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Friday 17 January 2014

Picture Perfect


This is the worst time of year for me to try to take quilt photos. It's dark when I leave for work in the morning, and dark when I get home. Usually I take all of my pictures on the weekend...that is, if it's not rainy, wet, dreary, or cloudy. But I had to take these pics today, because I needed to get this quilt into the mail for a charity raffle and I had only just finished it last night!!! So I grabbed the quilt on my way to work, ran around base on my lunch-break looking like a crazy quilt lady, and with the help of a few friends I was able to get some almost great photos:)

Today was a rare sunny day, so I thought everything was going to work out perfectly.


First I had my friend, Merv, help me out. He's a tall, crazy, opinionated "older" man and had no idea how to hold a quilt. I couldn't stop laughing because he kept holding the quilt every way but the right way. First, he just grabbed it on two random points and yelled "take a picture!". 

"I can't take a picture like that! You have to hold it where I can see the front!" I yelled back.

He started wrestling with the quilt (and cursing under his breath), flipping it sideways, upside-down, and every-which-way possible, and by the time he got the top of the quilt up-and-forward I was almost rolling on the ground with laughter.

I was finally able to get an almost-decent picture (above) when Merv stood on a bench (so the quilt wouldn't touch the  wet ground). I realized, though, that the quilt was just a backdrop and a perfect frame for the shadow of the basketball court fence that stood between the sun and us.




We then tried to lay the quilt across the bench, but, again, we couldn't let it touch the ground (the ground is ALWAYS wet here), so Merv held one end of the quilt while it was draped over the back of the bench. You can see Merv's end was much higher than the bench, and I thought the poor guy had probably had enough, so I didn't gripe about it, and graciously took the picture.




I got back to my job, and asked my friend Jasmine if she could help me try again and then she became the victim. She's tall for a female so she could almost just hold it up high enough, but the wind was whipping the quilt around like crazy and most of the time it looked like she was wearing a quilt suit. 




She has scrawny little arms and I was afraid she was going to tire out too fast to get a good photo.  I was no help, because I had broken out in hysterical laughter again watching her struggle with the quilt and fighting the wind. It is so funny the sounds people make when they're trying to hold a quilt. 




Fortunately, she is very good-natured, was laughing too, and didn't seem to mind that I was almost in tears.




We were able to get this action shot (above) that almost looks good except you can see the far-end is blurry.



Finally, in between gusts of wind, I was able to get the photo above--probably the best of them all, but really it's my least favorite. Sometimes the best pictures don't tell the best stories. The other pictures I took today mean more to me than most of the other ones I have taken of quilts. They weren't the prettiest, or most artistic, but they will always remind me that I'm really lucky to have friends who are willing to go through some trouble to help me out. 

Thanks Merv and Jasmine!!

(that hump in the picture below is where Jasmine had thrown the quilt over her head when she finally gave up :)


This quilt was made from the Cherry Pie quilt kit from Fig Tree and Co. and was quilted by the ever-amazing Asta.



20 comments:

  1. Your quilt is beautiful and I loved reading your description of the picture taking! I had to giggle. What a fun post :)

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  2. What a lovely quilt, and fun photos :D My favourite photos when I'm taking them are almost always the ones that are all wind-blown and hardly show the quilt.

    I am so jealous of your green, green, green backdrop. It's all dirty show as far as the eye can see over here.

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  3. this quilt reminds me of everything that made my day in high school. i was obsessed with this fruit! such a pretty quilt and fun photos.

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  4. This quilt is so pretty! Your pictures are still good :) be thankful for something green lol! Here it's dried up tumble weeds and dirt, not good for quilt photos!

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  5. Oh I have this one on my list to make for my daughter :)

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  6. Wooo-aaa, best quilt-holders ever!
    Thank you for sharing the fun!!!
    Very adorable quilt too, of course! :-)
    Esther
    esthersipatchandquilt at yahoo com
    ipatchandquilt dot wordpress dot com

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  7. Merv and Jasmine sound like great battle buddies!!!

    I love,love the quilting on this! I may try to mimic it on my daughter's lattice quilt I am currently working on;)

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  8. I was reading this and could hear your southern voice, laughing and can see in my mind you getting those shots! I love the Cherry quilt... my favorite pie...

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  9. The quilt is amazing and I loved reading the story of your friends helping get just the right picture. I started giggling along.

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  10. LOVE this quilt!! and believe me, I've been the crazy quilt lady on occasion when I'm really needing photos. You haven't stooped low until you've taken your class of 3rd graders outside for a photo shoot in the middle of the school day and had three of them hold it up, ha! by the way, I really love the close-up, wind blown picture even though the background is slightly blurry. lots of photos are like that!

    Thanks so much for sharing at Needle and Thread Thursday!

    :) Kelly @ My Quilt Infatuation

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  11. I love the names of your quilt holders... especially Jasmine's. ;) The quilt is beautiful and I loved your description of the process.

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  12. Ha! Great Photoshooting! Love the story and your quilt.

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  13. I have to buy this. My sister-in-law would love it. She loves cherries and has them all over her house.

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  14. What a great story about your photo session. Between the wind and the grey light by me in the winter, I can completely empathize! Looks good though!

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  15. You did the quilt proud! Love those yummy cherries. I love your story, thanks for sharing it!

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  16. Very cute!! Always a challenge to photograph quilts especially when you need someone to help, are dealing with the weather and are fighting the shortened hours. Makes for a good story though!! :)

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  17. Your quilts are beautiful! You do really good work and use the prettiest fabrics! Thanks for the extra effort to show us (to your friends too!) :) .

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  18. Oh my goodness, this is just so sweet! I love seeing cheerful, springy things during the never-ending winter!
    Beautiful work! And way to persevere through getting the photos ;)

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XOXO Cristina