The Right Lights.

It's no secret that I've been pretty dang terrible at blogging this year, but as I keep saying, I've had a fair bit going on... I know this house 'thing' is a marathon and not a sprint, but I don't think I anticipated it would take this long to turn this place into somewhere that feels like home.

Last weekend was the first time since we've moved that I've felt genuinely comfortable with having guests come to stay, and that's with the clutter that's still overtaking the front room, the fact we have no dining table and not to mention the amount of recycling we have (seriously, no one ever tells you that you'll suddenly amass more cardboard than you've seen in your life)!
It finally feels like we're getting there though, you know? It's not a chore to have downtime any more and we can have the odd evening where we're not unpacking another box or moving stuff from one room to another because it 'just looks better'.


With that being said, with our self-set deadline of the first weekend of August looming, we still have to paint the landing, living room, bathroom, front room, kitchen and hallway - but it's all good because despite running out of steam, we're feeling savvy having painted those first few rooms and we're being a little less ambitious with colour for this next lot - feature walls are fun and all, getting painting done is far more satisfying.

TL; DR: I got a new bathroom cabinet, I put it up in my house, I've lost track of all time.


[Bathroom Cabinet: Teagan (similar), c/o Pebble Grey]
Right, back to why we're here...

I was contacted just after we put in an offer on the house to write about bathroom lighting with the offer of a fancy bathroom cabinet mirror from Pebble Grey and here's my full disclosure policy because a bathroom mirror is one of those things you don't think about needing until you do and I was going to move house and I needed one so of course, I said yes. Plus, storage, I can't stress enough how much I love storage and thinking we wouldn't even have a bed at this point, I needed all the help I can get.

So when the cabinet landed on my desk after a couple of e-mail exchanges, I was pretty excited, I naïvely thought that it wouldn't matter that I didn't put it up in the flat because we'd be in our new house in a matter of weeks. Three months later... Obviously we've now lived here about 3 months and we're only just settling in, so we only actually put up the cabinet a few weeks ago so this review has (some how) ended up being almost 6 months late. But I'm doing this and it's a great cabinet and a great idea so I felt compelled to share anyway, despite the embarrassment.


That slate. ♥



Bathroom lights are usually pretty bright, in fact, I remember reading (back when for a period I was inexplicably obsessed with winding down in the evenings) that they can end up waking you up and making you more alert, a little annoying when it's time to get ready for bed.

I was actually considering, once we'd bought our own place, that we'd either get super-low wattage lights or a dimmer switch but instead, this delightful LED battery mirror came up and I have to say, it lights up the bathroom like the moon and is great for staying relaxed after making the move from the living room to brushing my teeth.





Our little IKEA drill has been the best purchase, but these little piles of ex-wall don't ever fail to stress me out.
The cabinet itself was very easy to put up but we're very much DIY novices so it still took a good hour or so - which included the mild panic that Moon had over whether he'd hit a pipe or not, he didn't, so yeah, easy peasy. I really like the way it looks and even though the light is a simple set of battery LEDs it looks pretty sleek, I'm so pleased.

I feel that the inside of the cabinet is a little bit of a let-down as mirror on the other side of the door is just stuck on rather than having a little more consideration - with that being said, I hardly open it as it's mainly for our medicines and Moon's man things.




Now we 'actually' live somewhere it's been really satisfying to be able to invest in quality pieces rather than cheap but okay. The bathroom cabinet, while sponsored, is a great example of the kind of things that it's worth investing in. Especially if all you need to wind down and get a better nights sleep is some nifty bathroom lighting and, considering the mirror the previous people had before was just that, it's changed the whole feel of the bathroom and instantly made it 10x more functional.

Like I said, it's sort of getting there, even our bathroom window is starting to look like home.




[*I was gifted this bathroom cabinet by Pebble Grey, in case I didn't mention it enough, all views are my own]
Gratuitous Doll pics:

Headshots.

On Saturday, I did my first paid headshots session, I actually quite enjoyed it, it was quite nice to lend my eye to something that had a lot of restriction. I know they never say to work with children or animals, but Jess was a lovely little girl and if she's as good with everyone else as she was with me, she's going to go far.

I'm not going to lie, I was quite nervous, particularly about the turnaround and working with people I had no previous relationship with, but I think I did an alright job. I think all that small talk at interviews might have paid off.

