Anatomy of a Christmas Card 2015
One of my favorite things about Christmas is cards. Call me old school, but I can't wait to get to the mailbox and see the treasures our mail lady delivers. Sure, I see most friends on social media, but there's something so happy and optimistic about the photo cards and letters which arrive. It makes me all kinds of happy.
When I think about sending our card, I want to bring the same level of cheer to our friends. That's what I tell myself to rationalize the way I over-think and maybe over-produce our cards.
Am I ridiculous? Maybe.
Still, I have found enough enablers to feed my habit, so the tradition continues...
This year (after a few failed pitches to Billy who balked on an idea involving a set creation) the inspiration came in the form of this photo:My son had a color run as part of a school fundraiser, and it got me thinking we could do something similar with Christmas colors. You may be familiar with holi color festival, which is a spring festival popular in Southeast Asia. The colored powder is now frequently copied at assorted events and with the power of the internet you can either buy or make your own. The powder is cornstarch based, so it's washable and environmentally safe.
The goal was to make our images a more festive version of the Modern Family mud fight. I pitched the idea first to Billy (I had him at "no construction."), then our photographer Joy Cannis (who never says no to my craziness). Joy and her husband, Chris, found our location in Chamblee in an alleyway with a fantastic white wall in full sun on one side...and an interesting vine covered wall on the other.The tricky part was finding the right color scheme for our color war. Every link I found either sold packages of colors for $100 (uh - no...) or they were sold out of the green. I resorted to making my own (thank you YouTube) and Chris found some at a local spot the morning we were getting together. Score!!
We took a bunch of before pictures to capture the more traditional, pristine look.Then we started having fun!Billy played the straight man which makes me laugh every time.We were, of course, operating with the understanding that we would never throw the powder at each others' face.Most of us observed that guideline. #dohThe mess was tremendous. Though the paint was technically washable, I'm not sure the clothes will ever recover from the amount of bleach I used.Still, the process was about as much fun as we've had making a card.Our "after" pictures were taken after we all wiped off our teeth (powder was everywhere!), but otherwise we let the mess remain as it landed. My favorite images, as always were linked to Billy's shenanigans. For example...The final card was put together by Lisa Hovis at Photosynthesis. I have worked with Lisa for custom design work for 12 years (she's amazing!). Here's the back page...Happy to have this one in the books!
If you're curious about previous card adventures, check out 2014, 2013, and 2012.