Back to Bologna

Yesterday as I was writing yesterday's Exploring with a Camera: Found Texture post I rediscovered an image for my market/wheels series. Taken over a year ago, this street scene in Bologna captured my interest for the texture, the scooter and the bustling street market. It was taken before I "discovered" my market/wheels series early last year. How many more images for this series do I have, hidden in my archives? I hope to find out.

As part of my goal to seek balance, I want to go back and sort through the thousands of images from my time in Italy. Seek a balance of working with the old and the new. Some of these images have been reviewed, edited and shared, but many, many more have not. I know I will learn more and see more with this review, both about myself and my photography. And hey, I can learn how to categorize and edit even more in Lightroom too, at the same time. Perfect.

I hope you all have a great weekend planned! I'll be working on my website, getting it ready to launch very shortly. I would love to have you to visit me in a few places, while I'm busy working...
- Musing on "home" at Mortal Muses, with a story of quilts, handmade with love.
- An interview on the Seek Your Course blog with me.
- Today I am the "Sparkling Sponsor" for the World's Biggest Summit. Yay! Welcome to all coming by! You can still sign up and join in this great, free class.

Meet the Scooter

I would like to introduce you to my scooter. I know, you've heard about it more than once (here and here), but it hasn't had a proper photographic debut on my blog until now. Ta-da!!

This morning I rode it downtown on a photographic excursion, so I had both the scooter and my camera together for the first time. They were instant friends, can you tell? The scooter and camera will be having more play dates in the future. Watch this space.

I don't know why I seem to be using seventies processing on all of my scooter pics lately, but that is how I see them. Maybe it's the retro styling of the scooter, but who really knows. I'm having fun, and that's all that matters, isn't it?

I hope you are having fun on this lovely Sunday too!


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What's going on around The Kat Eye View of the World...

• The current Exploring with a Camera theme is Process of Elimination. Check out the post and explore with us.
• Do you want to deepen the connection between your heart and soul and your photography? Registration for the fall series of the Find Your Eye e-course is open! Visit here for more info.
• You can subscribe to the Kat Eye News to stay up-to-date on all the happenings.

Scooter Love in the Pacific NW - and GIVEAWAY!!

Who would have thought it! I went to Portland (1.5 hours north) on Saturday with a friend to see the traveling production of Mamma Mia. After the show we headed to the Northwest section of the city and what did we run across? Vespa scooters. Not one, not two... Seven in all. Seven!! I was in scooter heaven! Especially this one, parked in an empty garage against a textured wall in some moody light. It was calling my name. Luckily, I had my little Canon PowerShot with me to answer the call.

Someday, I will have a red Vespa scooter. And I will park it in front of every texture-y wall I can find to take pictures. Until then, I will take advantage of every opportunity that comes my way to live vicariously through taking photos of someone else's red Vespa.  And I can do this in Portland. Who knew?

What a weekend though! Not only was there fabulous scooter love to be found, but we received our container from Italy. Yay! Early Saturday morning, the truck pulled up and there was the container waiting to be unloaded. All sealed and packed, just as it was as it left from our apartment on Via Matteotti. That means, however, that our lives are in disarray again. The semblance of order and routine we had been able to create for a few weeks is once again dismantled as we unpack boxes and try to figure out how to fit everything in to our house. Our house in the US and our apartment in Italy were the same size in square feet/meters, but there was so much more storage in the Italian apartment. Add the belongings that were in storage in the US to the items we collected over two years in Italy, and you have the makings of one gigantic garage sale in a few weeks. First priority is to get to the point I can walk through the house without tripping over anything though!

On top of that, the Liberate Your Art postcard swap blog hop was going on. So fun! I had such a great time hopping around, seeing where the art ended up. It provided a much needed break from the unpacking. The swap turned out better than I imagined, and the blog hop was a blast. I can't wait to do the swap again in 2012!!

Until then, I have tons going on around here...

• Find Your Eye registration is open for the September-October class series! I'll be running Starting the Journey and the all-new Journey of Inspiration. Right now the August class, Journey of Recognition, is going on and has it been fantastic. I couldn't ask for a better group of participants. I love doing this!
• We are exploring Night Photography in Exploring with a Camera. I had forgotten how much I love taking photos at night! I hope you will join us and link in before Wednesday. You can still get the Night Photography Camera Companion if you sign up for the newsletter too. I'm sending a "catch up" newsletter to all new subscribers this week so that new subscribers don't miss out.
• You still have a few more days to catch Superhero Summer Camp too. Sign up for this fun and free six-week class closes on August 31. 
• And finally - in honor of the seven Vespas of Portland - how about a GIVEAWAY!! My first one on US soil. I am going to give away a set of my new "Classic Italian Transport" postcards to one lucky reader, and a Vespa mousepad to another.

