Tags
#artist, #chalk, #crayons, #featuredartist, #flower, #nail, #nailvarnish, #paintbrush, #paints, #pastelcrayons, #petals, #vividcolors, @loodeloopy, Color, Macro
For the month of January, Janet chose @loupdeloopy to be our featured artist. I caught up with Lilan to learn a little bit more about her and her photography journey. What I love about Lilan’s story is that you do not have to have a fancy camera. All of her gorgeous images are taken with a mobile phone.
Tell us a bit about yourself? And … Are you a hobbyist or a pro?
I am an American expat based in Berlin, formerly a writer, editor, and translator, now a hobby photographer with the guiding wish to grow my skills in shooting and editing.
![13EAD045-8B99-40DF-8A88-9A997905893F[13010]](https://sharesix.files.wordpress.com/2020/03/13ead045-8b99-40df-8a88-9a997905893f13010.jpg?w=529)
Mobile macro is not optimal for capturing foreground, background AND middle-ground. So this tulip seemed a small victory
Tell us a bit about your photography gear. What is the lens do you not have but you desire to have the most?
With some embarrassment, I must admit to using mobiles phones only. The best clip-on macro lenses I have found are by Ollioclip for the iPhone SE. Having upgraded to the iPhone 11 Pro, I am limited to Sandmarc.
![88A3DB7E-261A-4BA2-9909-DE2715EFBFF0[13009]](https://sharesix.files.wordpress.com/2020/03/88a3db7e-261a-4ba2-9909-de2715efbff013009.jpg?w=529)
The rainbow hues, the translucence, the focus, and blur, the negative space and alternating angles – it works for me.
Describe your style of work and how you found your style.
My style has been shaped almost entirely by circumstance. I have been housebound and mostly bed-bound by serious illness for over ten years. This limits my subject matter to the details I can capture in my apartment or garden. I have always been enchanted by miniatures, so macro does suit me. And, perhaps because I spend so many hours lying in the dark, it is a lust for color, more than anything, that characterizes my work.
![2805C04C-FD66-4F74-B54B-95350E74874D[13011]](https://sharesix.files.wordpress.com/2020/03/2805c04c-fd66-4f74-b54b-95350e74874d13011.jpg?w=529)
Depth of field is everything! As are my neighbor’s art supplies, which I shoot whenever the opportunity arises.
Are you a creative person, ….have you always been creative, ….what inspires your creativity?
I have been creating in a wide range of art forms for at least 45 years. (My parents shoved colored markers in my pudgy fists before I was old enough to walk.) But writing was my one true love, and just as my fingertips finally grazed success, my disease impaired my language skills too severely for me to continue. Finding, some years later, that I had the capacity to photograph still surprises me. I consider the creative process a privilege; it restores joy and meaning to my life. I am inspired by color, by ephemera, by fellow photographers on Instagram, but I never push myself if uninspired or too ill. I know my creative juices will flow again soon.
![37578D5E-1F2A-427B-8004-318A3CA18852[13012]](https://sharesix.files.wordpress.com/2020/03/37578d5e-1f2a-427b-8004-318a3ca1885213012.jpg?w=529)
The saturation and texture here do me in.
Who is your favorite photographer, living or dead?
Picking a favorite photographer feels impossible! In terms of influences, growing up in California, running wild in the Sierras, I was initially most impacted by Ansel Adams, clichéd as that may be, and in my twenties, I was forever road-tripping through the Pacific Northwest and the Southwest, shooting the American landscape (analogue). More recently, the photographer who awakened my love of mobile macro was Michael Van Huffel. His work takes my breath away, and we share the same disease: @michaelsvh
![FullSizeRender[13013]](https://sharesix.files.wordpress.com/2020/03/fullsizerender13013.jpg?w=529)
In this case, depth of field is nothing. But I find satisfaction in the purity of shapes, the flat background, my nail art on a lone thumb
What is your favorite quote?
“I am not somebody who thinks I am entitled to good health or to a good, peaceful, happy life. We are fortunate when we have them, but when we don’t have them, it’s not that someone’s taking them away from us. It just happens.”
~Laura Hillenbrand, author of SEABISCUIT
![image2[13014]](https://sharesix.files.wordpress.com/2020/03/image213014.jpg?w=529)
A departure for me, as I rarely shoot in soft tones or textures. Credit goes to the rose.
Thank you Lilan for sharing a little bit more about yourself and your work. Go and check out Lilian’s page @loupdeloopy. There are so many beautiful colors.
We look forward to seeing your images on our Facebook page and our Instagram Page. The theme this month is {Morning} so tag us with #sharesix_morning.