Little Corner of Ania

I sort of feel renewed and inspired, so over the next few days (I hope) I'll share some photos from my trip to Oslo. Starting with...yesterday :p

I arrived Litteraturhuset straight from the airport, attended the "Press photo of the Year 2009" award ceremoni, which was very very interesting and inspiring. One thing I noted though. There seemed to be a lot of use of photoshop - no - not over-the-top use, but - to strengthen and underline the aestetic of the photos sort of. I don't know. I mean. We're talking about real photographer-pros here who knows their gear inside out in their sleep sortof. However. Makes me think that I can in fact be a bit more bolder when it comes to editing my own photos for the newspaper, at least for the feature/magazine-photos..? Uh. I so dunno. Another thing I noted re the awards. Darn men! So many men who won, and I think there was only three women who got awards - one of them getting multiple ones. Still. Huge overload of men winning. Hrmf. (ofc - it's the pictures that's speaking - but I did hope there were more females in the top-field sort of)

Then there was a very interesting debate (pictured above) about wheter the larger newspapers really need their own photoagencies (I'm not sure I'm using the term correct here) or wheter it's just as well the photographers are placed in various editorial fields within the paper. Lots of interesting thoughts and perspectives - I agree that the photographer and journalists might need to cooperate more, the photographer needs to be involved in the cases, know it well and stuff in order to carry out his/her assignments well, and at the same time, the photographers being together in one unit and have their own editorial chief would be strengthening their cases and well, they can learn lots of each others? I don't know for real as I havent been in such a unit - I'm the sole photographer at my local newspaper and I do often wish I had others I could console with, ask for advice and exchange ideas with sort of.

Then there were two seminars, I'm annoyed I didn't snap a picture of Jérôme Sessini when he spoke... he showed his pictures from the drugwar in Mexico, and I even dared ask him a question - in English - go me! My heart was racing and I was so nervous, what if he didn't understand me and had to ask me to repeat the question? Eeks... it went well and it seemed like he liked my question as he spent lots of time elaborating on it, way more than others. HAH! ;p

Pictured above is Samuel Bollendorff, who had an intriguing speech about his projects, especially interactive documentaries on the web. It looked just like a computer-game to me sort of, with questions from the journalist you could pick between and click and get replied in return and new choices where to go from there. Intriguing, seemed time-consuming and well, certainly a new way to share your photojournalism with the public. I'm slightly bummed I didn't ask him any questions, because I found his work intriguing - I just wasn't sure wheter I got it right, so it would be embarrassing asking something he already did cover or whatever. *cough* He only got one question from the public too, which I thought was a bit embarassing - that he didn't get more questions....I mean - what he talked about seemed to represent a new way to think of photos on the web hm? Ohwell.

Then I went home. Had to snap a photo of the castle (wohoo :p) in Oslo - I remember back in -90 or -91, when the old King died and we went to the castle to pay our respects and lots of people were gathered and there was flowers, pictures, lights and drawings covering the whole front yard. Funny how small memories still sits with you.

Just thought this building looked fine :p

I like playing tourist (uhm, I AM a tourist these days) but not in bright daylight - I prefer the dark when it's not so obviously touristy when you drag out a camera. I like to think anyways. :p

Just as I was gonna enter the subway I passed this scene and just HAD to drag out my camera again. There was a lone girl reading a book under the lights.....I just liked the scene. (streetphotography is way easier in the dark too, by the way *cough*)
Can't wait to get home to my own calibrated screen and my own photoshop and play with this picture.

Just had to add. My subway-station. I don't really miss it, but it sure makes me nostalgic having grown up taking the subway all the time sort of.

Off to do a photosession with a BABY, meet some friends and attend new photoseminars!!! :)

I’ve been working at the local newspaper for soon six months, and I’ve truly enjoyed every moment of it. How long I’ll be staying depends on when (and how much of) my next surgery will be up – I’ve been told sometime during spring 2010, but no exact dates, or how complicated it’ll be, so we’ll see how things pans out. In the meanwhile I’m just enjoying the experience, trying to learn as much as I possibly can.

