A sad conclusion: There are more artistic photographs of onions, on flickr, than books. By a long shot.

I'm a bookworm, so I decided to go book-hunting on flickr, which is when I learned that although flickr has many many photos tagged with "book" and even a 5000-item group pool - the vast majority fall into two categories: "the cover of my favorite/newest/would-take-it-to-exile-on-a-desert-island books" or "look at my huge/crazy/messy/just-organized bookshelf" which are interesting as far as they go (I love book recommendations, have shelves of my own that could use a brilliant organizational idea and even picked up a tip I might use for displaying favorite books), they're not exactly compelling pieces of photographic art.

After much digging (well, clicking and scrolling...) I found some examples worth the hunt.

"White Books" by Vicki's_Pics






No 16. by _cassia's_






Home Memories by Mamluke

I started playing with onion skins this weekend...


Purchase Abstract 4 (above) fromParallax

Sizes

8x10 $14.00 5x7 $8.00 ACEO $4.00 Greeting Card $3.00

... So this week, I started browsing flickr, to see if anyone else was taking photographs of their ingredients.

In the search, I saw lots of lunches -- french onion soup was popular -- and discovered there's a whole group dedicated to drawing faces on onions, and finally found other photographs of onions (slices of red onions are surprisingly popular).

A golden-lit macro from E_journeys'

And possibly my favorite, from lesbru

Black

And going all the way to the other end of the spectrum, this week I've been hunting for photos in black. (Look close, these are subtle)

First, a photo I adore, from a fellow etsy seller, Truis

Little Grey Kitty

And technology old and new on flickr

Long Time Silent from Fabio Fusco



Y We Do What We Do from DownTown Pictures

And one of my own personal favorites:

Old School from Parallax

Purchase "Old School" from Parallax

Sizes

5x7 $8.00 ACEO $4.00 Greeting Card $3.00

Working with White

I'm drawn, in my photography, to intense saturated colors and high contrast, so exploring all white photographs is something different, but I found some beauties.

This one is from Still Life, a simple architectural composition in classic lines and arches

.

Stairs, originally uploaded by still. life..

And here's a still life of my own, a study in white with eggs ...

And a more modern image of a sail and all of its lines from Jerret Taylor

Sail

Purchase "Study in White" (middle) from Parallax

Sizes

8x10 $14.00 5x7 $8.00 ACEO $4.00 Greeting Card $3.00

Twirling

(Part Two of my "Favorites" series )

I'm not a big amusement park person. I'm not enough of an adrenaline junkie for the rides, in fact, I'm a downright wimp. I'm no good at the games, and don't really want a cheap stuffed animal anyways. And you can only eat so much junk food off paper plates.

But I love the spectacle. The lights, the crowds, the tents, the rides, so much to watch. (so much to photograph)


This particular photograph, of the twirling tea-cups ride is from the Barnstable County Fair. Barnstable County is Cape Cod, Massachusetts, where I grew up. And every summer, sometime in late July or August, there's a great big carnival.

Twirling

The fair's a mix of elements. This, obviously, is from the Midway: bright lights, rigged games and fast rides, families with kids during the sunny afternoons, crowds of teens and young adults at night. But, off to the side, not nearly as crowded are still big barn-like buildings with 4H club displays, and quilt competitions and vegetable competitions.

I don't live there any more, and have missed some recently, but growing up we went for an afternoon every year to wander around, have an Italian Sausage (my personal favorite fair-food) and enjoy the show -- primary colors, bright lights and madly spinning teacups.

The results are in...

For the past week, I've been asking Etsians which of my photographs they like best. I closed the voting late last night and tallied the results this morning.

((Drumroll please..............)



1st Footprints

---------------------------------------------------

2nd Place Reflections Series

Reflection1




Reflection2





Reflection 3


----------------------------------------------------

3rd Place: Twirling




-----------------------------------------------

4th Place Tulips

----------------------------------------------------

Tied for 5th Place

Old School

Misty Morning

_______________________________________

One of the reasons I did this was to get a sense of what type of photograph people on Etsy liked. Color or black and white? Macro or wide angle? Traditional or modern? Representational or Abstract?

The answer I got? Yes.

Apparently Etsy likes a little of everything, we have a black and white coastal landscape (and a color coastal landscape) an abstract series, a geometric primary colored composition, a floral & a macro shot of a vintage camera with a vaguely steam-punk feel.


I'm still trying to figure out what I learned from this, I was hoping for guidance in what to focus my promotion on.

My 'take-away', I suppose is that on etsy, I can try just about anything.