April Creative Challenge | Stay at Home Top 5!
Here at Unraveled, our primary focus is to educate— but it is not our only goal.
Artists and creatives tend to go inward— in good times and in bad, but we are a community and together we move forward. We wanted to come up with a way to keep our community accountable to their creativity— no matter the state of the world, because creativity is how we cope. Our creativity is how we process and it is how we express the emotions we can’t always put into words. We wanted to provide an opportunity that we felt would give our community a reason to do the thing they love the most— especially during a time when they needed it the most.
The Unraveled Creative Challenge is a monthly challenge for our community members where we provide a prompt and they freaking deliver. The voting is all done anonymously and only open to our students. The entire process was amazing and such a bright light for everyone involved.
With over 450 votes counted— these were our Top 5 winners!
PROMPT: STAY AT HOME
5TH PLACE
I was hesitant when I first saw the post regarding the photo contest. Don't get me wrong, I thought the whole thing was brilliant - like almost all things Unraveled Academy - but I had always shied away from participating in contests. I believe I am still very much in a 'still finding and perfecting my own voice' kind of stage. Quite frankly, I didn't have the balls to compete with all the amazing artists out there.
I also knew I wasn't doing particularly well regarding my creative work these days and I desperately needed a deflection from watching the news. So I sat down, put on some music and started compiling my thoughts...
I knew straight away, that I wanted to create something light in contrast to the dark times we find ourselves in currently. My heart had been heavy with worry and sadness and I wanted to push through that. I wanted it to be something we can hold on to, something that represented hope - but also new beginnings.
I knew, I wanted to incorporate my kids, because obviously they are the most beautiful thing in the world to me. I decided to include my almost 7 years old, as she can follow directions better and has about 26.4 % more patience than her younger brother. I knew I could use that 26.4 % to my advantage. Do not worry - my little boy was included behind the scenes by holding the blow dryer, which he thought was way more fun than being in front of the camera.
I wanted to integrate something green & alive from my garden, as I feel most grounded in nature and during this time, I feel especially connected to the outdoors. Ferns happen to be one of my favorite plants ever and luckily I live in Florida where they grow like weeds.
I love movement in my photos and am particularly obsessed with flying hair. So that was a must.
Thanks to Karen Dell's "Seeing your home in a new light" and Lindsey Saunder's "Keep me where the light is" and lots of experimenting, I knew exactly which spot in my house would have the perfect light for accomplishing my vision.
With this somewhat 'rough around the edges' plan, I started creating and the rest fell into place. I knew the particular picture I wanted to use for the contest the second I shot it. I couldn't wait to get it on my computer screen. During the editing process, I felt a strong sense of highlighting the pureness of the shot. Not to get too religious here, but I felt a 'garden of Eden' vibe that I decided to go with.
I knew, I had to submit my work right away, or else I would not at all. I hesitated the tiniest second, gathered up all the courage in my heart - and hit 'upload'...
Thank you again Unraveled Academy for your support, for sharing your wisdom with your students and for working your butts off for us.
Congratulations again to all of the winners and participants - I am in awe of the incredible, artistic talent in this community.
4TH PLACE - TIE
The dilemma of the creative process is when you don’t feel creative - you usually aren’t.
As someone who is plagued by bouts of sorrow and self hatred, adding in a pandemic really brings my mental health issues out to play. There is a difference in being in a creative lull - the natural ebb and flow of the process - versus experiencing the absence of inspiration at the hands of depression. I sat at home for the first few weeks of this forced isolation feeling worse than I had in a long time. I scrolled instagram and facebook wondering why I couldn’t use my time wisely like everyone else. Why wasn’t I shooting prize worthy docu-style photos of my children being homeschooled? Why wasn’t I doing front porch sessions or facetime shoots? Why wasn’t I?! It is challenging to create when you lose interest in everything. So there I was, depressed and passionless and Ace comes along with a new challenge. This task would require that I actually get up and do something. I had to turn my home into a piece of art. I looked around and at first felt like I was drastically limited by my dull and poorly lit house, ugh. Push through...push. I knew I needed something tangible to break the hold depression had on me. My daughter has always been my muse… she would be my subject. Every year I take photos of her outside with flowers - this time I would bring it all inside. My family and I walked around the neighborhood with milk jugs on ropes slung around our shoulders. These would serve as the buckets for our foraging adventure. We walked two miles collecting flowers from the roadsides, wild gardens, and maybe some friendly neighbor’s yards ;) When we got back home, we put my youngest down for a nap and then carefully placed all of the flowers around my daughter’s head and hair making her into a magical woodland fairy. She was so good - she laid there completely still for about thirty minutes. I think she knew I needed this. I love what we made together. I love her so much.
