Tripping on Asphalt : The photoblog of Michele Scotto

Trying to Stay Warm and Dry

This breathtaking, Beinfield, steel fireplace, which I had the pleasure to photograph, is helping. But not as much as my brand new bottle of Marshmallow Smirnoff.

Knitting is one of my favorite hobbies. If you know me, then you know I always have a project on the needles in my purse. Always. I love the fulfillment that comes from working with my hands, completing projects, and continually learning something new. I also have a great appreciation for the beauty and quirks and energy in all things handmade, something rarer and rarer in our plastic society. I love cooking, crafting, making jewelry, collage, gardening, blah, blah, blah… but knitting is a take-it-with-you kind of sport, so it’s a bit more versatile than a lot of my other interests.

Generally, I find knitting very relaxing and motivating. It puts me in a more grounded mental state. Like photography. I feel more like ‘myself’ if that makes sense. Other times it’s infuriating, drives my obsessions/neurosis, creates added self-induced pressure, and especially if I am not careful, it can be ridiculously expensive, as my good friend Clio has learned.

Over the past 4 years, as I have become a more experienced knitter, I haven’t been so good at documenting my work. Sometimes because my knitting tends to be gifted and knitting to the nth hour doesn’t allow time for a shoot. But if I’m honest with myself, and you, I haven’t photographed my work mostly because it’s added pressure. Some other way for my worth or skill to be judged and potentially criticized. Something else to do, that I’m not doing. Another thing on a Post-It note. And I should have stock in Post-Its.

But now a few things have shifted around inside, though nothing I can verbalize yet. And I have come to terms with a couple of things. First, I’m currently tired of knitting for other people. I have very little I’ve made myself and truly love, and I’m not always sure whether I’m giving gifts that are treasured or tolerated. I’m sort of excluding babies from this commentary because I feel pretty strongly that children should all have things that are handmade for them with love. Acknowledging them as individuals in this world. But that’s a whole other blog post. Second, (you forgot this was a list, didn’t you?) I love what I do. I love creating. Creating a scarf. Creating a photograph. And putting all my insecurities aside about my work, my talent, my drive, is very gratifying and freeing.

But I didn’t know any of that (and I still don’t fully understand it, I know there’s more going on there, and surely more hours of therapy) until I started knitting, and re-knitting, this scarf, and decided to actually photograph it in progress.

The story of this scarf is that as a brand new knitter, a few short years ago, I bought this Rowan pattern book and a whole bunch of Rowan Ribbon Twist yarn. I started this scarf like 3 times in my first month of knitting, trying to perfect that bobble (that repetitive round boil of a thing). And once I perfected the bobble, I stashed it away amongst my UFOs (unfinished objects). I have no idea why.

So fast forward to this October. This October when it was 20 degrees and snowing on the east coast before Halloween! And I went to my closet and had nothing to wear that I had knit myself and really thought was cool. (I guess all these gifts I’ve been giving out all over the place aren’t cool either. Neurosis, check.) And I freaked out. Until I found a pair of awesome leg warmers that I wore for the rest of the weekend, and so I pushed the freaking out to the backmost corner of my mind. Then I was able to more successful freak out about packing the boxes. Which led me to pull out some patterns and yarn I have been saving for myself.

Right? Packing vs Knitting. Knitting totally wins. Sooo, enter the resurfacing of the Rowan Ribbon Twist Cable Bobble Scarf! (That name’s as complicated as CawfeeGuy’s morning Starbucks order.) So here we go, I frog it (rip it all out) and start over. Crazy? Like a fox! I knit the first half 4 years ago when I was a new knitter so my gauge must be totally different. In layman’s terms, in order for the whole scarf to look the same width, I needed to do it again. But now, as I’m re-knitting this scarf for the gazillionth time, I don’t think the yarn shows off the pattern enough. Beautiful yarn. Beautiful pattern. Not so much a match though. So I go on a quest for a larger gauge, in a more sumptuous texture, and in a color that’s going to better show off the pattern. And here we are today. With 2 skeins of Cascade Magnum in a lavenderish, greyish, awesomely flecked color I can only liken to corpses or Zombies.

See, we’re back to the Zombies \again. I’m so predictable. And I think you can also predict, you’ll be seeing more knitting here. And that it won’t be for you. It’ll be for me. Or a baby. Should I stick my tongue out now?

