My Head is Spinning and My Eyes are Heavy

This song pretty much reflects how I'm feeling right about now. Enjoy.

I had my cigar tonight. I'm debating wether or not to leave all the typos in this, because there will be many. Everything is heavy and spinning. Things were good until about the last quarter. Then things started moving on their own. Pretty trippy. I don't think I will smoke any more Gurkhas.

I miss black ops. That game is so much fun. On top of that, it is a ton of fun to play with friends. When you have a full team you don't lose a lot, and that is what gaming is all about for me: winning. I don't understand the concept of playing just to have fun. I guess I do that, but I only really have fun when I am winning. If I lose over and over again I just get frustrated and want to quit. Where's the fun in getting pummeled?

Well I'm super tired so I'm going to head off to sleep now. I'm going to attempt to wake up at 8:30 tomorrow so I can go make some prints. Goodnight everyone

PINAC and WTFOMGLMAO

You guys speak German right? Good. Enjoy.

One of my favorite bands that one of my favorite people introduced me to. Apparently, he is the lead singer and bassist. Pretty awesome if you ask me. Anyway, I really want to take pictures on the metrorail in Houston. As I was considering doing this I thought about what would happen if someone attacked me. I don't think it's likely, but kind of a what if type of thing. A coworker of mine informed me that there are metro police on each car. This was pretty reassuring until I started thinking about what would happen if the cop asked me to stop taking pictures. Before I go any further I should explain that if you are in public you have no expectation of privacy. I can take your picture all I want. Some officers do not believe this. That's why there are blogs and websites dedicated to showing people that photography is not a crime (PINAC). Anyway, if a cop did start harassing me there are ways to handle it. My concern is that I would be so intimidated that I would just say ok and stop taking pictures. I'm kind of a pacifist. Hopefully I just won't be bothered by anyone and I can take pictures in peace.

Second though of the night. I bought a cigar today to smoke tomorrow. That sounds weird read back, but oh well. I have become a cigar smoker in the last year and I rather enjoy it. The one I purchased today is made by Gurkha and is called a 'Warlord'. It's about six and a half inches long, about 7/8 inch in diameter, and smells wonderful. I can hardly wait for tomorrow evening.

I won't lie to you, I have some very exciting things running through my head right now. As I am a closet gamer though, I will not be discussing them. Trust me, it probably wouldn't interest you.

That's going to be all for tonight. I'd rather write a short blog than blather on just for the sake of length. Goodnight everyone.

Crippling Exhaustion and Grapes?

No blog tonight. I know, you're all crushed. Especially since I missed last night too! I am working on something though. I was going to put it up tonight but it's just not ready. I still have a few kinks to figure out. Until next time, here's some Weezer featuring the always stunning Elisha Cuthbert. Enjoy.

Late Night Photography and I Have a Picture for You!

Did everyone miss me? Who am I kidding, of course you did! Never fear though, I'm back, and best of all I brought my friends from Rise Against with me. Enjoy.

Today has been busy. Well I guess it started last night. As the regular readers will know by now, I don't post on Tuesdays. Mostly because I need at least one day off. Also, every other Tuesday is edit night for my school paper. We usually aren't done until the early morning hours and I just don't have the energy to do it after that. Well on top of edit night I had to wake up early this morning to get an interview. All of you know that I am very passionate about photography, but I also rather enjoy using a video camera. I am currently in my second Television Productions class and this morning I had a project to work on. It's a simple one really, just a common news package like you would see on the evening news. The three minutes you see though can sometimes translate into three hours worth of work. We are covering a sports event at our school so this morning we sat down for an interview with the coordinator. We still have to go back and shoot on Tuesday though at the actual event so we can get our b-roll (those are the shots that play while the anchor does the voice over work).

After that I finished up the last few pictures on my roll of film and went to develop it. I guess there isn't really a whole lot of purpose in developing just one roll, but I wanted to be in the lab so bad. I thought I would tell those of you who don't know just how long that takes. First off you have to get the film out of the canister. This has to be done in total darkness (the room with the red lights comes later). So, blind as a bat, you have to pop off one end of the canister and pull the film out. Don't touch the film though or you will get finger prints on it. Gripping it by the sides, you then have to locate the tail (the part you initially loaded into the camera) and cut it off. Once you have done this you can start loading the film onto a reel (again, in the dark). This was my third time doing this so I actually got it done pretty quick this time. Once it's on the reel you cut the spool off and put the reel in the development tank. Once you seal the tank you can turn the lights on. On to actually developing it.

