started to write down what I spend everyday, again (I did so in university but through the past years I didn't). Which means I now know exactly where my money went. I stopped shopping groceries with my Dad, which lead to less spending and less leftover food. I've become a conscious spender, which means I think before I buy something, does it take me nearer to my goals or further away.

Being a conscious spender has made probably the biggest impact, that and the fact that I now know my goals. It's quite funny, goals make everything easier.
And because those changes are finally getting a grip and speeding me up towards my goals, it was yesterday for the first time that I actually had the feeling that I will reach this years goals. Which feels fantastic!!

A window, a lamp with a shadow and the sky

Twilight in the city

One of my favourites. I think the light and colours are just awesome. No filters or wrong processing. I just love it.

Threshold crossed

I've been planning to make big drawings (A4, A3 and so forth) for about one year now. However while I wanted too and bought the big paper I never truly felt comfortable drawing big. I have my easel and the A2 paper for 3 months now, but I never used it. Instead I went back to smaller formats, postcards and maybe 20x20 cm. They were feeling safe and being fast. (I'm sooooo impatient.)

Today I finally went into the other direction while drawing I switched from postcard size to 20x20 cm to A2 and back to 30x30 cm. And it felt great to finally draw big, like letting lose, essentially it felt like freedom.

I've also decided that 2012 I will concentrate on drawing by hand. Why does this matter? Well, during the last two weeks I've stocked up on technology and frankly I was tempted to also get a graphic tablet like the Wacom Bamboo, and I started pondering the question of which graphic software I should get this year. Just a few minutes ago I realized that I was falling into my old behaviour, falling into the old traps.
I was so occupied with the future that I forgot the present. And at the moment I need my focus to be on my drawing skills, which frankly are underdeveloped. I have a certain vision for what my style is or, more exactly, of what I want it to be, however I simply lack the necessary drawing skills to get even close to the pictures that I want to create.

So right here and now I stop, take a deep breath, take a look around and focus on the next step that I take. Here and now are most important. To build my castle in the sky I have to start where I am. Learning to draw properly.

Waking up

to a beautiful new week. Last week was a bit off for me due to my tooth/gums-problem, essentially I was resting because my body decided to do just that. Sometimes it is matter over mind.

Anyway, I might not be fully restored but I will slowly start to travel in the direction of my goals again. This morning I reached another important milestone: 58 kg. Hah. So there we have it again, enough sleep is absolutely necessary to get rid of stored bodyfat.

I wish all of you a fantastic new week.

Almost Spring

Looking to St. Thomas Church, Leipzig

Surprisingly this morning I woke up to the Spring birds singing. Oh, and my gums seem to have mostly recoverd, I can bite again.

4th of January = Ouch

Yesterday was a really bad day for me. I went to my dentist 3 times, because my gums were trying to kill me. The postcard describes yesterday pretty good. Pain, sleep and Totoro. Today is a wee bit better, mainly because I now have strong enough pain meds and can watch "My neighbor Totoro" as often as I like, because I picked up the DVD on my way home from my last dentists visit.
Today I went to my dentist only once and as it looks I'll do so tomorrow again. I also ordered "The Dr Who" Series 4 and 5 from the UK today, but it won't be here before the weekend. Somehow Dr. Who isn't available in Germany. Good thing that we have the European Community and therefore no customs (duty) between the countries anymore. Hehe.

Tomorrow I'll try the film scan for the first time at my new scanner, hopefully it works out well. I have one film with really awesome pics left from my vacation in Austria and I really want to show them to you in good quality (without striations).

The end is a new beginning, the darkness that gives birth to the light

No, I have not become religious! Instead I have come to a decision. But let me start at the beginning.