I do however not think I’ve scrapped about the job or anything job-related before, so it’s about time isn’t? Here’s the car I’m using at work – we all share it but as a photographer I guess I’m the one who uses the car the most (besides, most colleagues uses their own private car when they’re going out). I don’t mind. I like this car :) I’ve taken a few nice photos with it, and I’m also using a photo of the (mirrors of the) car as my work-cellphonephoto. Simply put. I love this car :) Sure, it’s difficult to reverse (you have to use the side-mirrors as you can’t see anything by looking back yourself). But. I love it when I’m alone in the car and can put the radio on full (and maybe sing a long a teeny little bit haha) and just drive around the island. However. I’ve been stuck in the snow with this car twice. This photo is from the first time, I called the editor (in chief) to ask for help when I couldn’t get it out after a while but after ten minutes I managed it on my own after all and called off the help :p The second time however the editor had to go outside (it was right outside the workplace *cough*) and push the car outta the snow. Right! Glad he’s such a sport about such incidents :p

I love this Raffle Leaf Hambly-paper. It’s pearly and shimmery and just all around gorgeous. I added a huge cutout from the Frosty Snowflake-transparency. Two oldies but goldies :) The red transparency behind the photo is from the newer snow-transparency, Falling Snowflakes. Other products include chipboard-letters from Prima (w/newsprint on them - how fitting!), and rhinestones from KaiserCraft. The latter being a real favorite! :)

I didn’t really know what to do with this layout, but wanted to do some kind of subtle edge on it so I just folded the edges a bit and sewed around them. I do believe it turned out fab :)

Last friday I was invited to Anne Britt for a crop and to celebrate her and Grys birthdays. Made this card for her then. It’s just white corrugated cardstock folded twice sort of, to make two pockets for tags.

  I adhered the edges once so it would become a sort of “roll”, pushed it flat and folded it again to make these two pockets.

The embellishments was just various Hambly-scraps – rubons, transparencies and Kraft stickers – along with glimmer mist (ofc!), half a tag from Elle’s Studio and a butterfly made from Fancy Pants scraps :)

The left tag is blurred because there’s a giftcode for Papirloftet on it ;p

Pwetty butterfly! Punched three times :)

Look! New color!!! This time Zoyas Posh Matte Velvet Laquer. GORGEOUS. I dunno what’s better, this or the grey-black “dovima” color, but I do know this: It’s surprisingly easy to apply, dries superfast and yields such a well covered (pigmented), beautiful color. *sigh* Did I mention I’m in love? It’s surprisingly strong in wear too, as in… I thought it would chip easily and stuff (after the reviews I’ve read about matte nailpolish) but it’s just slightly white/worn out on the tips of the nails after two-three days of use (w/o topcoat). Not too bad! The next color is the purple one from Orly – I think the color is gorgeous too but from what I’ve seen (I helped some friends w/this nailcoat) it’s way more difficult to use than the zoya ones (doesn’t apply as prettily and as even as the zoya ones). We’ll see!

Pretty busy day today (isn’t typical? Only one assignment yesterday so I played some w/the cam and selftimer, see above :p but a zillion assignments today giving me no room to edit/pick out photos at all during work..hardly had time to eat :p) so I’m gonna head down to work to get a few things wrapped up before an evening-assignment later tonight. Have to since I’m off work rest of the week to attend Dok:10 – can’t wait! Callie Shell (the one who photographed president Obamas campaign) and Nan Goldin (awesome photographer, I’ve adored her raw work for a while) are two of many amazing photographers speaking/showcasing at the festival…..looking so forward to it!!

