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Jennie Day Blog

Repost: Welcome to Twin Peaks

October 10, 2014 By jennie

This post was originally published in July of 2013, when my friends and I set off to several film locations from the show, Twin Peaks. We happened to plan this little excursion on the same weekend as the annual “Twin Peaks Fest,” and a sign welcoming us to Twin Peaks was conveniently set out.

In light of this week’s news that Twin Peaks will get a 3rd season, belated only by 25 years, I thought this was an appropriate time to repost this. Enjoy!

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I leave you today with some wisdom from Special Agent Dale Cooper: “Harry, I’m going to let you in on a little secret. Every day, once a day, give yourself a present. Don’t plan it. Don’t wait for it. Just let it happen. It could be a new shirt at the men’s store, a catnap in your office chair, or two cups of good, hot black coffee.”

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Filed Under: Photos, TV Shows

How To Take Pictures of Fireworks

July 9, 2014 By jennie

1. Start by photographing any animals in the vicinity, because as soon as the fireworks start, they will run off to hide.

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Move faster than this if you want a photo of all the birds flying away …

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2. Take a few photos of your friends while it’s still light out.

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If they start yelling battle cries, take video instead of photo. Otherwise, you end up with a lackluster photo and have to awkwardly explain that they were yelling “onward! To victory!”

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3. Take a few photos of the aftermath.

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4. Once it gets dark, try a long exposure of the sparklers because it’s fun, even if the end result doesn’t look like much.

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Long exposures of cakes can also be cool, and look like the rapture has begun.

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Just don’t stand in the direction the wind is blowing because you’ll end up with a picture of smoke. (Duh.)

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5. Start to get the hang of the precise moment to snap a photo of the mortars as they go off, just in time for the big finale firework.

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But if your finale firework misfires and every shell goes off all at once before you can even get your finger on the shutter button, settle for a photo of the smoking carcass.

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The end!

Filed Under: Photos

Memorial Day on Alki Beach

May 30, 2014 By jennie

Summer came early in Seattle – meaning we actually had sunshine on Memorial Day weekend. That never happens.

We dusted off our cameras and went up to Alki Beach! Here’s what that looked like. (You can click any of these pictures to see full size.)

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(And here we thought the Statue of Liberty was in New York.)

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Why was Joel taking a picture of the back of Phil’s head? Don’t ask me. I have no idea.

Filed Under: Photos

Don’t Get Too Cocky

December 18, 2013 By jennie

I’m talking this week about the year in review and realized this is the opportune moment to follow up on the goals I set way back in January. One of those goals was to take a photo every day.

Last Christmas, Joel gave me a copy of Understanding Exposure which I read cover to cover in about two days. It’s a great read – I learned so much about taking good photos and actually utilizing the different settings on my camera.

So today, I want to share a photo recap of the year to show the lessons learned in 2013. Some of these photos are terrible. Truly awful. But they taught me the biggest lesson: don’t get too cocky. And for every awful photo I took, the next one was a little better. (I’ll share some of my best photos in a later post.)

Like I said, my goal was to take a photo every day for the year, and I did really well at it … for about a month. I spent many January afternoons out in the park behind the office, getting the hang of what I’d picked up from my reading.

January sunbeams

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these shots are not terrible.

When we left for South Africa at the end of January, I was feeling pretty cocky about my new photography skillz. I was sure I’d come home from the trip with a collection of beautifully composed and technically impressive photos.

Of course, that’s not what actually happened. The first few days, every good photo I took was by accident or with my iPhone. Most of the pictures I took were mediocre, at best.

Cape Town, from Table Mountain

I now joke that on that first day in Cape Town, I forgot to change my settings from “Seattle” to “South Africa” — my white balance was still in cloudy mode. I corrected that, but my photos from the next day’s adventure at the Cape of Good Hope Reserve didn’t turn out much better – I hadn’t figured out how to use the polarizer filter on my lens.

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By the time we made it to Bushman’s Kloof, I was shooting in auto mode most of the time and feeling pretty defeated about it. Every once in a while, I’d feel a little surge of confidence and fiddle around with settings in manual mode. Then I’d flip right back. These were two “a-ha!” moments:

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Take 1 (auto mode)

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Take 2 (manual mode, metering off the ground)

Sunset over the Kloof

Take 3 (manual mode, metering off the sky)

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Take 1 (auto mode)

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Take 2 (manual mode)

You’re going to laugh when I say this, but the day we got home from South Africa, Joel and I went to the camera store to “test” the newer models (both of ours were older, discontinued models) and they happened to have a refurbished model of the cameras each of us wanted. We walked out of the store that day, new cameras in hand. And I started feeling a little cocky again. With a fancy new camera, I’d take even better photos!

Of course, that’s not what actually happened. It took a little while to hang of my new camera. When I went to Disneyland in June, I spent a day sitting in an art gallery in West Hollywood with one of the girls I traveled with, who is a professional photographer. She went over some of the camera features that weren’t making sense to me, and I got excited about taking photos again.

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Art gallery self portrait.

This is the part where I interrupt my recap to point out that I’d kind of given up on my resolution to carry my camera with me and take photos daily. I took many when I traveled, obvs, and we made some day trips (like our Twin Peaks adventure) with the express purpose of taking photos.

We also made several trips up to the San Juans for wedding planning, and I took my camera along on every one of those. I was still switching around and fiddling with camera settings:

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Take 1 (aperture priority mode)

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Take 2 (manual mode)

The difference isn’t as dramatic as the South Africa photos; maybe I’m starting to get the hang of it.

Once we returned home from our honeymoon, I turned my attention photo editing, another skill that still needs improving.

