Kiwi Slice and Fruit Jelly

Title: "Kiwi Slice and Fruit Jelly"
12"x12" digital interpretation
©2009 Christine Pierce
(please click on image to enlarge)

The back-story: A couple of months ago, my friend Jenny and I spent the day photographing various fruit still lifes. Jenny had the terrific idea to slice a piece of kiwi fruit very thinly and hold it up to the light, letting the sunshine glow through the translucent fruit.

Easier said than done! But, after many comical attempts, we finally managed to get the thin slice of kiwi fruit to stand up on the plate by adhering it to a glob of sticky fruit jelly. Here is the set-up:

©2009 Christine Pierce

And here is the quickly-snapped reference photo I used for the painting:

©2009 Christine Pierce

Still Life Photo Shoot

Clementines and Plum Blossoms in Silver Bowl

Yesterday, my artist friend Jenny Mark and I spent several fun-filled hours photographing fruit still lifes*. We had two cameras popping away and berries were flying and backdrops were falling... But it was a blast, and we ended up with over 150 reference photos for future paintings. Of course, of those 150 photographs, there were probably 12-15 real "keepers."

It was a great experience and we learned a lot, including:

1. using the same color background and tablecloth creates a unified look;
2. a tripod is a necessity; a monopod would have been even better;
3. two different cameras under the exact same conditions can yield vastly different results, especially in terms of color quality;
4. using a tungsten light really makes the colors vivid. We used natural lighting for the majority of our pics, but the few photos taken with the tungsten light were noticeably brighter;
5. some planning is good, but being open to serendipity is even better.

Here, you can see that the white background is too jarring:

The black foam-board backdrop is somewhat better:

The black velour backdrop is just right:

The bonus of photographing fresh fruit is that it makes for a lovely lunch afterward:

I'm sure elements from these still lifes will be appearing in my paintings and drawings for months to come!

(* Wikipedia informs us that the plural of still life is still lifes. It seems counter-intuitive, but I'm going with it...)

Gerbera Daisies

Here is a loose still life of some gerbera daisies in my kitchen.