Have a lovely week! :)

You can´t get away from the fact that it´s soon Valentines, at least not if you´re a (foregin) scrapper..it´s still not that a big deal here in Norway, but I believe people generally are more aware of this - the stores all want to sell us on this one. Valentines Day his Sunday also coincides on the National Mothers Day, aswell as the day the Carnival (Fastelavnsøndag) is celebrated here in Norway. Three things in one! ("men det går jo ikke" :p)

Anyways, I created these cards from Fancy Pants Designs "Vintage Valentine" and "Splendid" collection. They were featured at the product spotlight post for Fancy Pants the other day.

I have to admit that I didn´t really see the point with banners as embellishment before, but they sure are growing on me - especially in miniature-format - it´s so cute!! I cut then hearts from a sheet of the "Splendid"- line (Fancy Pants Valentine-line from last year) and ran them through the sewing machine. The cute little dragon is from the cards-sheet from same line - just cut out as a die cut. And the talking bubble? I´ll elaborate on it in a later post when a little article about it will pop up at Minneriket. The two background-papers used on this card is from "Vintage Valentine".

The other card is more simple, and I (*blush*) forgot to sew along the edges before I adhered it to the card with (real strong) 3d foam, so hence the drawn lines along the edges. Ahwell. Backgroundpapers from "Vintage Valentine", handcut hearts and punched out butterfly (w/Martha Stewart-punch - I SO WANT THE LARGE BUTTERFLY ONE!!) from "Splendid" and tag from Elle´s studio aswell as letters from Adornit.

The butterfly has gotten stickles on it..and oh, just a friendly little advice - don´t try to squeeze the stickles-bottle right above your project. Luckily the glitterglue-mess was easily removable *cough*.

I also made a layout for the same product spotlight on "Vintage Valentine". A quite simple one (and a much used design on the layout imo - I feel like I keep doing the same thing over and over again..?? Nrgh). Anyways, cute story - little one got a small..hm, what do you call it - wooden splinter? Thorn? Under her foot, and it was causing her much pain and she refused to let us touch it/try to take it out. It was a 1 1/2 hour long struggle and she allowed us to put her in the bathtub to soften the skin but no touchie... in the end she was exhaused of all the crying and we put her to bed and had to force her to lie still in order to be able to remove it. Not much fun, neither for her nor us, but it had to be done...and hey, she got to pick a "littlest pet shop" toy because of this - we tried to sweeten the deal by promising her this if she was a good girl and would let us remove the thorn for her...she wasn´t a good girl, but she remembered the promise so we gave her the reward nevertheless :p (we normally don´t do rewards (other than the usual diaper-thing (done long ago thank god :p) & sleep-in-your-own-bed-thing), but this was an exception :p)

I made this layout back when I had a crop at my home with some friends, and stole (mwahha) my neighbours gorgeous papertape to make the ruffled border. It was paired with a border-diecut from Fancy Pants "Splendid"-line aswell as a glitter-flower from Making Memories and a FP-button on top of it. On the piccie you can see daddy trying to persuade the little one to let him remove the thorn :p

I finally got my nailpolishes in the mail!! YAY!!!! It´s simply GORGEOUS, DIVINE, LOVELY - I´m madly in LOVE with matte nailpolish!!! Pictured above (please excuse my poor neglected, ugly cuticles :p) is the ZOYA Polish Laquer in "Dovima matte"....*sigh* I just love it :) It´s a dark grey/almost blackish polish with grey shimmer in it so it doesn´t look too flat. Can´t wait to try out the other colors I got too, ZOYA "Posh matte" (red) and ORLY "Purple Velvet". I´ve read that matte polish chips more easily than normal polish, and I can see a slight wear at the edges of my nails (in less than 24hours) but it doesn´t look too bad....yet. I don´t mind. Cool nailpolish makes me happy :)

Minneriket er et fantastisk forum og gratis online magasin for scrappeinteresserte!