Looking through a water pipe

First there was nothing and then there was a big bang.... No, no, no, not that far back. ;-)

It started yesterday evening when I drew Tarot cards for today. Yes, I drew more than one card, since I had a very important dentist appointment today. Almost all cards I got were "bad" cards: The Devil, The Hanged Man, etc. Naturally I wasn't happy about these cards in sight of my dentists appointment, since I didn't want to sacrifice my tooth, so I tried to cheat and drew card after card. ;-) But all I got were cards that had more or less the same meaning, pointing into the same direction, like the Devil and the Hanged Man. The Hanged Man means that there has to be a sacrifice to end a deadlock. In case of the Devil, the card description speaks from "the darkness that births the light", the reason for the chosen picture above, the cards meaning is the Natural End.

Now it's one day later and I'm smarter. The good news my tooth is fine. It actually looks like a tooth again, but the gums around it are hurting. The dear Tarot wasn't referring to my tooth, but to...

Hahah, won't tell ya...

After this realization (at my favourite café) I bought a few fortune cookies for some friends (New Years tradition of ours) and I also got one for myself, it said: "If you look in the right place you'll find what you look for". And todays Elle UK horoscope makes sense now, too: "If you’re feeling like you must transform now or never, you’re right in line with the times. The 2012 energies are strong right now, and because your element is being touched off by both the Moon and the Sun today, you can feel how truly powerful you are. Ban all anxiety and invite triumph into your life."

  Today I also got a place in the illustration workshop on January 21st, which I was afraid to be already sold out or to be cancelled (which happened to all the courses at the adult education center that I signed up for during 2011). I'm really excited about taking part in this workshop.

I think 2012 is starting of very well for me.

Happy New Year!

I wish all of you and your loved ones a fantastic new year. Let's make it an awesome year, filled with love, fun, laughter and beautiful moments abound.

As you probably haven't noticed I haven't been blogging for a week. The reason? I needed time to recover and sleep and finishing up and throwing out and reminisce over and plan for and just "be" in general. So the last week was still quite full with stuff to do and I didn't get it all done, but that's just fine with me, I'll do the stuff in the upcoming weeks.

Epiphanies occured more then once last week. The first I had at 0:15 AM in the tram home from work last Tuesday. Wonderful isn't it? Nothing like a tram ride at midnight for finding about more about oneself. What it was? I am now ready to finally move from being an observer to being a doer/maker/creator. I think I have been an observer for most of my life and while I knew for quite a while that I had to take things into my own hands, I wasn't ready to make the change just then. Now I am.

I'm actually moving my own life into a direction that I want. I think the reason why I was an observer for so long, was that I didn't know what I wanted. But last year I've finally have come to terms with myself and have developed my very own set of goals, I've even written them down. And the funny thing is, having goals makes everything else quite easy! Suddenly I'm much more focused with everything. I just love it.

So as one of my goals is to develop my artwork and most importantly drawing skills (I've tried to draw Alice's Cheshire Cat last week. Tim Burton would probably have a heartattack seeing this awful mess I drew!) I have come up with an art project for 2012: The SVA - 366 - Postcard - Project. Now the idea is more or less stolen from other people around the world, such as Mike Winkelman, also known as Beeple.He's been doing such a thing now for more than 1700 consecutive days. Which is amazing. So in my case this means I will draw (at least) one postcard per day and I will post all of them on the San's Visual Art-366-Blog. We'll see how this works out.*

Doodle 15.3.2011-1

Another realization of this week was that I actually have fully transitioned from tomboy to woman this last year. Meaning I just feel weird wearing hooded sweaters and badly or non-fitting clothes. This is HUGE, at least for me. During the last weeks I had to wear wide old jeans and hooded sweaters for work. I'm sooo glad this is over and I'm back to my now normal clothes. The move from tomboy-ish attire to womanly clothing took me almost three years.

There is more to come, but the year is long and so I leave you to your hopefully not too bad hangover from your New Year's Eve party.

CHEERS.


* I have my doubts that I will actually pull through, but who knows? I just might have changed soo much, that I actually might end up really drawing a card every day of this year.