Rowan Ribbon Twist, above, while beautiful, is not my favorite match for this Rowan scarf pattern

As of the date of this blog post the scarf’s not done. Sheez. It will get there. But a few babies bumped it’s priority ranking.

2012 01 05 yarns
zombies Comments (3) Permalink

The Death Star is not fully operational

We are still not fully unpacked. But as of the big push we made this past weekend, we have retrieved all of the gnomes. Which is good because I was tired of hearing them yelling and grumbling at me from random boxes.

2012 01 03 rolling in glitter
stand-in Comments (0) Permalink

¡Próspero Año Nuevo!

Let me not bore you with my New Year’s resolution/goals/adventures, which are plenty… and include brushing up on my Spanish. See, already I am boring you. Dug’s list is much more exciting as it includes traveling somewhere (I can’t remember where exactly) into space with Chewie and me in the Millennium Falcon…

photo booth

I’d like to just say thank you. To all of you. And to God and the Universe, for this incredible year we’ve had here at Sequined Asphault Studio. May you all be blessed with love and good fortune in the year to come. I’m excited to see what’s in store for us all.

2012 01 01 rolling in glitter Comments (0) Permalink

Stand-in: holiday left-overs edition

Here are some holiday left-overs for you. Less of a problem for the arteries than my other left-overs. Which are going into the trash Monday morning. I feel a bout of the 17-Day Diet coming on…

2011 12 30 stand-in Comments (0) Permalink

Some would call me mean-spirited

I say, “HO! HO! HO!” I have no problem putting dogs in stupid outfits and compromising positions for my own entertainment and the entertainment of others. And project all you want onto these dogs, those are your issues, if they hated it, they’d let me know. They sure as hell let me know everything else. Like when I’m not sharing enough chicken, steak, or lamb. Yeah, I said it. I feed my dog lamb. And DUG would feed them filet.

Let’s be honest. I paid good money for a Yorkshire Terrier (and I remind him of that every day) because every time I see them, they make me laugh and feel good. Why else would you get a dog? And now that I have Chewie, he makes me feel good every day. He’s worth the weight of 10 Chewies in gold, and then some. And when I put him through the absolute torture of dressing him like a Bee, hypothetically of course, and playing the Black Eyed Peas song “Imma Be” at full volume while he marches around the house, I don’t feel an ounce of guilt. And his belly’s full of chicken. Or mozzarella. So it’s a win/win.

And for the record, when we were packing and someone came across the Mickey Mouse lavender Fairy Hat (I kid you not), and someone put it on Rufus’ head, and it was obvious that he did not like having something on his head, because he stood completely still and refused to move, I was the one to remove it, immediately. Well, immediately after running to the bathroom because I was laughing so hard I almost peed myself. Or was it that Hot Dog costume?…

Really, though, I prefer to think of myself as Chewie’s Person, and I try to be as good to him (and people) as he is to me and everyone he meets. He and his brother are amazing and constant reminders of do unto others. And we could always stand to learn a bit, or sometimes a lot, from them about how to treat each other. See, it’s not all ice in there where my heart goes. Some of it just melted. A little.

Anywhoo, here’s my nephew, Rufus Elton Lacicata, dutifully waiting until after the Thanksgiving holiday to bring you some rainbow Christmas cheer. Dad would have a fit if we’d posted this one day too early, and even though we did this shoot probably last May, Rufus told me, in no uncertain terms, that I was not to post it until after Thanksgiving. So here we are.

Yes, the Dogs talk to me… Remember what your Mother (or Daddies) taught you, If you don’t have anything nice to say, shut the @#$% up. Or something like that.

Seasons Greetings! Et cetera, et cetera.

2011 12 01 little guys Comments (1) Permalink

Mister Serious turns one month

Little Miss A has a new brother and he’s a cutie! He showed up as a present for us right when we got home from our honeymoon! I heard he gave up his first smile to Mom this weekend, but I didn’t get one when we had our little photo shoot the other day. He was a natural in front of the camera though.

In lieu of the traditional black and whites we were planning, we decided to go with a more modern monochromatic look.

Little Miss A doesn’t know it yet, but she provided the stand-in for our set up. Ariel. With feet. After she’s given up her voice to be with Eric.