Vi har nå en blogcandy der du legger til knappen nedenfor i din blogg, skriver et innlegg, og melder om dette inne på blogcandytråden på forumet. Det trekkes ut en RAK blant alle deltakere, til en verdi av 350,- (blant annet en Martha Stewart-punch)!

Frist er fredag 19.februar, kl.20.

For ordens skyld:
1. Legg til knappen på bloggen din, med link til Minneriket.
2. Skriv et innlegg om Minneriket der du også legger ut knappen.
3. Svar i tråden med link til bloggen din.
4. Kryss armene og vent på trekning av premie!

Enjoy the weekend! :)

Looking at the past blogposts it seems like I’ve been creating with Pink Paislee only lately, but it’s not the case… will share some other stuff soon, but for now – I hope you don’t mind yet another Pink Paislee-layout, eh? :p

This is my first official PP-layout – made for the Monochromatic Monday-posts. Whee! :)

I went for brown as you can see. Inked the edges & mounted it on 3d foam. Dunno what I’d do without 3d-foam scrapwise. Lie down & die? :p

Decided I needed to break the monochromatic look some by adding yellow accents to the layout. The title, “gievf foodz” is sort of gamerspeak – it just means “gimme food!” :p

The journaling is hidden – not really on purpose – I just found out that I didn’t seem to have room for both journaling and title, so I put them both at the same place – a flap I made.

Now a question..in Norwegian :) (ps thanks for all the lovely comments :) )

Anette Said,

10:12 AM

Hei!
Du er bare så utrolig flink! Etter å ha sett deg bruke disse flip notes'ene har jeg veldig lyst på slike selv. Vet du hvor man får tak i? (Bor i Bergen, men kan gjerne kjøpe over nettet også). Håper du kan hjelpe meg!

Takk! :) Hmm, tror ikke Pink Paislee-nyhetene er sendt ut til butikkene enda – skal ikke si det sikkert, men tror det skjer i midten av mars… ser at Papirloftet tar inn Pink Paislee, og har handlet dette hos Scrappejungelen tidligere i høst også, så forhåpentligvis tar de også inn nyhetene. I utlandet finner du Pink Paislee hos bl.a. A million little things – ser at i blogposten deres skriver de at Pink Paislee kommer i beg/midten av mars :)

Ps. Loved listening to Kines playlist at Spotify – anymore of you have playlists on Spotify that you want to share? I’d love to take a listen! :)

Ps2! Speaking of Pink Paislee – check out the awesome new e-zine + sketch-contest! :)

Title: “Thirty one today” – Aimee Mann

The newest sketch (173) is up over at Pencil-Lines, guested by the fabulous Lisa Day and once again the entire team (well, the half of us who was up anyways :) ) did an amazing job. I finished this layout a few weeks ago - the first layout I made with Pink Paislee after receiving the DT-box...but it seems I actually forgot to email it to PL...whoops! Hopefully it´ll be updated soon with my layout aswell *cough* :)

I did mention that I love these notes yeah? *sigh* Such lovely journaling-notes, just the right size for most projects :) And the pleated, already-sewn-upon-ribbons!! Love love :)

I used a mix of all the three new lines for this layout - "Queen Bee", "365 degrees" and "Bayberry Cottage". Other stuff includes gems from KaiserCraft (perfect for just about anything!) and the lovely border-punch from Martha Stewart - the name of this punch eludes me atm but I´ve been eyeing it for a while and finally got around to purchase it some time before Christmas..

I decided to use my sewing machine on this die-cut paper - it´s actually one whole piece, but with sewing along the scalloped edge I sort of made it look like it was two papers put together, adding more dimension to the one-piece paper.

Ps. I played squash, ran the threadmill (ok, for like 15 min only but daaarn!) and swam some yesterday. I´m sore today and got reminded why I don´t work out at all courtesy of my little one asking me "mommy why is your face purple?". It took approx 1h 45min before the color of my face turned normal again. Bleh :p

We’re off celebrating mother-in-laws birthday today, spending some activity-time together at a swimming-pool before the birthday-dinner. Figured I’d share the card I made for her here in the meanwhile..

