Friday 8 April 2011

Eyeshoot Photography and Food has a new home!

I have moved this blog over to my new site - you can find it here: http://www.eyeshoot.co.uk look on the top menu and click on 'WP Blog' and you'll find posts from Sunday 3rd March with all of my old posts following on.

If you 'Follow' the blog with Google Friend Connect, I have moved you over automatically!


Please be patient with me while I settle into my new blog home, it's rather a different arrangement than Blogger which I am very used to, but hopefully I'll be in the swing of it soon.


I hope you continue to enjoy my ramblings and photos and on my new site, you'll be able to see my photography portfolios and my photo projects too.




Monday 28 March 2011

The Writing's on the Wall - Graffiti Themed Treasury.

Inspired by my feature on Midday Masterpiece  I've put togeterh a graffiti themed Treasury filled with a load of great pieces from prints to wall decals to coasters and beautiful photographic prints  - in fact, there's something for everyone!



Coasting

I had a fun time making my first two sets of coasters last week, especially as the weather was so lovely and I could do all of the messy stuff outside on the terrace in the surprisingly hot sun.

I have made two sets (I need to source more coasters to use to make more) so far, one with my Double Yellow Lines photos which I also have for sale as a sweet print set:




Here's how they look as coasters, I've given them three coats of semi-matte varnish and they have a slight textured finish, I think they look great!


I've also made up a set with my Heart and Love Graffiti pictures (also available as a six part print set)





This particular set has been featured on the excellent Midday Masterpiece blog - you can see all of the other lovely graffiti inspired pieces here!  Thank you to Melissa for featuring my work.

Wednesday 23 March 2011

Making photo coasters in the sun on the terrace


I've been making a start on a new line of photo goodies for my Etsy shop - photo coasters! As it's such a lovely day I've been experimenting with varnish and other messy things out in the hot sunshine on the terrace - it's all drying really quickly!

I've made two sets of four coasters so far, one with my double yellow line pictures and another with a selection of hearts and love graffiti. So far so good!

They should be appearing in my shop soon.....

Monday 21 March 2011

I'm donating 25% of my sales to the Japan fund at The Red Cross


I will be donating 25% of my earnings from prints, print sets and Mini Picture Blocks to the British Red Cross' fund for Japan.  Click here to see the items in my Etsy shop included in this event.






Wednesday 16 March 2011

Treasury Attack!

I've made an unprecedented three Treasuries in the last two days, the reason I've had a splurge is that I found an amazing tool which automatically Convos all the people you've included.  I used to hate doing this bit of the process as Firefox used to crash continuously and drive me mad.  This miracle tool is on the fabulously named Shmetsy, you just install it and when you've compiled your Treasury and pressed 'Save' a little box pops up with the link to the Treasury and a line tells the recipient they are included, you can change the blurb to whatever you like, press 'send' and off all the Convos go, not crashing anything.  Magic!

Here are the three Treasuries I've so enjoyed making this week!

Avocado and Prawn Cocktail



White and Orange



Into the Blue

Mother's Day Certificate

It's all very well making mother's day cards with beautiful flowers but I wanted to offer something a bit different, so am pleased to announce my 'Mother's Day Certificate'! Customers can customise it to suit their preference, replacing 'Mother' with mum, mummy, mom or whatever and obviously their name will replace 'Sarah' or it can be left blank so it can be hand signed.



Wednesday 9 March 2011

Recent Treasuries on Etsy featuring my work.

I've not posted any for a while, so here's a batch of lovely Treasuries to look at and buy things from! Thank you to all of the curators who have kindly included my stuff.













Monday 7 March 2011

Tulips from Amsterdam (or somewhere)

We had lunch at the intimidating sounding International Anthony Burgess Foundation which just happens to have a splendid (if rather hot in the glaring sun) cafe.  There were some beautiful tulips on the table which were calling out to be photographed.  The actual red background was much more saturated and intense than in my finished photo, but impressive as it was, it just didn't work in the photo.  I find too much solid, flat red difficult to work with and it somehow always looks very odd.



Tuesday 1 March 2011

My Picture's in the Guardian.....again.

Crosby Steps is in the Been There photo gallery for February's travel competion, the theme was black and white.

Crosby Steps by Sarah Franklin


Monday 28 February 2011

Red Bench on which to consider things.

I've 'revisited' a photo I shot in Barcelona a couple of years ago, given a bit of Eyeshoot magic and here it is:




Wednesday 23 February 2011

My First Collection on Artfire

I have a shop on Artfire to sell my photos etc.  Or rather I don't actually sell anything there so I have upgraded to their Pro version which has a vast array of features, in fact, it's all a bit much.  I'm so used to the simplicity of Etsy that I always find other sites hard work.  They have a feature over there called Collections which are a similar thing to Treasuries on Etsy.  It's a much easier process on Artfire as you add the item you like directly from their shop and the system automatically messages all of the people whose work you have featured which saves copying and pasting loads of Convos |(in Etsy) and continually crashing Firefox in the process!  So I was very pleased with that.

Here's a view of what I've put together, click on the image to see the whole view.


Whole Lotta Love

I came across this great little scene while in a dull Manchester on Saturday and thought that it would make a great print, so here it is!



Tuesday 22 February 2011

Treasuries featuring my work.

Here's a selection of recent Treasuries which feature my work:




Thai Pork Wrap recipe based on found shopping list No.4

Continuing my occasional post inspired by one of my shopping lists - this one features in Volume One of a series of mini zines I will be making to record my finds, you can find it here.


This list is rather extravagantly written on one very small corner of a very large, brand new A4 manila envelope which still has the price written in the corner.  This implies to me that it was written in a hurry on the first piece of paper to come to hand, but the super neat and organized, bullet-marked list belies this!

