Pragmatic Lens

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Yesterday was Halloween, my favourite holiday of the year but more importantly it was Athena's first halloween (she is my furr baby) and I couldn't help myself but do a photo shoot with her.

The backdrop was made by me, its crate paper rolls from spotlight, the cauldron was also purchased from spotlight.    Athena's costume, jester bell collar was purchased from City Farmers, we also had a witches hat but that wasn't going to happen.

For anyone who owns, or has dealt with a cat knows you can't make them do things, they do what they like. Trying to get Athena to stay in the cauldron was a task. Daniel (my fiancé) and I tried treats, placing her in there, holding here there but nothing was going to work. I ended up having to composition two images together to create one.




It took 39 images before I gave up and decided to create a composite. I started with the above two images, having Athena in a laying position was going to allow her to look natural in the cauldron. Photographing her in the same lighting/ backdrop allows me to edit the images quicker and means the white balance, shadows and highlights are similar in each image.

I had to bring Athena down to meet the cauldron, I then erased the rest of the image and Daniels had to match the lining of the top of the cauldron.

I decided to clone some of the original backdrop down to the bottom of the corners to get rid of the light shining through at the bottom of the image. After finishing the composition I needed a little more halloween spirit, the add of text an bats came about.

Originally I had it in white until it was suggested 'pumpkin orange', which completed the image and made it whole.

I hope you enjoyed seeing a little into my process, fine art is a passion of mine that I would love to be able to do more of!

This week is Baby loss awareness; taking the taboo out of openly talking about a loss of their all-to-brief lives.

People's reaction to a loss of a baby isn't always what you would expect. A lot of people don't know what to say or do to try and help. Though they are trying to not say the wrong thing or to cause more harm, it leaves you feeling alone with no one to talk to.

I have experienced two types of loss with an infant, my nephew of five months and my unborn child. Both under completely different circumstances but what I grieve is still the same, "what would have been".

For my nephew it was hard, it was the first time I experienced a loss of a baby, though he wasn't my child the ache it gave was unbearable. I got to know him, I held him, I tickled him, made him smile, laugh and I got to see into his big beautiful blue eyes and say I love you. He was taken from this earth, unwillingly and too young, but I got a glimpse at his personality, his unconditional love, his happiness and that left too many what if's, too many could of been's. That is the hardest part, accepting that you will never know.

You are always taught in school that the effect of an abortion is devastating and it is. It was the hardest decision I have ever had to make, to not meet my own child, our chid and even harder to live with that decision. I always wonder what they could have been like, if it were a boy or girl, what kind of parents would we be, what career would they have chosen, what colour of their eyes would be. It leaves you with so many unanswered questions, but the worst part is the social controversy around this subject.

The taboo about abortion makes it that much harder to deal with. When I found out, I wanted to confide in people, my family and friends but the social controversy on the subject makes you unable to do so. I had a fear of saying "Im pregnant" and people jumping in with congratulations!. I had a fear of telling my family, I had a fear of what was happening to my body, I had a fear that people would now judge me as a bad person. Which shouldn't be the case as about a third of Australian women will have an abortion and will experience feelings of judgment.

Loss is apart of life, accepting loss when a life hasn't been lived is hard, but its harder to not be able to openly speak about it, it allows for us to heal and seek guidance in the hard times.

#Break the silence.