lamps and creations

i uploaded a bunch of lamps to the shop this past weekend and am so excited to share my new creations. the one shown above is, hands down, my favorite! sometimes i have a hard time letting go of certain things i make and i imagine i will hold on extra tight before i ship this one out. although the though of it bringing beauty to someone's home makes the separation a bit easier :)

i love when i can find the skinny pipes of vintage lamp glass because they are so delicate that i am sure most have been broken through the years. luckily, this current upload contains 2 lamps with the skinny necks!

but the best part of this lamp is the beautiful floral base. i love the petal detail - it puts a smile on my face every time i look at it.

if you have been looking for the perfect lamp for a certain spot in your home, head over here to see what i have to offer. they are one of a kind creations lovingly put together by yours truly.

safe travels and lamps

i am packing this lamp up for a very important trip this week. it's going as a large "calling card" for me to a very important building that houses the offices for a very special magazine. fingers crossed for me peeps, fingers crossed!

chandeliers and a collective decision

a few months back, i took a poll on what color my next chandelier should be. the result? you guessed it - gray.

on a side note, i never know if gray is spelled "grey" or "gray". it gets me every time :)

anyways, there is something i absolutely LOVE about the understated grandness of this piece. it is crazy heavy and sports 5 full sized bulb sockets, not the standard flame bulb sized ones. what does this mean? maximum light, like twice as much of a normal chandelier.

this specific fixture was scored for me by an ohio friend. she found it at a yard sale and thought it would be perfect for me which i definitely can't argue with. we vacation together every other year, so i picked it up from her in north carolina this past summer and back to atlanta it came. in it's original form, it had crazy chains flowing off the center column. but the really strange part were the huge railroad sized nails that were attached to the chain. i immediately removed the crazy embellishments (after researching the piece to make sure it wasn't a valuable one of a kind), painted it and love the transformation.

i have not ever listed chandeliers in the shop because i know the shipping cost will be through the roof, but i might make an exception for this fixture. i really, really want it to find the perfect home.

paint and choices

remember this watermelon baby?

or this sweet lemon yellow chandelier?

well, believe it or not, on a recent antiquing trip, i found yet another one. another one!!! i am going to make it my mission to rescue everyone of these chandeliers from a depressing tag sale. i just love how it is dripping in crystals. literally dripping, they are everywhere. the question is, what color should i paint this one? soft pink, kelly green, or trendy grey? take part in my poll over there on the left side of my blog. it will be up until monday - help a girl out :)

chaos and order

this is the chaos that happens when i take product shots for etsy. i have tried shooting in the back yard, in the garage with the doors open, and now i have moved into my front entry hallway. it seems that there is no place where i can get consistent light for an hour at a time, so i have resigned myself to the fact that color correcting will have to be. and if you have been reading this blog for a while now, you know how much that frustrates me.

i would love to pass this job on to someone, but the truth is that the quantity of shots i need are either too expensive to have someone else do it, or i have nothing to barter with. so for the time being, me as photographer = me being my own worst enemy.

luckily i do have some photoshop skills to clean up the horrible images i take which gives me an end result of this...

i am head over heals with this lamp. i think it would look great sitting on top of a big chunky vintage desk. head over to my shop to see more lamps. it feels really good to get my shop stocked. woo hoo!

styling and lighting

isn't it funny how procrastination just snowballs? playing around with different styling for my etsy products has been on my to do list forever. the next thing i know, it is summer break and i feel like i need to push it off even more now that the munchkins are home and want to go swimming every day! but today, i forced myself, really forced myself to attempt new photographs and i am pretty happy with the outcome. yes, the image needs to be crisper, and the color needs to be a bit whiter, but all in all, i think it is descriptive and a nice composition. the part i love is how the lit light bulb blows out the background and you don't see any lines of the bulb at all.

i will most likely use my new light tent to take the detail shots, but i wanted to see how they would look on the blue table as well.

check list items:

1. learn to shoot in manual mode so i can enable the white balance corrector on my camera.
2. add extra lighting behind photograph.
3. shoot tons and tons of my items so i can post them in the shop and send them on to happy homes!

what do you think? is this an appealing way to stylize my lamps. should i add some reading glasses or something to the photo?

lighting and lamps

i have a confession to make... i hate photographing my work for etsy. i know, i know, hate is a strong word, but it is such a road block on my way to etsy success that it drives me crazy!

i am a freelance graphic designer by day, i was an art director at an ad agency for years, i can take beautiful photos of my kids, but when it comes to product photography, i am at a loss. lighting is my problem, i can stage a shot and crop it perfectly, but the lighting is always off. it is possible to photoshop good lighting in, but i am a stickler wanting my photos to represent my product colors exactly. when you fix one thing in photoshop, often another color will skew. it just isn't my thing to use filters and such with my product shots. is it too much to ask that a photo be perfectly lit when i download it from the camera???

hopefully all my problems are about to change. this light tent arrived in the mail yesterday and i took it for a spin with the photo above. i need to iron out some of the wrinkles, literally, and then hopefully get some pointers from my photo extraordinaire friend. wink, wink! i need to get a system in place so i can shoot my products assembly line style and it won't seem like such a daunting task.

on a lighter note, what do you all think about this sweet lamp base that i painted buttercup yellow? i can't get enough of the asian inspired fish which hold up the base.

light, pink and girly

a good day is when i find lamp parts that can be painted. having a pink accent on a lamp makes the piece even more unique and special. plus, it doesn't hurt that the little girls love it!

new items being added to the shop daily... head over here to check out all the girly creations :)