Bright mango orange, cerulean blue and lush decadent emerald.
Colors… they delight the soul.

The Eloquence of Color
With orange and black bands peeping and curling around the corners, I can almost be fooled into thinking a tropical clown fish is hiding in an vintage aquarium. But no.
Its only my camera and I. What Fun!
What Camera? What Lens?
I’m just using my old, Canon Rebel 600d with the 100mm f2.8L macro lens.
This older camera with an updated lens – its helping me to see in new ways.
Learning to “see differently.”
I like it.
Below: This is how it looks as is, regular. A “Normal” look.
I do, Love the colors and the reflected glass details.
The Pineapple motif in the front glass, is different.
My antique cerulean Kanwha glass vase in the back with its crackle glass, definitely vintage!
But the photo is, all in all…. a fairly regular traditional style and look.
I’ve Captured the Colors, but I haven’t Said much else.
I wonder. How to go about ‘saying something’ in a photograph…… What could I do? I might just Pause; and think on some options.
I often use this same approach for painting as well.
I pause.
I walk away from the artwork for a few minutes.
It helps immensely.

Improvise
Interpretation, improvisation. Adding that bit of ‘extra’ to the recipe. Ad libbing. Giving that little bit extra, and going the extra Step.
Ad libbing. Improvising. Interpreting for myself.
I truly love this. It is a walk into creativity. Whether it is cooking, cat training, photography, mixing some colors, painting. Or simply…… going for a zen stroll.
I like, going that extra step. You never know what beauty and adventures lie just around that next bend.
Sure. It could lead to trouble.
But, generally Not. And nothing in art, is ever truly a life catastrophe… is it!
A Pleasing Philosophy:
Painting. Creating an art image. Taking a photograph.
These are all …. kind of like writing a fiction book.
You – get to make up all the characters.
You make up and control all the scenes. Everything.
Whatever colors you want.
Whatever shapes, objects, things you’d like – they can be – in what ever locations you choose.
YOU are the author.
We forget this!!
Improvise More
Photo #2 Emerald Reflections
This is just a bit closer.
Same Pineapple glass.
But I’ve found a gorgeous green plate to lay underneath.
The deep emeralds and jades that I’ve captured look exquisite in this abstracted version of Real Life.

Colors and Imagination
And finally….. letting some imagination loose.
The Impressionist Painters loved their dreamy paintings and ever so soft, blurred edges.
I’ve taken it to just a bit beyond.
Yet, there is still a hint of a focal point that the eye can travel to. To connect with.

With this image I zoomed right in with the 100mm macro lens. I chose to give it an ultra soft, abstract look.
This image lends itself especially to oils or pastels. With the dominance of soft blurred edges either would be ideal.
The Scarlet – Orange is in many places diffused. Greyed down, desaturated. And with the background being in lovely soft Greys, it presents a smoother and less jumpy visual effect.
Capturing Color
3 approaches I was led to use today by the lovely Muse of Color
- Captured Color by using the complementary pair: blue & orange
- Captured Color by changing/improvising the colors I wanted in the reflections
- Captured Color by choosing to diffuse, blur and desaturate colors I wished to
This is Part #1 of Capturing Color, stay tuned for Part #2!
Thats prettty cool!
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Agree!
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thank you!
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thank you! glad you enjoyed this 🙂 cheers, Debi
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Love the abstract version. Very creative.
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thank you!! I appreciate that! glad you enjoyed these 🙂 cheers, Debi
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So much to reflect on in this marvellous post of yours Debi. Letting the imagination loose is such a great philosophy, improvising and of course realizing that one is the master of one’s own destiny. Like you I love color, which for me began with Matisse. Your colors are always masterful and a great reminder of what is possible. As for cat training…now that’s another story 🙂
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Thanks! I’m smiling – thank you Andrew! The cats that ‘own me’ now, aren’t so easy – but the 2 in Dallas I’d trained by voice and hand to (sit, stay, jump, heel, fetch, walk the plank….) I just like taking things, to another level.
Matisse was such a brilliant colorist and a master of design.He said so much, and didn’t muck around.
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How I adore your genius artistic perspective!!!!! HSW!
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thank you so much Jodi! I feel maybe it was given in abundance, to make up for the ‘deficits’ in those other ‘areas’ !! LOL
thank you. I do love sharing different ways, to see things!
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Oh you lucky duck!!!!!!
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🙂 yeah, you say that Miss Jodi!! …. but, the down side is my math skills are this side of a 5th grader! lol
and my tech/computer skills are less than a kindergartnerer!
So. I guess I gotta take the good. with the not so good 🙂
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I hear you! Math is NOT my friend….
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🙂 well, we …. have Other, Friends! lol
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Improvising, love that!!! Or I would say “Loosing the rules”! That’s my newly found motto for freedom!
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oh!! I like yours way Better Eva! yes. that, sounds just right! loosing the rules. – delightfully, not wicked and fun.
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Before I got as far as reading.. “Painting. Creating an art image. Taking a photograph.These are all …. kind of like writing a fiction book” … I was thinking… “Wow, this is like reading a great book!!”
Debi , another brilliant post and as always inspiring. I can’t tell you how much I love your chosen image for seeing differently and the experiments that resulted in the image.
I could write so much more… but I’ll just say “thanks again for the inspiration!” Awesome!
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Robyn – wow. Thank You! I’m so pleased that you really liked that featured image!!! it is not, an easy one that the many would ‘like’ – but I did. So Glad, you did too 🙂
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Love it because it is different Debi 🙂 It leaves you lots of room to ponder and wonder!
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yes! it does 🙂
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