Road Ends here

I was walking my dogs the other day and to my dismay there happened to be another canine owner walking her two, what appeared to be, beagles (but on steroids because they were the biggest beagles I've ever seen.) This is never a good thing for anyone walking four dogs, three of whom can be a BIT volatile. While my 'boys' stood alert, ears erect, the girl was struggling to control her two animals. As I was waiting on her to proceed with them so I could take my dogs in that direction, her attempts and pulling one of her dogs failed as it broke off the leash and bolted over towards my pack. As all hell broke loose the girl ran over to retrieve her runaway. When she finally did I had to wait yet again for her to head off. Getting tired of waiting I decided to just turn and head in the opposite direction. There isn't much grass and we usually don't walk them there for the fear of fleas, ticks, and so on. But whatever I was getting annoyed with the situation. It was while I was in this peeved state of being, walking in the hot Charleston sun with equally sweltering dogs that I came across this sign.

I later came back out with my camera because, Idk, I'm weird and like things like this. The road here ends to abruptly, giving way to the natural world with all its animal inhabitants.

As I was walking back from a somewhat disappointing shoot of the sign above, walking up some stairs, when I nearly stepped on this little guy.

beach in Charleston, SC

I hate it. I don't think I've been anywhere else where there are actually a noticeable amount of ants crawling around the sand. And the water....yea I don't see how people swim in that. Maybe it's just because the first beaches I had ever been to were on Guam where the water is [usually] crystal clear. Every other beach I've been to, in Cali, Texas, Korea, Europe, and here in Charleston, has had water that is murky and pretty unattractive. LOL
Anyways so Sunday we went to the beach because my parents were just heart set on running down there. So for what FELT like an hour they were off running while I had to sit with Zae among the masses of other sunbathers who seemed to be enjoying themselves way more than I was. Mostly because it was hot and Zae was fussing almost the entire time. I couldn't even really get any shots which was my initial intention. BUT I did happen to capture one guy....

I love the whole lawn chair IN the water lol

After the beach I was starving since I had yet to eat sooo before heading home we stopped by this AMAZING little bagel shop: "Charleston Bagel." Besides the 'sandwiches' being yummy I found a cute little sign hanging up on the pick-up window.

Luckily for me there were plenty of bottles lined up right beside the sign further emphasizing the saying. =]

Until next time,

RAGity Ann =]

Never-Never

It's so insane to me how much news coverage the story of Michael Jackson's death is getting. To see just how many people from all over the world he has effected. For any one person to have such an enormous following blows my mind [in a good way.]

I guess what freaked me out the most about M.J's passing isn't how sudden it was, but how relatively young he was. I mean, my dad is 50 also and it really good shape for his age. But it just shook me to think about something like that happening to my own father. I try not to think about the passing time but when things like this happen it forces me to acknowledge the fact that people grow old and eventually die. To just imagine what life would be like without either of my parents is too much to bear. I guess in a way I'm like Michael and J-holiday in that I just wish there was a real never-neverland "where nobody has to grow old." lol blahhhh

The following are some photos I turned in for my final project for Photo Foundations I my second quarter. The subject was repetition [yea kinda lame but it was completely last minute I had no inspiration.] But I actually liked how these came out.

I loved the texture of the steel bars and how through the first four you can see glimpses of the building in the background.

I feel like since i've been in the states I've wanted to photograph telephone poles. The repetition as well as the interesting visual you get from the hanging wires always intrigues me. I also liked the gradation in the sky and the two other structures looming in the background.

My favorite from the series. I chose to cut the faces halfway to emphasize the praying position of the hands.

RIP

Regardless of what anyone may say, this man has left an impact not only on America, but on the entire world. His music has crossed boundaries and has succeeded in bringing masses of people together. He is a legend, and icon, THE king of pop.

R.I.P- Michael Jackson

1958-2009

A Day At The Beach..

This is my final project for Photo Foundations II. Yea the title is LAME but i couldnt think of ne thing else at the time lol.

Body Tagging

For some reason this wouldn't flippin upload on myspace. But yeeaaa this is one of the photos from my original book idea which was using diptychs to show similarites between things in the natural world and humans. For instanceeee, with this photograph it's counterpart would be a graffited wall. I loved the idea but didn't have enough time to execute the damn thing. UGH O well I'm pretty pleased with how my current book is turning out. Once I'm finished putting it together and send it out I'll be posting all the photographs from that.

Until Then,
=D

X-men Origins

O
M
F
G...ok I am a huge X-men freak and I just got home from watching the newest installment. Besides the story making more sense that previous ones, they FINALLY included Gambit!!
Origins is by FAR better than The Last Stand; in my eyes anyway. The action, characters, and story were just on point to put it simply =]
I hear there's another Origins coming out within the next year..or two? This one centered on Magneto. I'll most def be awaiting that release as well....

In other news, this weekend is pretty stressful with my 20 photos for my book for Photo FoundationsII due tues AND me changing my subject at the last minute. I'm not to enthused about the change but I literally have NO time to complete my original idea so yeaaa..I'm working with my fall back. I believe I have all the pics I need, I took well over 20, BUT the hard part is finding useables worthy of publishing LOL

Besides all THAT my sister is here for the weekend so that kind of levels me out. I just saw her a couple months ago but it feels like forever!

