PRINTS

New prints

"New prints"

Back in the days before digital, we printed out our pictures, kids. We had to! It was the only way to see them. You put this little roll like thing called "film" into a camera and each roll of film let you take like 24 shots or something like that and you never new how your pictures where going to turn out until you got them back from the photo lab at the local Walmart. As a result, my mother's house was full of boxes and boxes of pictures of total crap images. Pictures of thumbs. Unrecognizable landscapes. Blurry. Half a picture bleached out. We had boxes full of these kinds of pictures, but that was just how it was. There was no editing or choosing before print. Also, film and printing didn't seem all that cheap at the time. Getting a roll of film developed was a bit of a luxury. 

As a kid, I was well aware of the cost and hassle of printing a roll of film. Being aware of all of that made me really choosy about taking a picture. So choosy that I often wouldn't even take a picture. My mom would send me to camp with a camera and couple of rolls of film and I'd come home with twelve shots left on the original roll of film. During all the 4-H years, they liked you to include pictures in your record books. Every time I went somewhere or did something 4-H, mom would once again send me with the camera and several rolls of film. Still I'd come home with empty rolls of film. My mother would beg me to take pictures. Yes. There was a time when I had to be forced to pick up a camera and use it. That all changed for me with digital technology, where you can take as many first pancake pictures as you want or need to get the one right picture. Now, the only reason I have a cell phone is for the camera.

Digital is an anti-hoarder's wet dream. It means I can have tons of pictures piled into multiple places without having the tangible pictures piling up in boxes that I have to store in the basement. The basement is where all things go to die a slow agonizing spiderweb laced death. At the same time though, it's kind of sad. A couple of years ago I vowed to start printing out a few of my pictures every month or so. I hung a bed frame on my wall and clipped a bunch of clips to it to hold pictures. This has worked out well. I admit that I don't print pictures every month, but at least every season, I put a new batch of photos up on the wall. Actually, this year has been a pretty good year for printing out my own photos. Michael's been the one to push for larger prints to put in real picture frames to hang on the wall and it's been a difficult thing for me to do. That's another story though about probably earning more trophies than actually received as a child.

Any way. Printing Photos! Usually, I print my Instagram photos through Walgreens. They keep the square shape and integrity of the original photo. I also like the way the square pictures look on the bed frame. Lately, I've been using VSCO to post my #365 pictures. I just like having one uniform spot for them and I use the same filter for each photo. It's a nice artistic space without the likes and faves and number of views. It's a space for me, not for people to notice me. The other day VSCO sent me a coupon to try out Artifact Uprising. I got 25 prints for free (excluding shipping) and they showed up at the house yesterday. I could not be more pleased. The photos are printed on this thick paper with a pretty white boarder and a textured matte finish. They just feel really good to hold between your fingers. They really are just lovely. You get twenty five 5 x5" prints for $21.99. That's about $0.89 per picture which is double the price for 4 x4" prints from Walgreens. Since I'm only printing up pictures about four times a year, I think I can treat myself with the prints from AU. At least that's how I'm going to justify that purchase.

Because I really do love them and no one is paying me to say that.  

THE TAKEAWAY

Detroit

"Detroit"

Every time I've gone to a BlogHer conference, I've come home fired up and ready to make major changes to the blog and write write write and take more pictures, better pictures and to speak out more against injustice in this world and raise more money for charities. I come back ready to change the world with my blog or I have at least gained some new techie knowledge to help me make my blog better for changing the world. This time? Not so much. Or I've just gotten way more mellow with age. This is not to say that I gained nothing from attending the conference or that I wouldn't recommend attending the conference. If you are new to blogging, this conference has invaluable tools and information for all things social media. Not to mention it is a great way to meet other women who have shared interests and build a following. I've gone from kind of wanting a following to not really caring if I have a following. It's not the reason I blog. I was talking to a woman at the conference and she asked me how long I've been blogging and I was shocked to realize that I have been blogging at Elephant Soap for almost fifteen years. I might have five more readers now then I did in those early years.

I attended a workshop on mobile photo editing thinking that I would learn about some new camera apps. I did not discover any new app that I didn't already have on my phone, but I was inspired to go back to a couple of those apps and give them another try. Snapseed and VSCOcam are two photo apps that I have on my phone that I never use. I think I tried using them once or twice, but then got lazy and didn't want to really spend time learning how to use them. I discovered an editing tool in Snapseed that I had been looking for but not finding in my other camera apps. I had shoved this app over into an unused section of photo apps on my phone. It's now been moved up. VSCOcam has inspired me to rethink my 365 day project. My Instagram feed is messy and random and I love it, but I'd like my 365 things that make me happy pictures to stand out. I want a cohesive artistic flow to them and I want them all in one place. VSCOcam is turning out to be that place. And because I'm working on having a cohesive artistic flow of images, it is making me more mindful of how and what I photograph for a happiness project. This is something I needed because my 365 Days of Happiness project had grown a little stale. There were too many days when I reached the end of the day and said "Oh crap! I haven't taken a 365 day picture yet!" and so I would scramble and just shoot something. I needed a reminder to be a more mindful photographer.

The other thing I sat in on at the conference was on storytelling behind the hashtags. I'm not good at hashtags. I often forget them or type them out wrong. I know they can be powerful tools for spreading the word. I thought I was sitting in on a discussion of how to use hashtags but instead ended up listening to stories that have developed from #YouOKSis, #KnowMe, and #SolidarityIsForWhiteWomen. These were stories that I needed to hear. They made me realize that I need to be paying better attention to my surroundings and speaking up when I see something that doesn't seem quite right. I need to not be afraid to say something, which inspired my own hashtag #SaySomething. I've also been pondering a way to do cool science workshops in the inner city schools here. I want to show kids the career possibilities that are available in the science industry. ALL Kids. Not just the white ones. 

So, I didn't come home on fire with ideas, but I came home with some good ideas. I came home with tangible ideas. These are things that are not beyond the realm of possibility or me just thinking up super grand ways to make the world a better place. Maybe I've finally fully grasped that I cannot change the world by trying to actually change the world. Making a difference starts small and right in my own backyard or my own neighborhood. I'm going to focus more on the smaller side of change. These are the things I took from BlogHer '15.