Nik Software, using it to make your photographs pop.

I love every type of bird, apart from crows but even they are beautiful for the glossiness of their black and turquoise coats.

 Swans are much maligned for their aggressiveness and manure making propensities

But I love the elegance of their necks

and their bright red beaks

I think they can look regal and their voices are like the chimes of a squeaky set of park swings.

They can be aggressive I agree and when they put their heads down like this and swim towards you, it's advisable to move out of their way

Geese also have a reputation of being aggressive because of their ability to extend their wings and come running towards you while hissing.

 But these lovely babies at the lakefront just go about their ablutions not hurting anyone.
They are so fussy about their appearance and the cleanliness of their feathers.
I hang out with them quite regularly and they know me.

I went down to their bathing place and stayed for an hour photographing them. They don't seem to mind. The air coming off them is one of acceptance and gentleness.

I tried an experiment.
 I do this to cattle in paddocks and it always works.
I looked one in the eye and said I love you so much you are beautiful and I blew it a kiss.
It looked up at me and fluttered its eyes like cats do when you talk to them.
 This means that they return your sentiments.
They are very sensitive they can feel how you feel about them and they often respond returning the feelings
I believe we are connected energy wise to all living animals.
It's just a matter of taking time to sit down with them.
Most people are far too busy  or insensitive to notice.

The lake on this day was glassy and even though the skies were overcast it made for  an almost surreal scene, the Nik software helps this.

You can change the tones and the sharpness with it

These scaups are another favourite type of duck of mine.
 They have high pitched peeps and have a cute shape like those yellow floating  rubber duckies you had as a kid.

This is a scene out at lake Okareka which has been heavily manipulated with Nik software to the extent it looks un natural but I like it that way

I love cloud scapes

 and are perfect subjects to experiment with.  I can imagine flying amongst these clouds.

  

I go up  Mt Ngongotaha to take shots of the mist rolling in during early winter mornings  and take shots of Mt Tarawera, because it's just up the road from me.

 

Mt Tarawera always manages to look menacing to me as though it's holding in an explosion that can fill our atmosphere with choking ash at any time.

 

 

Early mornings are some of the best for the light.

I still have a long way to go before I master all the intricacies of this photo manipulating software, but the important thing is I'm having fun discovering how to make my photos pop.
There are a lot of masters out in cyber space who make online videos to help.

Give it a go and see what happens.

Creative Quote of the week

I've developed into quite a swan. I'm one of those people that will probably look better and better as I get older until I drop dead of beauty.

Rufus Wainwright

Tarawera Mountain and Mokoia Island

 

Impressions of the Rotorua Lakefront.

This family of geese are always lurking around at the lakefront eating grass and acorns at the moment because they are in season.
 

I love them because although they have a reputation for being aggressive

These ones aren't. They are really friendly

I have followed them so often on their little jaunts with my camera I think they are almost used to me

I think they recognise me because the feeling I  got off them the last time I saw them was gentleness.

It might sound strange but I find I have a really deep connection to most animals.

I have had encounters with them too numerous to name where they seem to sense something on me that makes them feel very calm.  Perhaps they know I respect them and they just relax around me.

I've manipulated all of these images in Photoshop using NIC software so they are not natural looking but that is the whole concept.

 


The walk to Sulphur point  along the lakefront is shrouded in these Kanuka's which give off a lovely reviving aroma.
 I particularly enjoy the shadows.

This is a section of rust off some old machinery at Sulphur point that always intrigues me for its Australian like landscape colours.

Rust never sleeps is evident in this shot.

I have chosen the lakefront as my project for the year to revisit in all seasons in all weathers.

It's an exercise in digging deeper.

Creative Quote of the Day

The goose that lays the golden eggs likes to lay where there are eggs already.

Charles Spurgeon

 

 

Turn your photographs into water colour paintings with my lessons on Monday, Tuesday, Wednesday and Friday mornings at my studio at 374 Clayton Road, Rotorua. 

Ring to book your space at 346-3435 or email jkeen@clear.net.nz

 

 

Rotorua Lakefront portraits of a young woman and her best friend.

