Angle-poise lamps?

Doing my rounds of WOYWW blog posts yesterday was very enlightening. It's great to see how other people craft. Amongst other things I saw a pillowcase being used as a background for taking photos of cards. Wonderful idea. 

It got me thinking about how everyone here takes photos of their layouts before putting them on their blog.

Do you take great care to get perfect lighting and a plain background for your photos? I have pictures in my mind of people precariously climbing on steps to get the perfect shot. And positioning angle-poise lamps to prevent unwanted shadows!

Are you a perfectionist? Or are you more laidback and anything goes?

I tend to use a wooden table or the lounge floor for my photo-taking but I'm never totally happy with the end result. Cropping the photo doesn't always remove the background either if I haven't got the camera perfectly straight to begin with. And lighting is always a problem in the evening when I tend to take my photos for the blog as I'm at work all day.

My daughter often uses large pieces of white card as a blank background for her photography shoots. She has even hung sheets from the  lounge walls - but come on, I'm not taking an 'A' level here - I just need a decent picture of my layouts for others to see! And layouts tend to flippin' bend in the middle if stood upright I find! Not helpful at all.

So, any tips shared on how you overcome these pesky problems would be gratefully received.

Neat or Not?

I was reading Julia Dunnit's blog post the other day and it had me laughing out loud http://stamping-ground.blogspot.com/2009/08/image-from-shimelle-part-of-everyone.html  She compares real life to the perfect lives we talk about or show photos of on our blogs.  Most of you are honest and show photos of the crafty mess you get into. There are some very candid shots for 'What's On Your Workdesk Wednesday'.  This photo of mine is less than perfect- it was taken in my computer room at 9.30pm with no natural light.

Julia's post got me thinking about the photos I show - and those I choose not to.

So, I'm going to ask you a question. How neat is the back of your scrapbook page?

I must admit that many of mine are not pretty. Some have holes cut into the paper (gusseting is the polite term or being frugal is the excuse I use), stamps tested out in different colours until I find the one I like, sticky tape holding ribbons in place or those unsightly brad legs sticking through! I've even gussetted pages before now, forgotten about it and got sticky tape showing through which then sticks to everything in sight! My remedy for that faux pas is to put strips of waste paper over the glue  - thus making the back even more unsightly!

My reasoning for accepting pages like this is that I put one page back-to-back with another in my albums, so it doesn't matter what the rear of each individual layout looks like. But.... there's always a but... find the odd page in its' clear plastic holder that hasn't yet got a partner behind it ... and anyone can see what you've done!

Also, I've just bought an acryllic 12x12 page holder to hang on my wall. The layouts can easily be slid in and out and changed whenever I like. This one purchase has made me look hard at the finish quality of my work which is now displayed for visitors to see.

As a salutary exercise, and in the interests of Truthful Blogging, I've looked through all my layouts and here is the worst backside example I could find. Sadly, it's the back of the layout shown at the top of the blog.

The less said the better!