Step One: You must rinse your film with water that is the same temperature as the developer (in my case 68 degrees). This is called the pre-wet. You invert the tank slowly while twisting (this is called agitating) for thirty seconds. After agitation you gently tap the tank against the sink a few times to dislodge air bubbles from the film. You the rest for thirty seconds and dump out the pre-wet.

Step Two: Pour in the developer. The film I use must develop for eleven and a half minutes. You agitate for thirty seconds initially, and then ten seconds at the beginning of each additional minute, tapping the tank at the end of every agitation. Pour out the developer ten seconds before the time is up.

Step Three: The developer is bringing out the image on the negatives. We now need to 'stop' that reaction from happening, so we pour in our stop bath and agitate continuously for thirty seconds. After that we rest for thirty seconds.

Step Four: Now we have neutralized the developer, but the film is still sensitive to light. We need to 'fix' the images so that they will not be photosensitive anymore. Pour in your fixer and, just like the developer, agitate for thirty seconds initially and then for ten seconds at the beginning of each additional minute for three and a half minutes.

Step Five: We need to get most of the fix off of our film, so we will fill the tank with water and dump it three times.

Step Six: Now we will add a chemical that will help us remove the rest of the fix. Agitate continuously for about a minute or two.

Step Seven: Now we need to wash the fix remover off our film. We do this by either filling the tank up and inverting for set amounts of time, or by placing the reel in a container that fills with water and empties by itself for five minutes.

Step Eight: Now we are going to apply a wetting agent. The reel goes back into the tank and we agitate continuously with the wetting agent for about a minute or two.

Step Nine: The film now comes off the reel and goes into the dryer. Before we dry it though we must take a clean sponge (soaked in wetting agent) and sponge the film gently. Once this is done you let the film dry in the dryer for about fifteen minutes. Cut it into strips of five for storage and you're done!

You are all now experts in film development (sort of). Valuable life lesson really. You're welcome.

I had to leave the lab to go to class, but later on I went back to make a contact sheets and to experiment with making prints. I haven't learned exactly how yet but I had a rough idea so I gave it a go. Nothing really came out but I did have a lot of fun. Once again, the dark room (that's the one with the red light) is very soothing.

I did whip out my digital a bit tonight. I was initially trying to create a wong-style diffuser (imagine a barf bag over the top of a flash) when I had an idea. I'm not going to tell you how I did it just yet. Feel free to guess though. 

1/125 sec     f:9.0     ISO 400

It came out exactly as I had hoped it would. This is pretty much straight out of the camera. There were a few lens flares I had to fix but other than that I didn't do a whole lot of processing here. Everyone should immediately notice I broke the all important rule of thirds (omfgwtf?!). Calm down. It's going to be alright. I centered the subject because I wanted the blackness to really envelop him. Others might not agree, but I think this goes to show that rules are meant to be broken, even if only occasionally.

That's all for tonight. I'm sure I will have a hell of an earful tomorrow evening. I will be learning how to make prints tomorrow. I might go home too. So that should be an interesting blog. Goodnight everyone.

Paper is Expensive and Why am I Obsessed with Terrible Images?

This guy uses synthesizers to make some very cool music. Hope everyone likes it as much as I do. Enjoy.

I woke up today and wrote a paper. That's pretty much it really. I went to Camera Coop to have my filters replaced. Maybe I didn't tell that story. I need filters for making prints in my photography class. Well I finally got some but one of the filters had a hole in it, thus rendering it pretty useless. My professor recommend a way to fix it, but luckily Camera Coop took it back and gave me a new set. That place is great. They're always so friendly and helpful. I did drop a bit of money while I was there. Like $150 bit of money. Paper is expensive.

I was looking at Holgas today. They're poorly made, poorly contained, plastic cameras with plastic lenses. You might be asking yourself why, oh why, would I want something like that? I'll tell you. They produce images that have a heavy vignette around the edge (dark ring around the photo). The images are really soft and often have light leaks causing further distortions in the image. I cannot really explain it but something really draws me to the images it produces. I spent about two hours crawling through Holga galleries today and I couldn't really find a reason to not like the pictures. I have it on good authority that I do not need a Holga to produce such images though, so in the future I will be attempting to recreate these things digitally. Film is just so much fun though. I fear that taking pictures with my digital camera will never quite satisfy me again the way it used to. There's something magical about exposing the film, developing it, and finding out what you got. Not to mention being in the darkroom. It's soothing in there. Almost therapeutic. Magical. And expensive.