I like photographing  people with their cute dogs.
Normally the Rotorua lakefront isn't a place to find such subjects because it is supposed to be a dog free zone.
But I was fortunate to see this little guy Jack and his mother Jamie Lee  from afar sitting on a bench down from mine.

I just had to ask Jing to go and ask her to come closer for a photo shoot. 

I knew I had to capture this couple because they were so perfect.  

Their love for each other was so evident.
 The little guy was so calm, relaxed and trusting.
I felt like he would want to be with her wherever she went.

This is  the type of dog that I could have.
He is a Highland Terrier and his name is Jack

He wasn't really interested in me, but that was fine because it was lovely to see him so contented and self contained in his bubble of devotion. 

He was beautifully groomed and clean

They were from Auckland visiting for the long weekend.

We talked a lot about him

He was around seven so they had been together in a long relationship

I asked he how hard he was to look after and she said, no trouble, you just take him wherever you want to go

Your life revolves around where you can take him

If I had a dog like that I'd want everywhere to be a dog friendly zone so I could still go to any place I liked

Why not? They are just like people and they get sleepy  too.

It  was a pleasure to meet Jamie Lee and I hope I meet her and Jack again some day.

I took my husband Graham out to Palmers Garden Cafe for lunch and guess who sat next to us? 
Two other adorable dogs called Jeannie and Lulu and their mother Joanne.

The dogs licked me, it felt so soft and lovely.
Aren't they adorable as well? 

Dogs are flying freely to me these days. 
Perhaps the universe is trying to tell me something.

I think if you had a dog by your side you would make a lot of friends quite quickly and easily. 
Dogs break down barriers easily, especially if they are cute and fluffy. 

Creative Quote of the day
The only creatures that are evolved enough to convey pure love are dogs and infants.”
― Johnny Depp

Painting and mosaic classes. 
Come to my studio for some classes and learn how to paint or mosaic your type of dog. 
Adults classes Monday to Wednesday and Friday mornings.
After schools kids and teenage classes every week day except Thursday
Weekend workshops by arrangement. 

Ring 07 3463435
Email jkeen@clear.net.nz 
Mosaic and Art Studio set in a dog friendly, organic, garden at 374 Clayton Road. Rotorua, New Zealand. 
 

Paintings and Poetry from Photographs

 “I have to admit, an unrequited love is so much better than a real one. I mean, it's perfect... As long as something is never even started, you never have to worry about it ending. It has endless potential.”
― Sarah Dessen, The Truth About Forever

  “She hated that she was still so desperate for a glimpse of him, but it had been this way for years.”
― Julia Quinn, The Secret Diaries of Miss Miranda Cheever

  “Maybe I was destined to forever fall in love with people I couldn’t have. Maybe there’s a whole assortment of impossible people waiting for me to find them. Waiting to make me feel the same impossibility over and over again.”
― Carol Rifka Brunt, Tell the Wolves I'm Home

  “Sometimes no matter how many eyelashes or dandelion seeds you blow, no matter how much of your heart you tear out and slap on your sleeve, it just ain't gonna happen.”
― Melissa Jensen, The Fine Art of Truth or Dare

  “I want him to see the flowers in my eyes and hear the songs in my hands.”
― Francesca Lia Block, Dangerous Angels

 “Soul connections are not often found and are worth every bit of fight left in you to keep.”
― Shannon L. Alder 

“I think if you like somebody you have to tell them. It might be embarrassing to say it, but you will never regret stepping up. 
 I know from personal experience, however, that you should not keep telling a girl that you like her after she tells you she isn't into it. 
You should not keep riding your bike by her house either.”
― Donald Miller, Blue Like Jazz: Nonreligious Thoughts on Christian Spirituality 

 Creative Quote of the day 
"The silver lining of heartache is the creative genius it inspires. 
If hearts didn't get broken, then poems wouldn't be professed, songs wouldn't be sung, books wouldn't be written, movies wouldn't be made, some paintings wouldn't be painted."
Samara O'Shea

Come to my studio.
 Learn to paint water colours. 
After I have taught you the basics we can branch out into a theme. 
You can make paintings from your photographs. 
You can work out what theme interests you by studying the quotes of others.
I will show you my secret recipes. 
You can then paint the idea, it can be abstract or realistic and you can accompany it with a poem.