Made with the truly elegant “Queen Bee”-line from Pink Paislee, using a mix of the 12x12” and 6x6” papers. I seriously think all the lines from Pink Paislee this winter are awesome, but this one – this might just as well be my very favorite..because it’s so…not me! And yet I adore it and love to create with it!

I also love to mix 12x12” and 6x6” from the same line whenever I can, especially for cards and smaller projects. Just grab whatever scraps from 12x12” you have lying around and supplement with 6x6” papers. And can you tell I simply LOVE the flip notes? Love the shape and the pattern/colors of these – there’s 24 sheets w/12 different designs in one pad.

The card is made based on a sketch from Ett Trykk - a very classic and a (to me) much used design, I think my cards usually end up looking approx like this...it was nice to not have to think about how to do this card and just go for that kind of design again though :)

I picked the note I wanted to use, embossed it with the “enjoy the journey” stamp from the “365 degree” stamp collection and sewed it on a brown background-paper found in the 6x6” paperpad from “Queen Bee”. The flowers were handcut from yet another 6x6” paper and layered twice for added dimension (instead of just one row w/flowers sorta – there’s two here)…actually, the only 12x12 paper here are the cardstock (base, from prism) and the brown floral-patterned paper that runs across the card – a leftover from a previous project :)

Other materials include Fiskars Upper Crest border punch, gems from KaiserCraft, embossingpowder from Gelly, sewing machine and ofcourse – Glimmer Mist. Can’t resist painting some gold & iridescent gold glimmermist on the cutout-flowers! It’s usually hard to see the glimmer on (my) pictures, but if you squint long enough I think you can see it on this flower above.

The inside of the card is quite simple – just decided to add another embossed stamp to make it slightly less boring – this time a stamp from the “Cupid” line.

Had to make the kraft-wrapped gift match the card as well, so this time I pulled out a 12x12 sheet and cut it and used both sides of the same paper along with a sewing machine for the wrapping. Found another flip note to use too, as well as a leftover flower that didn’t make the card. Other materials includes felt letters from American Crafts, gems from KaiserCraft, Glimmer Mist (Gold) and staples :)

In other scrappy-related news, just got two layouts picked up for pub – sweet! Shipped the layouts yesterday – the only downside to this is that I now need to scrap more, as I originally intended for these layouts to be part of some of the monthly DT-stuff for Feb…ohwell, no big deal eh ;p

Wish you a lovely Sunday – and don’t forget tonight's Pencil-Lines! :) Will have another Pink Paislee-project to share then :) Oh, and speaking of Pencil-Lines – look what Anna finally received!! Woohoo!! This means I’ll get my copy soon, and so will people who have pre-ordered! And it’s not too late to get your hands on your own copy either – just go to this page to order one for yourself :)

Title: “Hotel Song” – Regina Spektor

Yesterday morning I entered my office and was greeted by this LOVELY sight!!

Finally! My very own gear at work! Had to wait for this for so long because the budget didn’t allow more gear-shopping for 2009, but once 2010 came the order was sent in (and slowly processed) and here we are! Hello Canon 7D! Hello Canon 24-105 f/4.0! Hello Sigma 10-20 f/4-5.6! Hello huge battery-grip w/extra batteries! And oh yeah, hello UV-filter too I guess :p (now, if I could get a 50mm f/1.4 too I’d be in heaven, but alas…)

I’m excited – and slowly learning this camera and it’s specs. The body and lens is pretty lightweight compared to my own D700 + 24-70, and feels fairly plasticky – one of the reasons I didn’t go Canon in the first place when I started w/DSLRs (*cough*)…the battery-grip will take a while to get used to….same with the focusing-system (I’m used to one-point focus & moving the focus-square rapidly across the screen on my D700, it’s a bit different (and with one more extra step compared to my D700) routine on the Canon sort of – at least from what I can initially see)….but I can’t wait to get to know this other baby better!! :) :)

