If you follow me on Twitter, you’ll know I’m mad keen on vintage homewares, fashion and jewellery! If you want to check out my latest bargains, follow my Instagram feed @cathryncook or see my profile at http://followgram.me/cathryncook/
Here’s a few of my recent finds – vintage wine glasses, amber and plastic jewellery and my FAB new (old) deck chair!
Blythe photo by Gina Garan
Years ago, when I was studying photography, I came across a book of photographs of a doll named Blythe. A striking thing of beauty with large eyes and numerous outfits, she had been photographed on many different adventures. This struck a chord with me, not only for the novel photography project idea, but also for the doll itself and her fashions. In more recent years I’d seen Blythe crop up on ad campaigns, such as Sony, and I wondered if she was available to buy. Here’s what I found out…
Blythe was originally launched in 1972 but only lasted a year on the shelves, as children found her a little scary. Years later, Blythe was rediscovered and collected by Gina Garan, who photographed her ‘girls’ in various original and home-made outfits and published the book ‘This is Blythe
I fancied having a go at photographing Blythe myself, so I ordered a Petite Blythe on eBay, which seems the only place to buy from in the UK. She arrived on Monday and I enjoyed making two little dresses for her! Her model name is ‘Running Deer’ and she arrived wearing a Red Indian style outfit – check it out below, along with the two dresses I made:
A couple of things to note if you’re considering purchasing a doll: the larger size has colour changing eyes, so there’s more flexibility for changing her expression, plus there is a much wider range of clothes and accessories available on the market. However, she’s not cheap – Petite Blythe is a smaller and cheaper alternative if you’re on a budget (you’ll need a good macro function on your camera though in order to get those close-ups!!).
She is definitely great fun to photograph and if you’re interested in fashion, photography or making dolls clothes, I’m sure you’d have fun with Blythe too! View more of my Blythe photos on Flickr here.
I’ve always enjoyed photographing wildlife and one of the easiest ways to do this is to visit zoos and sanctuaries. Today hubby and I had a day off work and went for an adventure at Woburn Safari. This great park is designed so that you can drive around and get up really close to the animals including my favourites, monkeys! I took almost 300 photos in total and have uploaded 38 of the best to Flickr – view the full set here.
(Shot using a Canon EOS 450D
Last week saw volcanic ash from the eruption of Iceland’s Eyjafjallajoekull volcano cover the UK and ground all flights in and out for several days. Whilst this disruption sent friends and colleagues into chaos, I couldn’t help but take advantage of the positive side – the beautiful sunsets! Click an image below to see the full size version on Flickr:
I am lucky enough to live in the rolling hills of Surrey (England) and last Saturday I took a trip up to Box Hill to check out the multicoloured skies. Now, anyone who’s tried to capture an amazing sunset on camera will probably know it’s a bit tricky! If you’d like to try it out, my main advice would be:
Remember these are just my personal preferences, not a definitive answer – experiment with your camera settings and let me know how you get on. Any other photographers out there with tips, feel free to share!
Happy snapping :O)
Images taken on a Canon EOS 45oD
I’m guessing if you’re reading this you either like my posts about shoes and Trollbeads, or you like my photography…so to make it easier for you to find what you want you can ‘Click to view only posts about…’ in the right side panel.
To make it even easier when you’re viewing my photos on Flickr, I’ve created two collections – one for Fashion (mostly Trollbeads, Crocs and other shoes) and one for Photography…
Click to see the Fashion Collection here
Click to see the Photography Collection here
If you’re also on Flickr let’s link up – just send me a connection request!
Did you know you can find me on Flickr too?
It’s pretty empty right now but soon there will be a wider selection of photos, both in general photography and in products so you can get a quick overview of the pictures without all the words! If that’s your type of thing, check it out at www.flickr.com/photos/catcook/
Having spent five years studying traditional darkroom photography from GCSE, A-Level and GNVQ Advanced at College, through to HND and BA (Hons) degree at University, you can imagine I was less than impressed to enter the word of freelance in 2003, to find everyone using digital!
Where possible, I used 35mm film and had the negatives scanned to hi-res digital images, at the time using a Canon EOS 5. I used a Sony DSC-F717 where clients preffered direct digital (no film/processing costs!), but never quite made the leap to a full digital SLR…until now!
July last year I finally purchased a Canon EOS 450D and I have to say I’m pretty impressed so far. I won’t go into technical details but it’s a great starter camera into the world of digital SLRs and although it’s never going to be as satisfying as an old-school film camera, it’s certainly less hassle than standing in a darkroom shaking a film developing canister!
Here’s one of the first photos I took on it, about five minutes out of the box…
I thought I’d start off the blog by showing you the photo I used in the site header…
This photo was taken at sunset last June on a holiday in Cornwall (UK) and is part of a larger series (check out my Twitgoo feed here to find another couple!). In a previous career I worked as a freelance photographer and teacher and now I just take photos for my own enjoyment! I am also a keen scrapper (I make scrapbooks), but more about that another time…