Here are my personal favourites from the shoot. They're black and white because it seems to be standard for headshots, but I provided them with the option of colour to choose from.


If you're an actor/actress in the Surrey area and in need of headshots, it's something I'd love to do again, I am currently offering this service at weekends.
Give me a message/email/call and we can discuss rates.

Current possible finals.

At the moment I have two items of clothing from each person, three in two cases. I'm hoping the crit will help narrow down which ones I should have as my final five. I'm going to print them out at around A2 size, which looked pretty decent on a basic print out I did of some of the previous images I have shot.

But overall I'm pretty chuffed with the quality, I just need to spend the rest of the weekend working on the text to go with them because I feel that it's pretty important to anchor the concept in that way.
I know the dyptychs are different widths apart but it's not for presentation, it's because I'll be printing them out A1/0 sheet at a time and it's easier to put them together. Obviously they won't stay like this because I need to pick certain ones.

© Ruth Johnston 2011.

Grey test.

I hate following advice when I was perfectly happy continuing with the way I was going, but here is my test shoot using a grey backdrop with the name labels pinned into the clothing.

I'm unsure how I feel about this. I need to get on with writing some text so I can give a better idea of how the series will work.

© Ruth Johnston 2011.

We'll see what they say...
I have to say I'm disappointed with the current set-up overall now though because initially I was using one light on the lowest setting to light from above but I am now needing to use two, otherwise the backdrop looks shadowed and stupid. I think it's something to take up in the tutorial tomorrow. I'm unsure as to whether these are beginning to look too clinical or like bad product shots..

More clothes: project progression.

Here are my favourites from yesterday before my light started threatening to kill itself.

© Ruth Johnston 2011.

So as you can see the velvet is definitely working better, although I'll admit to a bit of cheeky editing, but a very minimal amount. I really love the lighting and I think the eeriness is coming through. I was particularly pleased when visiting speaker and ex-student, Tim Bowditch said they reminded him of Danny Treacy's 'Them', which I suppose is ultimately similar to what I want to achieve.

I prefer these to the previous ones - except perhaps the boobtube - because they are a lot cleaner, but I'm going to have to take out a light from uni and work with that. However, Elemental are getting UPS to pick up the broken light tomorrow, so all my complaining wasn't for nothing. I will be writing long and stern emails to every company I look upon ill-favourably from now on.

Just chillin'.

...complaining about my lights, again.

I was so happy to have them and to be able to say that I have them but they have ended up being so much trouble, they will be the first thing to get an upgrade when I have a proper job. I actually hate them.

I was having such a successful project shoot until then and I think I actually got some decent images - update later - but then the light I was using literally starting going mental and flashing non-stop, not a particularly good sign and I didn't fancy it blowing up in my face so I packed everything away and finished up.

I'm sad because it's quite rare that I feel so confident with how things are going and when I do it's like it's a sign. Technology can be so lame.
At least I got some photos out of it.

Latest shoot.

So I spent a couple of hours this afternoon colour co-ordinating my wardobe, I'm not sure why but I kind of think it reflects the kind of person I would really like to be at the same time. It's just a shame that I'm not and I'm still living in a student house. Things will be different when I have my own house, so I did the best I could with that idea. I think I'm going to stop shooting and thinking about shooting anything until Wednesday, so I can get some real research under my belt and I can figure out what I'm doing.
The weekend was a nice break and I thought I could come back to it a fresh but I'm more panicked and stressed out than ever. I feel like my technical ability is really letting me down and I'm back to AS Level, which is ridiculous because I haven't got to 2:1 3rd year without being fairly competent.
I'm probably just crazy-nervous about finishing and it all being over.





Maybe I need to severely Photoshop them to make them interesting or something, I don't know, I'm not sure that I really like anything that I'm even imagining right now. Forced creativity is so balls.
As well as those photos I also experimented with some different lighting and took a few self-portraits, I quite like some of them even if my skin is a bit rough. I particularly like the yellow-red-blue one, it kind ofmakes me look like an owl.

© Ruth Johnston 2011.

I think reading will definitely help, and getting the hell off Tumblr every now and then. Urgh. I basically need a hell of a lot of advice, and I'm too scared to show my work in front of everyone tomorrow because I'm an idiot.
Oh and here are two Polaroids I took, I'm really trying to channel something extraordinary and struggling to come to terms with the fact that I'm pretty ordinary. Sorry for going a bit emo.