I had an argument with my hubby the other day, because I love to bake but tend to uh, forget the time and sometimes – just sometimes - burn stuff. I told him I didn’t want no silly egg-shaped timer or whatever. And he forced me to use the timer on the cellphone for the last batch of the crisp bread I was baking (well, guilted me into, same thing!! :p). Anyways. The next day he came home with a wrapped gift for me. :D
(Yes, it’s a timer. Not a “toy”. *cough* ;p) Me like. And this little gift made me happy in a silly way. :)

Now, the sun is shining and I decided to just take the plunge and leave my D700 home and just rely on the 7D at work....scary but exciting!! :D

♥

The newest Fancy This-post is up over at the Fancy Pants-blog. When I saw some cute heart-origami-bookmarks while browsing my reader I just knew I had to try my hands on the patterns. Especially with Valentines Day drawing closer. So simple and so cute!! And useful to boot too! Me like!

I made mine outta – uh – it’s been a while now and I forgot to write it down, but I think – 6x6” and 9x9”?

It’s awesome when you have doublesided papers with solid-ish fill on on one side and pattern on the other.

For more images of these bookmarks, hop over to the Fancy Pants blog! :)

Last saturday I had these lovely ladies over…

(and yes I see you’re hiding, Sonja&Maren!!)

Thanks for a lovely evening and for all the yummilicous food =)
I am now officially addicted to the crisp bread (knekkebrød) that Ellen brought – I made several batches last night and will most likely keep baking these……so good!!!

Here’s the English translation of the Swedish reciepe:

For converstions, check this nice site :)

1 sheet crisp bread:

2dl corn-flour

1dl sunflower-seeds

1dl sesame-seeds

0,5dl flax/linseed

0,5 teaspoon salt

Mix the above, add:

1dl colza-oil

2,5 dl boiled hot water

Mix throughoutly and spread on waxed sheet. Precut these and sprinkle (very) lightly some more salt.

Preheat the oven to 150 degrees Celsius.

Place in oven for approx an hour, check in often by the end (like after 50min) to make sure you don’t burn these (which I sort of did first because my oven was too hot…:( )

Please do yourself a favour – bake these!! Yum!

Life’s pretty grey and dull these days. Snow, snow, snow and more snow. Blizzard-like at times. Here’s the bus-terminal right outside my work. Pretty grey & boring. Still. Sort of like the grey skies when snowing.

It’s been a while since I shared any photos of the view right outside my office’s windows, so here you go – a snowwy piccie of the boat & pier ;p

Miss Amalie does not mind the snow at all.

No, not at all. (I know – blurry piccie but still, it’s my personal blog, not my portfolio, and I like the movementthingie in the piccie! ;p)

This is how the bathroom looks these days. At least when both kids spend some time outside.

(pulled out my neglected 14-24 lens for this shot :) )

Just gotta add this piccie. Amalie’s discovered Diablo 2. She did for a while ago but didn’t really get much apart from moving around. Now she actually do stuff in the game beyond just running. Go girl! Pretty cute listening to daddy explain to her the concept of life (red) and mana (blue) - “If you can’t cast any spell it’s because your blue orb is empty. Then you have to drink from the blue potion. Drink from the red ones to stay alive.” (And Adrian? He’s into Dragon Age Origins these days :) )

Have a nice week wheter it’s snowing, sunny, raining or blizzarding at wherever you are :)

Ps! I got a grant to attend Dok10 in Oslo in February. It’s a photodocumentary-festival arranged by the Norwegian Pressphotographer’s Association. I’m so thrilled about it – look! Nan Goldin (link’s to an interview with her..and containing nsfw piccies I guess ;p) is going to be one of the speakers there!!

Title: “Please don’t leave me” - Pink