I will draw for the postcards on Wednesday morning when I write my blog post, from the comments left on this post. Let's make it fun, you can have more than one entry. How about a whole bunch of entries!! Leave a separate comment for each of the following:

1. Just to say hi!

2. If you follow me on Twitter or Facebook

3. If you are a newsletter subscriber

4. If you have registered for a Find Your Eye course (past or present) 

5. If you link in to Exploring with a Camera: Night Photography

Good Luck!

Linking in to Creative Every Day and Creative Exchange, as always. Happy Monday! 

My Two-Wheeled Adventure

This week, I rode my scooter to work for the first time! The first time out of the neighborhood, in traffic, stoplights and all that. I was nervous, but I had plotted out a route that was mostly 25mph streets with just a couple of 35mph, so I didn't have too much to cope with. I'm not one for posing in pictures, but I had my husband take a couple of photos of me when I got home just to prove that this scooter I've talked about is real and all!

A friend asked if I had all kinds of pics of the cute scooter in different places, and the answer is no. These are the first photos of it! I've been focusing so much on learning to ride it and practicing that I haven't taken pics. You can expect to see this little Honda Metropolitan in more photos soon... I'll have to find some good scenes to place it in just to get my scooter photo "fix" on a regular basis. Even though I have no cute photos of it yet, I'm linking in to our great new "Muse Mosaic" at Mortal Muses on the theme of TWO with my two-wheeled transportation. You can participate with your photos too!

And... we can't forget it's Paint Party Friday! I must be the slowest painter in the group. I posted this painting I started over a month ago and have had nothing to link in since then...

This week I added a couple more layers, purples and reds. I like the depth of the added colors but it needs more light/dark contrast so I'll be working on that.

After looking at it for a while, I started to feel like it really goes this way. We shall see, more layers to come. I'm just having lots of fun!

Have a great weekend!

Next step in the Dream

Ah, scooters. How do I love thee. I love the cute styling, how they look all parked in a row or against some wonderful European backdrop. I love the freedom they exude, as they zoom along the streets. I love to capture them as part of a scene. They scream "Italy" and "Europe" to me. I never had any desire to ride a motorcycle, but after living in Italy for two years, scooters captured my heart.

I wrote a few months ago about my scooter dream and how I signed up for Motorcycle Basic Rider Training through Team Oregon in July to help me along in my dream. The purpose of this course is to teach basic skills to make a motorcyclist safer on the road, and by 2015 anyone in Oregon who wants to ride a motorcycle will be required to take it. By the end of the course, if you pass, you have met all of the requirements to get your license and the class completion card waives any further testing.

The training was this weekend. It started with a classroom session on Thursday night for two and a half hours, followed by Saturday and Sunday classes which each had four hours on the riding range in the morning and then 2 to 3 hours in class in the afternoon. It included a skills test on the motorcycle and a written test that you had to pass.

Let me be honest - this was the most physically and mentally demanding thing I've done in a long time. (It took all of my energy this weekend, hence no blog posts!) Riding a motorcycle takes an enormous amount of skill and concentration, especially if you're new to it. You have to do different things with both hands and feet at the same time. You have to pay attention to the world around you so much more than in a car, because the hazards are so much greater and you are less visible. You have to learn to trust the machine below you and how to react quickly and safely.

I am not the most physically coordinated of people. I was always last picked in gym class, being small and slow. I was the one who would go out for a sport and work super hard, practicing a ton, just to become mediocre. The athletic stars would come in with no practice and exceed my skills by a long shot. But what I have learned through all of that, is that I have the determination and persistence to learn just about anything when I set my mind to it. I'm not completely uncoordinated, it just takes me more time to get it and more practice to master it than some others. I kept that in mind as I struggled with the controls and getting the sequence right. My past experience has shown me that I could do it, if I really tried.

I have to say, that this course was amazing. It took me (and others) who had never driven a motorcycle before, didn't even know the controls, to riding a motorcycle and passing a skills test in two days of range riding. That is just incredible. By the end, I was swerving around obstacles and taking corners at 15-20 miles per hour (24-32 km/hr), weaving through offset cones at low speed without putting my foot down, able to take sharp corners. Oh yeah, and all of this - in the rain! The second day of class it rained the whole time on the range, soaking us but showing us that we could do this in the rain as much as the sun.

