Inside my head is a passion fueled perfectionist who consistently pushes me further from my creative and productive goals than towards them. Inside my heart is my messy chaotic inner-child longing to play. Who’s call should I answer? Both.
If my perfectionist can let her hair down and let her passion play with my inner-child, they can explore beyond my current levels of understanding, exploring new possibilities while developing new skills. And play requires no fancy resources, no exotic locations, simply presence and imagination. (A plus for a gal home sick in bed with single digit wind chills outside.)
Today my grey and white cat was curled up with me and my fuzzy orange and black cheetah print blanket. I couldn’t resist the urge to snap a few pics of my cute kitty, but fan-girling over my furbaby hardly qualifies as serious photography. The perfectionist in me has always disliked the pattern and color clash of my blanket verses kitty. Then today, exploring a different perspective from inside my own Land of Counterpane, I noticed playful brilliant relationship in the pattern and texture. I wondered if I removed the distraction of color if there might be a real photograph hidden there under the covers.
I’m tickled with the black and white results, and surprised to say I like the color version too. I had raised part of my blanket to use as a portrait background. The light slightly ambered as it leaked through my blanket and washed over my cat, bringing out brown tones in her fur I’ve never noticed, and naturally color grading the whole scene into cohesion.
I let passion and play fuel exploration without the barriers from perfectionism or chaos. This gave me an opportunity to enjoy the process, to practice my still developing photography skills, and to end up with a couple of fun snapshot memories of my kitty. As far as I’m concerned, all of that is what serious photography is all about.
B/W or Color? Do you ever fall in love with both? Playing with pattern and texture in black and white was my aim, and I love the result, but was surprised to fall for the warm tones mixed in the color version too. Which is your favorite??? https://www.instagram.com/p/Bs4HdPDh8zO/
Aldridge Music and Pictures 