Notes on the Making
Process, decisions, behind the scenes — how the stories get made.
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Finally getting my posse of neighborhood kids
On just letting my characters be kids for awhile, or the start of an endless summer.
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Casting elves for In the Forest
While I always had these two main dolls (Kestrel and Wren) I had several other elf-like BJDs on the quest when I first started
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Improving Old Shots with Lightroom
I’ve recently learned how to get more out of Lightroom, and am using it more often to adjust my shots.
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More shooting in the dark
Lighting a shot is always a series of experiments. I have some very rough idea of what I want, and then I start playing around with placement and lighting. Sometimes sometimes everything looks great, and sometimes everything looks awful. I try to do more of whatever made the shot look great, but it’s a pretty…
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Shadow play: Playing with flashlights in the dark
The very best thing about photographing inanimate objects is that they don’t move. So, no matter how oddly you light them up, they won’t suddenly shift and blur the shot. There’s a ton of things you can do with that stillness, and I’ve done a ton of them – scenes lit with candles, or disco…
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Shooting under the bed with candlelight
Sharing a few shots from last night, when the cast of Underfoot was all cozied up in their beds watching Incredible Journey.
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Alternate BJDs or Sad news for Mr. Rat
Most of my ball-joint dolls are standard resin, hooks, and string ball joint dolls. They’re made of an almost indestructible resin, and, if any piece falls off or if the string gets too loose, you can just take them apart and restring them. A few, though are made of delicate material and are highly destructible.
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Some under-the-bed shots
My experiment with the tablet-as-a-viewfinder and the flexible tripod has been wildly successful, IMO. My sense is that most of the success is due to using a larger viewfinder.
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Follow up on taking on-the-ground shots
Now that I’ve figured out how to take on the ground shots without lying on the ground myself, I had to figure out how to stabilize the camera. I found a tripod that works for my process.