Little black kettle Triptych

© Sybille Sterk

Do not copy or publish this in any way, shape or form without my written permission.

I just started a new 1/52 project. This time we have a set topic/subject for each season. This season is for leading lines, and I've been on the hunt for lines ever since and came across my kettle during the chase. I loved the lines in the first and second image of this triptych, and love that the image is getting more and more abstract. The waterdrops on the kettle may show me to be a bad housewife, BUT they are ever so pretty and they prove that beauty can be found anywhere, if you just look. 

All images/textures/brushes my own or bought. Edited with Photoshop.

All my images are available on Redbubble, Artflakes, Society6 and Bluecanvas as prints, cards, posters, skins for laptops, Blackberry, iPhones and other phones (for the skins go to Bluecanvas). You can now also get most of my images on cushion covers (go to Society6 for these).

All on Society6

52 weeks in photographs - 2012

52 photographs, one for each week of the year 2012.

This was part of a Facebook project 1/52, which I joined at the beginning of 2012 (or was it the end of 2011?), and which I managed to carry through all year despite hitting the wall a couple of times.

The idea was to take one photograph a week each with a single chosen subject throughout the year. My subject was 'mirrors'. I started off with the obvious and took pictures of mirrors and did, what I feel I do best, manipulated my photographs.

The more the project went on, the more I had to start thinking out of the box and come up with different ideas. It wasn't just about the object 'mirror' any longer but what a mirror does and all the preconceptions, the magic and the concepts that surround mirrors and reflections.

The further along I came the more straight photography with less adjustments and manipulations I managed to do and I feel I've learned so much, from using my old camera properly to playing with my new one and the lenses I bought for it, to assessing an object through the lens and how to play with ideas and not go for the obvious.

It has given me some images I love and one that is my most successful image ever and some I am not so happy with and might revisit later again, just because. There is one extra at the end because I couldn't decide. So it's really 53. :-)

I've loved the project and the way it helped me grow as a photographer and the way it opened my mind to different approaches; which is exactly why I joined a new version of this project this time with 4 different set topics throughout the year, still with 52 images, one for each week though. Wish me luck!

If you'd like to see the images in detail, go here.

The Reflection of Love

© Sybille Sterk

Do not copy or publish this in any way, shape or form without my written permission.

Created for my 1/52 Project on Facebook. This was week 38/52 and one of the first photographs I took with my new camera.  It is also part of my new series of images for licensing on Arcangel-Images - use this code: SYST-00302.

Sometimes all we get is the reflection of love but the real love eludes us.

The image is of a heart drawn on a steamed up mirror. Created with my own photographs in Photoshop, no stock used.

Stop the Clocks

MyFreeCopyright
MCN: CLXHL-7V21E-GYBNM

Image created for the 1/52 project (20/52) from my own photographs.

This is about the Victorian tradtion of covering mirrors and stopping clocks with a death in the house. I presume the latter was to establish and record time of death, the former, covering the mirrors, is supposed to prevent the departing soul from becoming trapped in the mirror. There is a similar tradition in Jewish religion, however in this case it is to remind us that we are more than our physical bodies and to leave vanity behind and remember our souls.

Words are from my poem Night Songs:

"gone from sight
but not from mind
like a prisoner
forgotten
rotting
in a damp cell"

All my licensing images are available on Redbubble, Artflakes and Bluecanvas as prints, cards, posters, skins for laptops, Blackberry, iPhones and other phones (for the skins go to Bluecanvas).

Let there be light

MCN: CBV8W-1W24U-QGAXU

Another image from my 1/52 Project. This is 4/52. The frame is made from old Indian fabric printing blocks.

Created with my own photographs in Photoshop, no stock used.