Creativity Classes Monday to Wednesday and Friday mornings from 9.30am to 11.30am
$25.00 per person per hour plus materials. 
Janet Keen Mosaics and Painting School 
Phone 073463435
email jkeen@clear.net.nz
  

A list poem about Creation

Take A Leaf
By Janet Keen

Walk amongst leaves
 in silence
until you feel peace

 If someone with you
chatters 
tell them to shut up 
silence is sensuous  

live in the now
stop being so rushed 
pause, breathe in fresh air,
and leafy smells 

 listen to birds words
they have more notes to
sing than  people

let your camera 
snap at anything
that pulls at your heart

Take your photos home
print some out
see if you can draw
 segments

If you can't
turn one upside down 
and draw it again

 focus
on shapes 
and the spaces between them

 judge what comes softly 
hide it away for a day
in your secret nest
 
Don't show people
 you know who stomp 
on your leaves

 Look at your work
and love it

If you don't
repeat it all again
until one day you do

it is your own
 journey
 and you are special.

Hamurana Springs, Rotorua is a place where it is easy to imagine women poets like Amy Lowell, Sylvia Plath and Maya Angelou would be inspired.

Dreams by Amy Lowell

I do not care to talk to you although
Your speech evokes a thousand sympathies,
And all my being's silent harmonies
Wake trembling into music. When you go
It is as if some sudden, dreadful blow
Had severed all the strings with savage ease.
No, do not talk; but let us rather seize
This intimate gift of silence which we know.
Others may guess your thoughts from what you say,
As storms are guessed from clouds where darkness broods.
To me the very essence of the day
Reveals its inner purpose and its moods;
As poplars feel the rain and then straightway
Reverse their leaves and shimmer through the woods. 

To a Friend by Amy Lowell

I ask but one thing of you, only one,
That always you will be my dream of you;
That never shall I wake to find untrue
All this I have believed and rested on,
Forever vanished, like a vision gone
Out into the night. Alas, how few
There are who strike in us a chord we knew
Existed, but so seldom heard its tone
We tremble at the half-forgotten sound.
The world is full of rude awakenings
And heaven-born castles shattered to the ground,
Yet still our human longing vainly clings
To a belief in beauty through all wrongs.
O stay your hand, and leave my heart its songs!

Hero-Worship by Amy Lowell

A face seen passing in a crowded street,
A voice heard singing music, large and free;
And from that moment life is changed, and we
Become of more heroic temper, meet
To freely ask and give, a man complete
Radiant because of faith, we dare to be
What Nature meant us. Brave idolatry
Which can conceive a hero! No deceit,
No knowledge taught by unrelenting years,
Can quench this fierce, untamable desire.
We know that what we long for once achieved
Will cease to satisfy. Be still our fears;
If what we worship fail us, still the fire
Burns on, and it is much to have believed.

Listening by Amy Lowell

'T is you that are the music, not your song.
The song is but a door which, opening wide,
Lets forth the pent-up melody inside,
Your spirit's harmony, which clear and strong
Sings but of you. Throughout your whole life long
Your songs, your thoughts, your doings, each divide
This perfect beauty; waves within a tide,
Or single notes amid a glorious throng.
The song of earth has many different chords;
Ocean has many moods and many tones
Yet always ocean. In the damp Spring woods
The painted trillium smiles, while crisp pine cones
Autumn alone can ripen. So is this
One music with a thousand cadences.

Petals by Amy Lowell

Life is a stream
On which we strew
Petal by petal the flower of our heart;
The end lost in dream,
They float past our view,
We only watch their glad, early start.
Freighted with hope,
Crimsoned with joy,
We scatter the leaves of our opening rose;
Their widening scope,
Their distant employ,
We never shall know. And the stream as it flows
Sweeps them away,
Each one is gone
Ever beyond into infinite ways.
We alone stay
While years hurry on,
The flower fared forth, though its fragrance still stays. 

Crossing the Water

Black lake, black boat, two black, cut-paper people.
Where do the black trees go that drink here?
Their shadows must cover Canada.

A little light is filtering from the water flowers.
Their leaves do not wish us to hurry:
They are round and flat and full of dark advice.