And guess what - I passed! I am so excited. I am so proud. This gives me a bigger feeling of accomplishment than I ever, ever expected. I overcame my fears. I learned something that was hard for me but my persistence and determination paid off. And the good news, driving a scooter is much easier than a motorcycle! No clutch to worry about, no foot controls, yet I know how to do those too now.

Today, I will go down to the Department of Motor Vehicles with my class completion card and get the motorcycle endorsement added to my license. Here is one thing I know though - I am nowhere near riding on the road yet. I have a lot of practice to do, and skills to continue building, before I be-bop around town on a scooter. I have a little 50cc Honda Metropolitan scooter purchased from a friend to practice on though, and some great basic skills to help me progress.

Maybe you can't teach an old dog new tricks, but an old Kat? If she really wants to learn it, she can.

(Linking in to Creative Exchange and Creative Every Day today. Here's a story where following my heart photographically has led to something wholly new and unexpected in my life. Isn't that amazing?)

Orange Power

Imagine my joy: On Saturday, while wandering the streets of Milan for a last time, I found another image for my market/wheels series. And not only that, but the scooter is my "power color" - Orange! What luck!  I find orange to be an energetic color, full of life. For some reason, when I use the color orange, in my art, on my blog or in my clothes, it gives me courage. Courage to be different, to stand out, to be myself. Courage to share the "Kat Eye View." This discovery has sort of happened organically over the last year, and now I love anything orange. So I couldn't help but enjoy this scene immensely. Thank you, Italy, for another wonderful gift.

How about you? Do you have a power color? How did it come about? I would love to hear your story too!

Following a Dream

I am musing today on transportation at Mortal Muses, with an image of--what else--a scooter! Click on over there to see a companion image to this one. The image posted there is my favorite of the two.

This lovely find was another in a back alley of Ortygia in Siracusa, Sicily. Ortygia was scooter heaven. Streets too narrow for cars and a chilly, off-and-on rainy day led to an emptiness that is perfect for my photography. I would have loved to study this scooter with my camera more, but just as I started shooting the owner came out and got ready to leave. I did ask him if I could photograph it for a moment, and he nicely stepped away so I could take one or two more photos (this is one). I showed him the images, thanked him and then let him go on his way.

It's probably no secret that I have a dream of owning a scooter, after living in Italy. I've taken one step toward that dream, by signing up for a Motorcycle Basic Rider Training course in mid-July after we move back to Oregon. I don't want to buy a scooter and then discover I hate it, so I'm going to take this course and get my bearings and hopefully my motorcycle license. I also don't want to let too much time go by, and let normal American life wipe out remembrance of my Italian scooter dream, so I've committed myself now. I'll let you know how it goes come July. :)

Switching gears... along the lines of my post yesterday on claiming your artist, I later read this post by Stephey Baker at Marked by the Muse. It seems she and I were on the same wavelength! If you resonated with my post yesterday, I encourage you to check out Stephey's article as well. Each little piece of information, each little insight will take you a step closer to claiming your artist. It you want to, you can do it.

It's a Mystery

A dilapidated scooter, found in the back alleys of Ortygia. I wonder what happened? Why has this scooter been left here, to slowly decay? The tires are flat, the body is rusting and the seat is coming apart. There is a story here, what is it?

My mind jumps from the simple - the scooter stopped working and the owner couldn't afford to fix it - to the complex: The person who owned this scooter and lived in this building disappeared under mysterious circumstances and no one to this day wants to move it. The mystery could spawn a novel.

What story do you tell for this scooter?

I'm off this weekend to find the stories in the mosaics of Ravenna and the small country-within-a-country of San Marino. I'm sure there will be some groups of three waiting for me as well. Have a great weekend, I'll be back here on Monday.

Back Alley Bliss

Oh, scooters. How I love thee. Wandering the back alleys of an old city, finding a vintage scooter amongst the texture and filtered light has become heaven to me. Do I see scooters because I love to photograph them, or do I love to photograph scooters because I see them? That is the question. Much simpler than Hamlet's "to be or not to be" and, to be honest, I really don't require an answer. I'm happy to both see them and photograph them, regardless of the priority order.

This lovely find was in Ortygia, the old quarter of the town of Siracusa in Sicily. We got lost in the back alleys trying to find the duomo, and it was scooter heaven for me this day. I'll have several to share over time.

I've learned that is my favorite thing to do when traveling... wander. Just wander the back streets and alleys, away from the shopping zones. I don't need long, just an hour or two. I can guarantee I'll find interesting things to photograph when we just wander.

How about you? Where are you guaranteed to find creative inspiration?

