That last step

Posted on March 28, 2012 by Mary Beth Frezon

All along I’ve been taking photos of this quilt hanging on the design wall which is a fairly white color. Tonight I take it downstairs and set up the whole thing. First off none of my backgrounds are big enough. I may be the only person you know who buys black fabric by the bolt though so I was able to quickly jerry rig a long enough background. All said and done though I think the white is better. Tomorrow night I’ll try again upstairs on the wall and see how that turns out. I’ll have to move some tables around to get some distance.

Anyway. For your amusement:

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Taking pictures, what I use

Posted on March 27, 2012 by Mary Beth Frezon

If anyone is interested in the set up that I use to take quilt photos, here are links to where I got mine. I’ve had mine for about 6 years now. I bought the rest of my photo stuff from B&H photo in NYC and a few things like my ambient light meter via ebay. I think I’ve mentioned how much I love my light meter LOL.

Background stand: They start around $100 for one that can be used up to 10 ft wide.

Very handy for all sorts of things – design wall, photography, display etc.

Lighting: I use something like these light stands, but I’m now replacing the tungsten lights with daylight Compact Fluorescent Bulbs.

Most of the time I only use two light stands and the third lives near my design wall for extra lighting.

Backgrounds: I made a couple backgrounds to use behind the quilt. Both are two sided, white on one side and black on the other. The bigger one is knit fabric and just a big tube so the color is easy to switch around. The knit is easy to stuff in a bag and doesn’t wrinkle. I throw it in the dryer to de-fur/lint it and unwrinkle it.

The smaller one is white and black duck just seamed at the top and bottom with an extra row of stitching to make a “sleeve”.

I use a couple weird shower hooks over the top of the background stand, with a couple loops of nylon monofilament line, to hang the bar that is through the quilt’s sleeve. A small level is helpful to get the quilt hanging level although it’s probably easier to adjust the camera to be level with the quilt.

I often put a piece of masking tape in the literal center of the quilt so I can put it into the center of the frame, making it easier to make sure everything is square and parallel. If your camera has a grid setting in the display, that’s the perfect thing to use for taking these photos. You can line edges and lines up in the photo and know it’s good. (Don’t forget to remove the masking tape.)

I’m not a big fan of trying to take photos outside. My quilts are usually pretty big and trying to find a place to work and a still enough day that everything isn’t flapping around is hard.

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It’s a three-fur

Posted on March 27, 2012 by Mary Beth Frezon

Look over and there are three cats duking it out for sun in the window. OK, yes, it’s a little chilly. OK, just plain chilly. I have to say that for Deirdre, being somewhat the bottom of the heap is probably a good thing.

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From the quote box

Posted on March 27, 2012 by Mary Beth Frezon

I can’t always reach the image in my mind… almost never, in fact… so that the abstract image I create is not quite there, but it gets to the point where I can leave it. — Chuck Close

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Dual Duty, your time has come

Posted on March 26, 2012 by Mary Beth Frezon

Driving back from a work meeting at Proctor’s Theater in Schenectady I saw a big white glow back from Rt 5. I wondered if it was a drive in theater and tried to think what it might be. Got closer and it was the big white box building that is Taft Furniture. Big white-faced super plain building surrounded by huge amounts of continuous parking lot (are there ever any cars there?)

Anyway, I had this flash – why don’t people build big buildings like this that could be used after hours for other things – movies, theater presentations, band concerts. All you need is a big flat side without windows (more popular for building design than is understandable), or a slightly larger loading dock with a roof covering, or a racked set of stairs for arranging orchestra members or choirs.

I know – too good an idea. I’ll put it on my list of “things happening once I’m Queen”. Number one on that list is to tie all highway repair funding to the simultaneous burying of all power, phone and other cables. Off with the wooden poles and endless stringings of cables. Number two will now be: all approvals for commercial buildings with large parking lots over x acreage must include plans and support for one of several community entertainment types.

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