As promised, here’s a post of photos I’ve been re-working in anticipation of a show that may not happen now, since I’ve emailed the gallery owner twice and she hasn’t responded. Oh well. I’m still having fun re-working all these shots, so i’m going to keep on keeping on. Because it’s a lot of photos, I put most of them into collages, since in general I’ve processed several per set. This first one, though, hasn’t had any companions so far, so I’ll post it by itself first. And before I talk too much about the photos, I have a little Sandy the Massage Therapist story to share.

I quit going to see Sandy a while back because I made two consecutive appointments with her that I forgot about, and I was too embarrassed to try again. But eventually my arm started hurting enough to motivate me to make the call, and I’ve gone to see her several times the past few weeks. She has been her usual chatty, bizarre self, but hasn’t really given me anything to write about until today. Today, though, she went in on a topic she talks about often: all the men who come to see her and try to flirt with her or, erm, get buck naked instead of staying covered up. I didn’t realize this was a “thing” with massage therapists, and maybe it’s just Sandy exaggerating, but she swears that most of the men she works on constantly want to uncover themselves while she is working and, according to Sandy, she has to chastise them to make them keep their towels on.

I kind of wish I’d had a normal wig on here; the pastel hair distracts from the shocking balletic movement I managed to pull off in this shot. I didn’t think I’d be able to change it to a plain color without it looking fake though. 

“Do you know how many of those things I’ve seen over the years?” she said with an exasperated sigh. “Puh-lease, it is not like I need to ever see one again.” Then, she went on to share with me just how many of those things she actually has seen (and in case it isn’t clear, when Sandy says those things, she means penises).

“I mean, I’ve been married five times, so that’s five right there.” Five times? I asked, amazed that I’ve been coming to see Sandy for over a year now and this is the first I’ve heard this. “Yes ma’am. And then there’s all the guys I dated before that. I dated one guy for seven, eight years, and let me tell you, he was hung like a horse. I remember asking him how many times it would take before I stopped being sore every time, and he said about ten, so I said well let’s just get those first ten times out of the way now so I can get on with life. We’re still friends, you know, and every time I see him I ask him – so, have you tore any women up lately?” (I know, I totally should have warned you that was coming. Sorry.)

It’s a good thing I’m always lying face-down on the massage table when Sandy tells me these stories, so I can freely allow my mouth to drop open in awe and disbelief at whatever it is she’s just said. Feel free to do the same at home. But hey, my arm feels loose enough now to type this up and share it with you, so maybe that’s the plus side. Then again, maybe not.

But now, about these pictures. The shots directly above are macros of some roses Doug got me for our fifteenth wedding anniversary (March 11); I was taking pics of the Fendi purse I wrote about in my last post, and while I was at it I decided to spritz the flowers down with water and shoot some macros. I took a ton, but these were the best of the bunch. There was some freesia in the arrangement as well, so I may process some of the shots of took of it also, but I haven’t had time yet. I don’t have them anymore, because Simon kept looking at them and thinking, hey look, lunch; plus they were slowly dying anyway. But they were pretty while they lasted.

For most of the other shots, the main changes I made in re-editing them was to do less with them, rather than more. For most of these, when i shot and processed them originally, I was just learning how to add textures and filters and in many cases had gone overboard; I’d always wanted to go back to some of the best ones and re-process them in a more straightforward way but never got around to it until now. Also, I am using this opportunity to format my TIF files at 300dpi instead of the 72 I was using as a default before, so the files are a lot bigger (which makes them slow to work on at times, as my little laptop struggles to keep up).

Some of these shots were old enough that they were taken before I used full backdrops, and would instead hang a sheet on the wall and place a matching one on the floor, creating a very obvious line between them. When I couldn’t get that edited out properly, I did add some background texture to help conceal the edits, but I kept the textures subtle so as not to overwhelm the subject of the shot (the very first shot, and the second one in the collage above, are both examples of where I needed to add some texture to the background).

More coming from this set – I can only stand to do a few at a time before I get bored, but lots of interesting shots from this one

In the two curtain pictures above, I did use one of Topaz’s Re-Style filters to change the color pretty radically; in the original shots (some of which you can see here), I had a brown background and a purple curtain, but I decided I wanted a more unified color to entire shot, and I liked the underwater feel this filter created. I’ve got a few more to edit from that set, but these are the only two I had ready by the time I wrote this post. To get the color exactly right, I have to add more of the filter to the background than to the curtains, so it’s a rather tedious process to get it just right; I get bored with working on them rather quickly, but I’m pleased with the end result nonetheless.

For these next floral dress shots, I decided since in the originals I hadn’t covered up the floor at all and it looked kinda sloppy, to just go with it and create shots that appeared to be outtakes; I left the remote sitting on the floor instead of editing it out to add to that effect. I kind of wish now that I’d had more junk sitting around I could leave in, but alas, I was rather neat on this day, I guess.

This was such a thrown-together set but I got a lot of good shots out of it. Also, favorite wig. 

As I said, I haven’t heard from the gallery owner anymore, or the woman she asked me to email my questions to, so who knows if that will ever really happen. My plan right now is to leave things alone for awhile and keep editing my photos, then in a few weeks contact her again and ask her directly if she was serious or not about a show. If she was, great, and if she blows me off, oh well. Next time someone asks at least I’ll be prepared.

That jumping one gets tons of reactions – so much orange! – and the portrait I liked because it’s an unusual expression for me.