Most Valuable Characters in X-men Origins: Wolverine(besides Wolverine of Course)

[Wade Wilson/DeadPool]

[Gambit]

My Booky Wook

I finally found time to read this past weekend and began my venture into the mind of comedian Russell Brand in his bio "My Booky Wook." Silly title, reallllyyy good book so far! I marked some pages that contained segments that I particulary enjoyed. I love his way with words.

"We all have an essential self, but if you spend every day chopping up meat on a slab, and selling it by the pound, soon you'll find you've become a butcher. And if you don't want to be a butcher (and why would you?), you're going to have to cut right through to the bare bones of your own character in the hope of finding out who you really are. Which bloody hurts."

"For me happiness occurs arbitrarily: a moment of eye contact on a bus, where all at once you fall in love; or a frozen second in a park where it's enough that there are trees in the world."

I was a connoisseur of the Penguin[chocolate bars], which came in yellow, green, blue and red wrappers. I was a particular devotee of the blue variety, even though all Penguins are the same below the surface, which I think is a perfect analogy as we're likely to get for the futility of racism."

Those are the parts that most popped out to me so far. Doubt I'll have any time to read it again for awhile due to school projects/tests.

Alec Soth

ok here are some of the photographs I was trying to upload last night. These are some of the most interesting/inspiring photos I saw during his lecture.

Recap

Ok so ALOT of things to go over from last night to today.

1. Went to a mandatory lecture for Photo Foundations II. The speaker was a photographer named Alex Soth. I must admit I wasn't too thrilled to be going but it turned out to be very interesting. He touched on a very important question that I, myself have asked myself: "Why take photographs?" He talked about how a struggle for him was pretty much being motivated to continue doing what he does as a photographer when any amateur with a cell phone camera can document an event and have it be displayed in magazines/news etc. He showed us his collections of works and I was amazed by his descriptions of his process. I was inspired by him tremendously especially when he talked about his shyness in college; how he was the kid in class that never wanted to be called on & how when he needed to ask people (strangers) to model for him he would be very uncomfortable. It reminded me of myself because I am extremely shy and it made me think that if he could get over it then I can do the same. I could go on and on about it. To sum it all up it was just a really inspiring lecture. I WAS gonna post some of his photographs BUT for some reason my 'add image' button ISNT cooperating.

2. I flippin FKED my car up today on the way to my drawingII mid-term conference. I was making the turn right outside my apt. complex and accelerating [not a good idea] when i tried to move my dog off my lap and into the passenger seat. I looked away for what seemed like a 1/234567 of a second lol andddd i ended up BASHING into the curb. My front wheel is all messed up and my alignment might be as well. So I missed my meeting and i caused, what will probably be, EXPENSIVE damage to my car. fml right ??

3. I watched Zeitgeist for the first time today. I had heard about it before but never knew what it was about. But wow. It sure does make you think. I believe in God don't get me wrong, but the discussion of Jesus and the bible's thievery from Egyptian mythology was mind-boggling. For a long time I have questioned the bible's content but being a born and raised Catholic my mind is always conflicting with my heart and what I have grown to believe as fact. BUT other than the religious segment the parts on 9/11 as well as the banks made total sense to me. Overall a veryyyy good documentary one I would put up there w/ the Michael Moore films I've watched.

Mk well I wanted to add some images BUT since its not working I suppose I'm done for now.

Panaramic

Okk so today I put together my very first panorama. I've known WHAT they are and HOW to compose them but I had yet to create my own. So for Photo II we were assigned to just take photographs of anything, really, and make a panoramic picture from it. Mine is the pretty pool in my apt. complex at night. OO this was also my FIRST real nighttime shot =]

I also played around with it in Lightroom and came up with this blueish tinted version. I mean, who doesn't automatically think BLUE when they look at a pool or any body of water lol. So yea I liked this version as well.

Money makes the world go 'round

It is nearly summertime and since my original plans for break are probably not going to happen I must resort to plan B lol which is GETTING A JOB!

I hate the fact that my parents have to spend so much money on me. For Zae I understand but for school as well as my rent I think I should be doing more to help. I mean there's no WAY I could EVER pay my tuition but getting a partial scholarship would help along with the assistance I'm already recieving. All I have to do is maintain a 3.0 to apply for the scholarship right now im just under with, I believe a 2.6? 2.8? blehh. But as long as I ONLY get A's and B's this quarter I should be fine. Photography and Drawing II I'm sure I can pull it off. Art History II--yeee not so sure. BUT I did get an 84% on our first exam so I'm off to a pretty good start. So yea IF I can get that extra help with tuition all i'll really worry about is RENT but all that means is I get a job this summer. I kind of miss working anyway although I'd NEVER in my LIFE work as a cashier at a grocery store again haha.

But yea thats my rant. I need money. It's that simple.

who said..

point-and-shoot cameras couldn't take 'good' pictures? These were taken with my little cannon MONTHS ago. I just realized I had uploaded =)

"While I'm Gone"

My first project for photo foundations II. The end result was OK there are a couple I love others are just ehhhhhh...