Craft Show at Spinnet 2011

It hardly seems like a year since I did my very first craft show, at the old wool mill in Habo, Spinnet. Now I'm there for the second time. Such a lot has happened in the year that has passed and my full-time bead business and jewellery webshop joony.se are now officially up and running!

Here's a little taste of the photography and jewellery that I'm displaying this year. And if you are in the area, you're welcome and take a look in person. Carina who runs the café makes a great apple cake, so it's worth making the trip for that alone! Konstfest runs until October 9, 12pm-7pm every day.

Konstfest

It's been a busy, busy time preparing for the arts and crafts show at Spinnet, but it's been so much fun taking part so far. This is my little booth, with my jewellery and photos.

Up to now, I have sold quite a few:


wire-wrapped rings and........


rose cab earrings and .......



some little angels, and even quite a few ...



photos.

Grafitti

Sometimes a simple piece of graffiti on the tiles of a public toilet can make your day.

Translation: You are precious. Enjoy your day.

Photo credit: Gavin P. Williams

My first photo exhibition

The part-time course in black and white photography and darkroom techniques that I've been taking at the University of Jönköping has now come to an end. Our group is celebrabing this by exhibiting at Jönköpings gamla rådhuset, the old town hall in Hovrättstorget on the main shopping street of Jönköping. It's a great central location for us in an interesting building built in 1699.

Each member of the group has chosen 2 photos each to display, which in some way should compliment or support each other - a so called diptych. We had the opening on 29 May and the exhibition is on until June 10. See a few shots from the opening day here.

Such a cool photograph of my father, taken on the RAF base in Sudan, when he 24 years old. Restored using photoshop.

Virtual framing

Frosty berries, taken in December 2009 and framed in Photoshop

Back in the day

The snow is finally melting, but this was a winter that is going to talked about for a long time. But today my thoughts turned to summer when I was playing around with a few photos that I'd taken a couple of years ago on a beautiful June summer's day. Alice and I had taken the ferry over to the island of Visingsö on lake Vättern and had rented bikes to cycle around.

My digital SLR was still a new toy, and very few minutes I'd had to stop and take a few shots. Unfortunately, as is the fate of many of my photos, they have ever since remained unseen on my hard drive. That is until today, when I decided to play around in Photoshop to try and give a few of my snaps the vintage feel that is so popular at the moment. I saved them as photoshop actions which I can then apply to other photos in the future, but there are many available for download on the net. The site moderskeppet explains them here, with some links.

These are the results of the morning's endeavours:

September

....... in Sweden has been gorgeous so far. I've been out into the countryside of Habo to capture the mellow evening light.

The Cake Barn

Well, Garnheim's Bed & Breakfast (aka. my house) has officially closed its doors for the season after a month of guests, mainly family over from England. We have had lots of fun and eaten LOTS of cake.

The cause of this cake gluttony is several visits to "The Cake Barn" as we have dubbed it - or "Lustfyllt" which is its Swedish title, a beautiful converted barn with an all-you-can-eat cake buffet.

If you happen to be visiting Habo (18km north of Jönköping on road 195) then this is the place to go. There are also many antiquey bits and bobs for sale, as well as the owner's pottery. A lot of thought seems to have gone into this concept as every corner is like a scene from an interior design magazine. Judge for yourself from the pics I took.......

London through a Kodak 620 Junior

On our recent trip to London I dragged 3 cameras around with me. The one that got the most attention was my dad's old folding Kodak 620 Junior, which I am now able to use after learning how to re-spool new 120 film onto old 620 spools.

Here are the shots that I delevoped in the darkroom yesterday. I love the vintage look to these, dust specks and all (no photoshopping needed here!) and how the overexposed edges (due to light leaks??) merge the image into its background.

Covent Garden
View over Thames to Big Ben and Westminster Bridge


London eye Marble Arch, Oxford St
British Museum, covered courtyard
My house!

Finally got my act together.....

..... and finished my digital picture course. It was an online university course which required a lot of discipline to do the lessons and tasks, something I am clearly lacking as I finished a year late!

For my final assignment I wanted to do a not-your-run-of-the-mill portrait series. So I turned A into Thumbelina and created this pic of her on a bell pepper (ecologically grown by me I may add!). I also did a pic of her sitting on a wooden spoon and inside a coke bottle. About 10 hours of photoshopping went into these pics........

Gotland grunge

In late summer 2008, we took a trip to the Swedish island of Gotland. This photographic memory is my attempt at a grungy pic, digitally messed with in Photoshop CS3. It was taken on Fårö, a tiny island just north of Gotland.