Cold worlds shake from the oar.
The spirit of blackness is in us, it is in the fishes.
A snag is lifting a valedictory, pale hand;

Stars open among the lilies.
Are you not blinded by such expressionless sirens?
This is the silence of astounded souls.

Sylvia Plath

I Know Why The Caged Bird Sings

The free bird leaps
on the back of the wind
and floats downstream
till the current ends
and dips his wings
in the orange sun rays
and dares to claim the sky.

But a bird that stalks
down his narrow cage
can seldom see through
his bars of rage
his wings are clipped and
his feet are tied
so he opens his throat to sing.

The caged bird sings
with fearful trill
of the things unknown
but longed for still
and his tune is heard
on the distant hill for the caged bird
sings of freedom

The free bird thinks of another breeze
and the trade winds soft through the sighing trees
and the fat worms waiting on a dawn-bright lawn
and he names the sky his own.

But a caged bird stands on the grave of dreams
his shadow shouts on a nightmare scream
his wings are clipped and his feet are tied
so he opens his throat to sing

The caged bird sings
with a fearful trill
of things unknown
but longed for still
and his tune is heard
on the distant hill
for the caged bird
sings of freedom.

Maya Angelou 

Phenomenal Woman
Pretty women wonder where my secret lies.
I’m not cute or built to suit a fashion model’s size
But when I start to tell them,
They think I’m telling lies.
I say,
It’s in the reach of my arms
The span of my hips,
The stride of my step,
The curl of my lips.
I’m a woman
Phenomenally.
Phenomenal woman,
That’s me.
I walk into a room
Just as cool as you please,
And to a man,
The fellows stand or
Fall down on their knees.
Then they swarm around me,
A hive of honey bees.
I say,
It’s the fire in my eyes,
And the flash of my teeth,
The swing in my waist,
And the joy in my feet.
I’m a woman
Phenomenally.
Phenomenal woman,
That’s me.
Men themselves have wondered
What they see in me.
They try so much
But they can’t touch
My inner mystery.
When I try to show them
They say they still can’t see.
I say,
It’s in the arch of my back,
The sun of my smile,
The ride of my breasts,
The grace of my style.
I’m a woman
Phenomenally.
Phenomenal woman,
That’s me.

Now you understand
Just why my head’s not bowed.
I don’t shout or jump about
Or have to talk real loud.
When you see me passing
It ought to make you proud.
I say,
It’s in the click of my heels,
The bend of my hair,
the palm of my hand,
The need of my care,
‘Cause I’m a woman
Phenomenally.
Phenomenal woman,
That’s me.

Maya Angelou

Creative quote of the day 

Painting is silent poetry, and poetry is painting that speaks.

Plutarch

Painting and Poetry Classes

Monday to Wednesday and Friday mornings. 

Paint a picture and write a few words about it in your visual diary, I will show you how to bring the magic of creativity into your life every day. 

Phone Janet Keen 346-3435

email jkeen@clear.net.nz

Painting and Mosaic studio/ Classroom 374 Clayton Road,

Rotorua 

 

Poem Making Creativity Challenge. 

By Janet Keen 

You don't have to be original

all  the time  

or held up

by waiting for your  muse to arrive

Your own poetry can be sparked by

 going to nature

where magic lives. 

Be still, 

be open to what want is 

wanting to be revealed 

use your i-phone,

 your pocket rocket,

you don't need a fancy DSLR

Take a series of shots and

manipulate them into a mood

borrow from poets you admire

and place them 

below your photos. 

Don't worry about 

 odd juxtapositions

Gaps between your image 

and your readers thoughts

become metaphors

You don't have 

to tell the whole story 

everyone has their story too

let others contributions

become part of the conversation 

 if you are fortunate

 you will find someone to have a

poetry dance with 

if not

do it alone

 poems live everywhere

they grow out of  the bones of others

read and read and read

their  poetry 

if their poems speak to you

 this is good enough

you are good enough

try not to be lazy

 and use any cliches 

just start writing

then go back over your words 

looking for flaws

if it hits you in your heart'

it's being real

if it's been written before

"take an axe to it"

( example of a cliche)

i would like someone special 

( you know who you are)

 to 

find my poems

do my exercises

and write me some poetry back

I will be watching