The Birth of a Series

Walking down a side street in Parma a couple of weekends ago, I happened on this lovely scooter. Of course I had to stop and photograph it, trying out several angles and compositions. Good thing it was a pedestrian zone, as I kneeled in the street for quite some time waiting for people to walk by so I could have an empty sidewalk. Every so often a scene like this will grab me, and not let go until it has its way with me. I'm always content to just follow the photographic muse when that happens.

When I got home, realization dawned on me. This image is the second in a series. Even though I didn't plan it, the photo is a perfect complement to Where Fiats Retire, an image from Sorrento I shared a couple of months ago. Similar processing (read below for details) and I was good to go.

I've never had this happen before, an image come along months later that so perfectly pairs with an earlier shot. And not just any previous shot, a favorite. I loooooove that Fiat shot. Guess what? I looked through my images and there is another shot in the series, which I'll share tomorrow. I wonder how many more are hidden there? Will they start appearing to me more often?

I guess this is how a series is born. I had no idea!

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A quick reminder - today is the last day to link in to Exploring with a Camera: Breaking the Rule of Thirds. Tomorrow morning I'll draw for the winner of my giveaway as will Tammy at Bliss and Folly. Take a look at all of the wonderful images shared and be sure to link yours in too!

Photo processing in Photoshop Elements 8:
1. Cropped out some distracting info on the right edge.
2. Ran Pioneer Woman Seventies Action.
3. Added a Hue/Saturation Layer, and increased Hue to +5 and Saturation to +16 to increase the color of the  scooter back a little bit brighter.
4. The wall behind the scooter was too similar in color to the scooter, competing for attention. I added another Hue/Saturation Layer with Saturation set to -27, and used a layer mask to only apply this change to the red wall.

Here's the original, straight out of the camera, for comparison:

Tomorrow, Tomorrow

I love ya, tomorrow. You're only a day away...


Do I have you singing the song from "Annie" yet? I hope so! Tomorrow is the start of Find Your Eye, and it's only a day away! I'm so excited. I chose this picture from Bologna today on purpose. I loved the row of scooters, just repeating off into the distance, but this first one had it's own unique touch - a yellow daisy in the windscreen. Just like all of us, who are unique and have our own little touches to share with the world in our photography. It's not too late to join the class if you are interested.

If the class is not for you, lots of great stuff will be going on here in the The Kat Eye View of the World! I'll be back with regular posts next Tuesday, giving you a first look at our trip to Spain and Portugal. Exploring with a Camera returns this month on a regular schedule after a holiday hiatus, and I'm bursting with ideas. In the last week I've also posted on monochromatic color at Mortal Muses and on my 2010 Word of the Year at Christine Kane's blog, stop by and see me there too!

Sing with me now...

Tomorrow, tomorrow, I love ya, tomorrow. You're only a daaaaay aaaaa-waaaaay!

When life gives you rain...

Take photos anyway! This photo is from a back alley in Orvieto, a hill town in Umbria. I love the old scooter, the textures of the wall, the greenery and the reflections of the wet ground. A peaceful little scene, I can almost feel the cool, damp air.

The two days we spent in Orvieto on our April were rainy. I found that I wasn't as inspired to take photos - have you ever tried to take good photos with a two handed camera while holding an umbrella? Not the easiest thing to do. But the photos I did take, I find that I like. They have a very different mood than the sunny, perfect weather photos. Maybe even a little more character.

As we travel around, sometimes only a day or even less visiting a new place, I have to make the most of that time. Regardless of the weather, my goal is to capture some essence of that place. I don't have the luxury to visit again and again, to study a certain place in all light, all weather, all seasons. And you know what? I find that's ok. I've learned that when life gives you rain, you take photos anyway.

As usual, another life lesson we can take beyond photography or our other creative endeavors. Today, here in Italy, it is rainy. I think I'm going to make the most of it!

One Red Scooter

I'm home! This morning (night, depending on your time zone!) I flew through Amsterdam on my way home to Italy, so I decided to post this picture from Amsterdam. This is one of the images I created to decorate our living room. I love the red scooter! A line of scooters parked is sooooo European. Everywhere here, nowhere in the US (at least that I've seen, maybe someone from the big city can enlighten me). I want a scooter now. A red or orange or pink one. But I'll probably just settle for taking pictures of them!

Now that I'm back in Italy I'll get back up to speed on my photo a day. I was just waaaaaay too social in Corvallis! Almost every minute was scheduled between work and shopping and visits with friends. It was a ton of fun! More to come on thoughts about the visit when I'm lucid. Right now I just want to crawl into bed...