I am glad that I didn’t wait until I felt better to create something. I am grateful to Unraveled for continuing to shine a light in my life!
4TH PLACE - TIE
It is a curious time for creation.
The minute I saw the creative challenge post I knew I wanted to participate. I also knew if I waited too long to act on it, things would get in the way (Hello – homeschooling the boys, remote working, the “shoulds” were drowning me)
So I knew three things.
1. It had to happen now and for that to happen;
2. It needed to be EASY.
3. And if I was going to take the time to do this, it had to be FUN to balance all the other stuff piling around right now.
So I asked myself: What can I do at this moment to celebrate the present? And the answer was: DANCE. (Please note, I am not a dancer…dances mostly occur in the kitchen while cooking or bathroom while getting ready. So this is not a natural first thing to pop in my mind)
I remembered Lindsay Sauder’s self-portrait lesson where she had tried Vaseline on her lens and figured that would be a great way to blur my face enough to skip the hair and make-up I didn’t want to take the time for (remember, I’m going for easy and fun here…) and those sequins had looked so great with the blur as well… so time to dig out my sequin leotard that was made for this moment.
It was evening, so there was no great light to be found. I utilized a standing lamp I could adjust in a corner of my bedroom which had a plain wall for the backdrop. Once I started setting up the tripod and light I noticed the large circular window might be a neat shape to play with.
I turned on some music, my remote wifi synced to my camera and started playing around with lighting and angles until I found something I liked. The one I ended up submitting was not even one of my favorites until I began editing in Lightroom. Some of the others just had a more serious vibe than I wanted.
Camera: Nikon D750, Lens 24-70, ISO 400, F 2.8, 1/16
4TH PLACE - TIE
We had already been home for a week with a fever and the rain was constantly pouring down with the darkest gloom filled clouds we had ever seen when we got the news that school would be shut down and we would be on "shelter in place" here in California. My heart sank for my sweet boy, although he is not in real school just yet, he is a very social butterfly with his friends and at his small preschool. So instead of focusing on what was going on in the world around us, we decided to make the best with what we had, a cute shirt, houseplants and a little bit of window light creeping in.
3RD PLACE
Ideas have a tendency to drive me wild and when this contest was first announced, I felt completely empty. I could not think up a single thing and was wishing pictures I had previously taken hadn't been shared online so that I could just use one of those. I then took about 200 self portraits I absolutely hated and that helped shake the negative vibes out of my system. The night of the self portrait disaster, I laid in bed with my mind racing for ideas. The one thing I kept coming back to was light, where I could find it in my house and when. It eventually lead to me realizing the sun rose on the side of the house the bathroom window was on. The next morning I overslept and thought I totally missed my chance for this image. Regardless I ran around in a panic, pulled the screen off the bathroom window, moved furniture outside the window, scrambled to pick up bath toys and move hair products. I set up my tripod, threw off my shirt and shot. My 35mm is my widest focal length so I knew I had to get the camera as far back as I could to try and get as much of the tub as possible. The rest was just luck (i.e. the sun flare), I ran through my timer about 4 times and collected about 100 images before seeing this one on the back and knowing I had it. I have been focused lately on taking self portraits without the need of doing my makeup and hair so the silhouette was what I was aiming for. While the timer ran I just looked out the window and played with my hair. It's funny because while the image exudes peace and calm, taking it was anything but, in fact, my pants were wet from the bathmat and I was surrounded by a dozen bath toys. My settings were 1250 ISO, f/2.8, 1/250.
2ND PLACE
This is Reagan and Riley. My 5 year olds twins, and my reason for everything I do. This image just captures their personalities perfectly. Reagan is my performer. She has big dreams of becoming a mermaid one day, and also performing on stage. Riley is my more wild one, and would much rather be tumbling around on the grass and chasing animals around. The world is a scary place right now, and I am doing everything in my power to shelter these girls from it. It is so important to me, that they don't realize what is going on around us. I don't want them to lose that childhood magic. I want their days to be filled with rainbows and stardust. With messy hair and chocolate smiles. With random concerts, sitting on top of the couch, singing into their microphone while the wind sets them free.
1ST PLACE
This image is so special to me, so taking 1st place just made it more special. I took this picture on a hard mothering day. Like, extra hard. Whenever I have these days, I like to shoot. It’s very therapeutic. This little guy is facing some challenges that we are still in the process of figuring out. So our days are very long. But I find the hardest days, are the best days for me to shoot. I create some of my best images when I’m feeling emotional exhausted. I think because my heart craves so badly to find the beauty in the hardship. These pictures serve as constant reminder to myself to find the good no matter what because it’s there. It’s always there.
Want to see ALL 51 submissions?
Want to be part of the Unraveled Creative Challenges?
We would love to see how you express yourself!