The ingredients here can only be for some sort of South East Asian curry, the galangal is a dead give away as I've only ever seen it used in Thai cooking (it's a relative of root ginger, it has a different texture, being a bit more like Chinese water chestnuts, the skin is more pale with pinkish markings and less tough than ginger, it looks a bit like a very knobbly Jerusalem artichoke.  The taste is decidedly more citrussy and ginger can be used as a substitute as galangal can be tricky to find)

I've done a little research and created a recipe of my own based on some I've found on-line and in my collection of cookery books.  It can be made with the ingredients from my list as well as the normal Asian store cupboard ingredients I would expect any cook to have.

Thai Pork Wraps

Chinese leaves
2 tablespoons of cooking oil 
6-8 fat cloves of garlic, finely chopped
3 shallots, finely minced
5 inches of fresh galangal
2 whole small red chilli, thinly sliced - leave the seeds in if you like it hot
500g of lean pork mince 
1 large carrot, shredded (you can use a mandolin or vegetable peeler if you knife skills are not up to it!)
2 tablespoons of Thai fish sauce
2 tablespoons of soy sauce
1 lime - juiced
Handful bean sprouts

To garnish
Handful of fresh coriander, finely chopped
Handful of peanuts, roughly chopped
3 spring onions, finely sliced on the diagonal

Method
Separate the Chinese leaves, keep them whole, wash them and set aside on a towel to dry.

In a large frying pan or wok on a medium heat, add the oil, garlic, shallots, chilli and galangal and lightly fry for a minute, don't let them colour too much.  Turn the heat up to a high temperature and add the pork mince and stir well, keeping the meat constantly moving and mixing it well with the other ingredients so that it cooks dry and doesn't steam which will happen if your overcrowd the pan.  It is best to do this in two batches if you only have a small pan/wok.

One the mince has cooked, add the finely shredded carrots and toss for a moment or two so that they wilt a little.  Add the fish and soy sauces and mix well.  Add the lime juice (no pips please) and stir once more and remove from heat.  Arrange in a serving dish and add the chopped coriander, peanuts and bean sprouts.  To finish, sprinkle over the sliced spring onions. 

Spoon the minced pork into the Chinese leaves and fold over to make a parcel, eat and enjoy.

(Ingredients on the list not used in recipe - beef and mixed veg)

Monday 21 February 2011

Keep it simple Treasury

I've made a Treasury to show off some lovely simple pieces I have found on Etsy, drawings, prints and other goodies all which have a simple line in common.

Keep it Simple - curated by Sarah Franklin


Wednesday 16 February 2011

What's for supper, a little book of found shopping lists.

I have a secret, it's not earth shattering gossip or anything like that, it's a little embarrassing. People think I'm strange.

Here goes - I collect shopping lists, as I have mentioned here before. Other people's shopping lists. I look in shopping trolleys, the floor around trolleys and at the end of the conveyors at checkout and when I find a list, it makes me happy. I have a drawer full of them and really want to share the eccentric, eclectic, gourmet, fast food wonderful variety of them.

So using list I've scanned some I have made them into a little tiny book of sixteen full colour pages each one with a little glimpse into the life of someone who lives in my part of the world. I've even hand stitched it!




Taste Test as a Treasury Making Tool.

I was in a very nice Treasury on Etsy the other day which had been compiled using the Etsy Taste Test which I think I recall hearing about a while ago but didn't look at it, just read about it being rubbished in the Forums, and that was that.  Anyway, when I came across the Treasury yesterday there was a link to the Taste Test and I had a look and liked what I saw.  It's a really good way of compiling a Treasury without sifting through pages and pages of stuff I don't like at all.  You can't enter any keywords, so if you wanted items on a specific theme or colour or location, it's not for you.  I like to make my Treasuries by look and found that this tool made the whole experience much more efficient and I think I'll be doing them more often from now on!





Tuesday 15 February 2011

Holidays in Wales, early 1960s style.

I bought a box of 35mm slides a couple of years ago at a boot sale for 40p which turned out to be amazing.  I've never known what to do with them but somehow I didn't post them on my blog, so here we are.  I would love to do something with them, but I've no idea what!





Monday 7 February 2011

Take a look at a small sample of the gorgeous Treasuries my work has been included in at Etsy recently. I'm a rank amateur at making these collections look good compared to the people who made these.

Click on whatever catches your fancy to go to the items in their shops where you can read all about them.







Thursday 3 February 2011

Above us only sky.

I took some photos off the terrace a couple of weeks ago of a spectacular sky, both blue and pink.  I forgot all about them until today when I applied a little magic to them and turned them into two new prints!




Wednesday 2 February 2011

Up, up and away.

I've made a new Treasury jam packed full of beautiful photography from the Fpoe Team on Etsy.


(click the link to see the real 'live' version where you can access all of the shops and leave appreciative comments and buy beautiful art!)


Tuesday 1 February 2011

A new floral digital collage sheet.

I've made a new digital collage sheet today and it's full of gorgeous flowers.  There are eight images each repeated six times in a neat 1" square.

Digital Collage Sheet of 1 inch Floral Photos for Crafts, Scrapbook or Jewellery Projects


Sunday 30 January 2011

On Etsy's Front Page twice in one evening!

I think that a double Front Page in one evening is a record!  The first one happened while we were at the Royal Exchange Theatre watching the world premier of an excellent play called Mogadishu and the second (which led to three sales and used my title) while I was fast asleep!


Tickled Pink by Eyeful


I Can Feel Your Smile by Rush Creek Mosaics