2011 11 28 little guys
portrait
stand-in Comments (2) Permalink

I may have lied

So I moved a week and a half ago now, and as of today, my house looks like this. (I’ve already unpacked maybe 30 boxes mind you.)

I could give you some excuses like: oh, we had 3 days to pack up and move, DUG threw his back out and hasn’t been able to stand upright or walk for the last week, we work full-time jobs and then some and barely managed to feed ourselves this last week. But you don’t care. Well, I shouldn’t say that. Maybe you care. But the multitude of people who laugh and ask in a day, “Are you all done unpacking? How’d it go?” as if, of course, it’s all done, and then follow it up with “Ooooh. I just couldn’t live like that. I’d be fully unpacked within 48 hours. I’d just stay up til it’s done.” Those people, they don’t care. They judge. Judgey judgey judgey.

So folks, I guess I lied in my earlier post. I am not all Stay Calm and Carry On about my boxes. I’m depressed. I may not be at the point of nervous breakdown. But my ability to function normally has definitely been compromised. My hair is a mess. I wore a cashmere sweater as an outer-garment into an ice storm today. And my dvr is completely effed thanks to stupid Cablevision of Connecticut so I missed my Tuesday night Glee therapy session. *sigh* Did I mention I have bad hair?

Anyway. I’m trying to channel Apartment Therapy here. Small is Cool and all. I mean, I am going from one small place to another, so it shouldn’t be impossible. And I don’t really think Maxwell would pat me on the back for best iteration of a landing strip, but I like to imagine him patting me on the back and saying, “Ignore those miscreants. You’ve totally got this.”

2011 11 17 behind the curtain Comments (2) Permalink

165 Boxes

So we’ve moved! Very exciting. Also more than a little daunting and a lot time and energy consuming. We never could have made the sale happen without our amazing, Super Woman of a realtor, Doris Ghitelman. You need a realtor? Call this woman. She’s no joke.

And we never could have packed those 165 boxes in 2 days without the saintly (and a little bit masochistic) CawfeeGuy and CawfeeMate. Yes. I said it. 165 boxes in 2 days. Of all. My. Shit.

Anywhoo… I thought this would be a perfect time to give you a tour of the old digs. Which is now dismantled and is someone else’s new digs. And a perfect time to remind myself, the self that’s living amongst approximately 147 unpacked boxes in our new home, that it will get better.

See… Once upon a time, I lived like this:

But with a little bit of pixie dust and some of those cookies Alice found in the rabbit hole, it became this:

And all the while in between, which is actually the part I enjoy best, it was like this:

For me, the most stressful part is over… for a while. The selling, the packing, and the moving. I love the newness of unpacking, cleaning, reorganizing and designing a lifestyle. Designing a lifestyle with my new husband. When there are 30 boxes left and no where to put the crap, then I’ll have my next nervous breakdown. But that’s another blog post. This one’s about new beginnings. And fond farewells. And gratitude.

2011 11 14 behind the curtain
interior
residential Comments (2) Permalink

Enrique and his dancers

As I sit here working on updates to The Dance Collective web site (while missing a class at The Dance Collective), I am reminded of how rewarding it is to work with my clients. As primarily an Architectural Photographer, the vast majority of my clients are creatives by nature and trade: architects, interior designers, builders, magazines, etc. and so they approach shoots with the same creative energy they approach everything else in life. Even my rogue Clients, including Amanda and Enrique of the The Dance Collective are Creatives. And, seriously, it make for a way more interesting day, or night, as it was in the case of this particular shoot.

During my interiors shoots, I am a focused perfectionist. I shoot directly to the computer and double and triple check everything from the technical aspects of things including my lighting and camera settings, through composition, and a plethora of other artistic decisions. For example, we might move a chair multiple times to get the shot just right. Props are swapped in and out. Books, pillows, ottomans, furniture. Candles or lamps may be lit and extinguished. Until we have that perfect moment. The one that everyone feels is just the right balance. It’s all way more exacting a process than one would ever imagine.

With people it’s a little different. A lot different. There are countless decisions that are made in order to achieve the final shot. But they don’t necessarily build with each shot better than the previous. You can’t get everyone to achieve the same expression, the same posture, or the same grace in every frame. People are unruly. For me, it’s less relaxing and a little more ‘a wing and a prayer.’

So instead of shot 29 being 28 shots more sophisticated than shot 1, sometimes shot 29 looks like this.

clowns