Central Park, seen from the Top of the Rock

Of course, after that, fall was upon us, and I’ve been feeling uninspired when it comes to my camera. Lately, I’ve just been taking photos for the blog. One of my ongoing projects here has been to update my recipe photos (many of which are still really bad iPhone photos.) Here’s one of my more successful recipe photos, if I may say so.

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I stopped being lazy and got out my lightbox and full spectrum lights and the tripod for smaller subject matter.

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I still have plenty of room for improvement, and plan to keep reading and fiddling, as time allows. I didn’t quite follow through on the part of my goal that was “take a photo every day” — but I did accomplish the part of it that was “learn more about photography,” so I’m calling that a win.

Filed Under: Photos

The Internet Loves Cats

December 4, 2013 By jennie

Joel and I lavish attention on our feline family members, but if they could talk, they would tell you that they’re completely starved for attention, and also, they haven’t eaten in years and you should open that can of food on the kitchen counter right MEOW. I figured it’s time to give them some attention on the blog, especially because if there’s one thing the internet loves, it’s pictures of cats.

Here are some pictures of cats.

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This is a testament to how much these cats love Joel – they are almost never close enough to one another that they’re in the same frame, but they’ll do just about anything to sit with Joel on the couch.

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Eggs

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Stormy

Both cats are doing well – I’m pretty sure Stormy is Benjamin Buttoning, because she still has some kittenish qualities, like her surprise every time she discovers her tail has been following her around again. Eggs, like other kitties his age, is having some health problems, but he is still the sweetest and cuddliest cat I’ve known.

Filed Under: Photos

This Is Halloween

October 28, 2013 By jennie

It’s almost Hallowe’en! We aren’t really doing anything to celebrate; the only thing we did was go pumpkin picking at the adorably autumnal Craven Farm in Snohomish, then carved Jack-o’-Lanterns.

Some pictures for you (click to see full size.)

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Happy Hallowe’en!

Filed Under: Photos

The Honeymooners

September 6, 2013 By jennie

I’m ba-ack!

So to recap, we got married, then went on our honeymoon to New York and Washington, D.C.

All the posts that went up in the past, well, pretty much for the past three weeks, I wrote back in July and auto pilot’s been flying the blog for a while.

I’m organizing my thoughts about the wedding and honeymoon and plan to start blogging about that in the next week or two. In the meantime, here are a few snapshots from the past few weeks …

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Mom, Auntie Barb, and Allegra doing some assembly line work on the escort cards.

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Joel taking a pizza break before the ceremony. I told him to wear a bib, this is what happened.

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Welcome to New York City!

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Lady Liberty. About 30 minutes after I took this picture, it started dumping rain. Thanks, New York, for raining all over my honeymoon.

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Black walking shoes = packing essential for NYC. Morgana, Joel, and me.

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After New York, we took a train down the coast and spent Labor Day in “The Other Washington.” This is the Marine Corps Memorial (Iwo Jima) just across the river in Rossalyn, Virginia.

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Still settling back in to real life and sifting through the piles of wedding debris scattered around the condo. More later!

Filed Under: Photos, Travel, Wedding

Welcome to Twin Peaks

August 7, 2013 By jennie

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Remember this show?

Obviously, I don’t remember it from its original run (I was 4) but a couple of years ago, Joel and I decided to watch the entire series. We didn’t make it all the way through – we found, like the viewers in 1990, that we didn’t really care to watch after we knew who’d killed Laura Palmer.

With the film locations being so nearby, one sunny Saturday in June 2011, we set off on a Twin Peaks adventure.

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Click to see full size.

I took just two pictures on that little excursion (the left and the middle – I stole the other one from Joel!)

Last Saturday, we set with our doppelgangers on another Twin Peaks adventure. What we didn’t know was that this weekend was the official Twin Peaks Festival. And at the last stop (where the “welcome to Twin Peaks” sign was placed) we just so happened to bump into the tour group.

Anyway, I took many more pictures this trip. Here they are for your viewing pleasure.

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I leave you today with some wisdom from Special Agent Dale Cooper: “Harry, I’m going to let you in on a little secret. Every day, once a day, give yourself a present. Don’t plan it. Don’t wait for it. Just let it happen. It could be a new shirt at the men’s store, a catnap in your office chair, or two cups of good, hot black coffee.”

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Filed Under: Photos, TV Shows

The Definition Of “Meta”

July 29, 2013 By jennie

The actual definition: a term, especially in art, used to characterize something that is characteristically self-referential.

The “this really happened” definition:

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Sunset in Seattle at the corner of Sunset and Seattle.

Filed Under: Photos

Christmas Scenes

December 28, 2012 By jennie

I hope you all enjoyed a wonderful, safe (and even gluten-free) holiday!

Today’s post is short — just a few of my favorite pictures from Christmas.

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Playing with bokeh (also, Dr. Zoidberg) (please don’t make fun of me for this, but sometimes I get my cartoon squids mixed up and call him Dr. Squidward).

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Boba Fett commandeered Santa’s sleigh.

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I tried my hand at making a homemade bow; something my grandfather did every year. Mine didn’t quite turn out.

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To Jennie from Santa – a new car! Well, really, from Toyota’s low interest financing, which is kind of like Santa.

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Me and my soon-to-be niece wearing Christmas mustaches.

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Joel helping Allegra with her Christmas puzzle.

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And our Christmas feast of turkey, mashed potatoes, gluten-free stuffing, green beans, and olives. I made the gravy and cranberry sauce and both turned out quite well (if I may say so). I forgot to take a picture of our Christmas Eve feast with Joel’s parents which was … also turkey!

And with that, merry (belated) Christmas to all and to all a good night 🙂

Filed Under: Lifelog, Photos

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