I think I had a really clever idea here but just couldn't get the lighting right. I hate it when I can see a photo in my mind and can't capture what I saw!
I had the idea of somehow creating a three dimensional black pi symbol with ice cream on top to create pi a la mode but wasn't sure how to do it. The only thing I could think of was cutting it out of foam of some kind. My friend and I went to a craft store and found this cool floral foam which is easy to sculpt. When I excitedly showed my wife the foam she angrily reminded me that she told me specifically to get floral foam the first time I mentioned the idea. Then she explained something else to me but I wasn't listening anymore...
I used a pi symbol from Wikipedia.com to create a stencil and my father did the work of using a hack saw to cut away the unwanted pieces and sand it down to smooth edges. After it was spray painted black and sealed I was so excited that I was on the right track. Then I remembered I'm not really a good photographer.
I used a white to black sweep I borrowed from my dad for the backdrop, bought the whitest ice cream I could find (though it still looks yellow in the photo), and tried my damnedest to figure out the right lighting. My original idea involved ice cream melting and running down the sides of the pie. I went through two full ice cream melts shooting hundreds of photos and they ALL sucked! I'm so unhappy with this shot.
I had he "brilliant" idea of shooting in Lo80 ISO setting on my camera which is a setting designed for low tonality. But, the low ISO came with very low shutter speeds and the movement of melting ice cream actually blurred the image. When I reshot at 400 ISO so I could get some crisp melting images I still didn't come up with anything better than the shot here (shot at 400 ISO).
One of these days I'd like to be mentored by someone who can take me to the next level. My problem isn't creativity, it's the technical side. I can SEE the image, I just can't shoot what I see. I get so frustrated when my friends see a ribbon shot on DPC and say, "that's stupid...it was so easy!" I try to explain to them that just because you can envision an image in your head doesn't mean you can come remotely close to capturing it on film. The proof is ine pudding.
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