Through The Viewfinder And Into The Greenhouse

Yesterday's greenhouse made it into today's photography as well.  This time with the addition of a Kodak Duaflex, allowing me to get a nice TTV shot.  The greenhouse can be found in Belfast's Botanic Garden.

I appear to not only be on a black and white kick, but also a greenhouse kick.  Worry not, I'm sure I'll beat at least one of those habits tomorrow.

Eggs Through the Viewfinder

Since I had my Duaflex out from yesterday's picture, I figured I might as well use it today as well.  When I thought of what my day would entail (band practice and eggs), I knew what I would be photographing.  Eggs
My wife and I rarely eat eggs.  I wont say that we are vegans... we purchase things that are not vegan, but they are produced locally and organically and are from farms that we can actually walk around on.  We think that this has a more positive effect on the world around us than not touching anything that isn't vegan.  We want to create a demand for local small businesses that believe in the ethics and practices that we believe in.  (I know there are some contradictions and issues in the practice that we subscribe to, but we are constantly altering the way we look at things, trying to figure out what is the best method for us.)
But today, I must make about three dozen hard boiled eggs for my sister's wedding.  I am in the process of doing so.  Some of them will become buffalo eggs, some will be red beet eggs, some will be mustard eggs and some will be dill pickle eggs.  They all will then become deviled eggs.  Here are three of those three dozen.

Beautiful Local Brown Eggs

These eggs have such a nice color to them.  So unlike the bleached white things you get at those massive grocery stores.  They would go rather well with a slice of that honey oat wheat bread that is sitting in the background of the photo.

Laundry Day

It wasn't laundry day for me today (yesterday, on the other hand, was), but it was for someone in my neighborhood.  Passing the brightly colored articles of clothing on my way home was all the prompting I needed to figure out what today's photo would be.  I got home, grabbed my cameras (my Canon T1I and my ancient Kodak Duaflex IV), and went right back out.
On its own, a clothesline might not be anything special, but I have taught myself how to see the world in different shades, void of color all together, and in tons of different forms that require post-processing or just simple in-camera manipulation.  I saw the clothing hanging there and I knew that all it needed was to be shot through my old Kodak Duaflex IV - the more and more popular Through the Viewfinder, or TTV technique.

   Laundry Day

The only post-processing that I do to my TTV images is an upping of saturation...The images that you would get from a working Duaflex were known for their strongly saturated colors.

My Backyard

Cellar door is a phrase considered by many to be the most phonaesthetic.  This means it is beautiful solely based on the way it sounds, and not due to any connotations or mental images that may surface when heard.
Donnie Darko, a fantastic movie, brought this concept to the general public even though the idea has actually been around for awhile and has been written about by many great minds, including J.R.R. Tolkien.
Oddly enough, it seems that there are very few cellar doors left.  I am one of the lucky few that still has one connected to their house, and so, once I was ready to go in search of today's picture, I started in my backyard, near the cellar.  

 

The Most Beautiful

Spring's slow but steady approach has me photographing more flowers and plants than I ever have before.  But which is more beautiful? A tangible thing like a flower or a phrase or idea, like "Cellar Door"?

For both of these pictures, I used a technique called TTV or Through the Viewfinder.  You can read more about it at the end of this post, but basically I shoot with my regular camera, through the viewfinder of another camera...in my case an old Kodak Duaflex IV.  You can see my other TTV photos at my Etsy Store, look for "through the viewfinder" in the title.  next2hector Etsy

A Fence Through The Viewfinder

"Fence" may not be so phonaesthetic, but if shot from a decent angle with a unique technique, it might end up looking pretty decent.  This fence is also in my backyard.  As of late, some beautiful cardinals have been using it as a tight rope.

These images were taken using a Kodak Duaflex IV, manufactured from the 1940s-1960s. The Duaflex was not the only camera used to create this photo. 'Through the Viewfinder' means a picture is taken, usually with a digital camera, of the viewfinder on another camera, usually an old camera (in this case the Duaflex), in order for the final image to have a vintage feel. The vintage feel comes from the dust specks that are on the old camera’s viewfinder as well as the vignette that images will tend to get due to the convex surface of the viewfinder.