I tried to make my own grid spot last night. That's a lattice work of grids that you put in front of your flash. This makes a vignette around the image which, I think, looks very cool. The real kicker is that I always become inspired to do these things late at night when I really should be asleep or there isn't enough light outside to take pictures. It's really similar to thinking of the perfect thing to say five minutes after a conversation has ended. I always think "Hey that would be a good idea" at midnight. Why can't I have that inspiration at noon, when I have the whole day ahead of me to do it. I have even tried writing my ideas down for the next day so that I could make something out of them. I find that the next day when I look at the idea I am much less enthused about it. For some reason my creative streaks seem to happen after the sun goes down. This is less than ideal for a photographer. Some might say I could just use studio lights and such. Those are expensive and take up space. I have little space to spare, and even less money. This sucks

That's all for tonight. I'm still looking into getting photos. It seems like what I will need to do is find a bunch of pictures I want to feature and then contact all the photographers. If I get the ok from them I will start posting the pictures. I should be able to get a decent pool built up so that I can post one daily. Also, no blog tomorrow. That's edit night. Goodnight everyone.

Overexposed Negatives and Cracked Hands

If you've seen the movies 28 Days Later, 28 Weeks Later, Sunshine, or Kickass, then you've heard the wonderful music of John Murphy. This is my favorite by him. Enjoy.

I woke up today to a phone call. Admittedly, I wasn't too happy at first. As I climbed out of bed though I started to wake up and, in the long run, it worked out great. I took a shower, ate breakfast, and headed for the lab. Before I could develop I needed to shoot about a roll and a half of film. Luckily for me, the area around the lab is beautiful and full of wonderful shots. I easily went through almost two rolls. Sadly, after I developed I realized my camera's light meter had lead me to overexpose a lot of otherwise great photos. One in particular was of a vintage chevy in front of an auto repair shop. I thought it was a great shot, but the sky over the shop is completely blown out. Too bad really. Hopefully I can go back and get it again.

Another thing I noticed is that I have taken my film photography more in the direction of digital. Quite the contrary to when I started, I find myself pulling the shutter too quickly. I haven't been thinking enough about the composition. Consequently I have a lot of pictures that need to be cropped. I bought a small pocket notebook today to help me with that. I am going to start taking detailed notes about the pictures I take. Not only will this force me to think about the exposure and the composition, but also when I develop the film and am looking at it I can go back and see what I did wrong if things don't turn out. I actually did my first experiment tonight. I have been wanting to use my strobe with my film camera for a while now but I had no idea what power level the strobe should be set to. I set up a chart in which all factors were constant except the power of the strobe. I went through all the different levels, so hopefully when I develop I should have a solid base for what power level the strobe should be set to for different situations. I'm going to wake up early tomorrow and take some more pictures. I want to go to the water wall sometime but I've never been so I honestly have no idea what to expect. For some reason I am always drawn back to the park. I feel like I could go there a thousand times and never get the same picture.

Does anyone else have really dry, cracked hands? I thought it was because of the cold weather. For whatever reason, I cannot use hand sanitize anymore. It's like a million little needles stabbing my hands. I even went as far as to put lotion on the other day. Lotion! I hate that stuff, it leaves your hands slimy and nasty. I was willing to try anything though. I need to figure out what it is. The cold weather has left but my hands are still screaming at me. Any suggestions?

I have run into some issues with posting photos on here. Until I am clear about it and am able to know for certain that what I am posting is ok, I will have to postpone the pictures. I can point you in the right direction though. My first suggestion is to look up Sally Mann. I have already posted a photo by her in an earlier post, but she has many other greats. Hopefully this will suffice for now. Goodnight everyone.

Iced Tea With Lemon is Terrible and Photography is Meticulous

There are three versions of this song. The original, a remake by the Black Lips, and this version which comes from the movie Scott Pilgrim Vs. the World. This one is my favorite. Enjoy.

Work went by much faster today. I still ened up being trapped on the register for a while, but there was plenty of time on the floor as well. Not very eventful though. I spent most of the day waiting for the next hour to come around. Does that happen to anyone else? During the day time doesn't seem to move, but right at the end you're thinking "man that day flew by." That's how most of my work days are.

They say I need some rogaine to put in my hair. Working out at the gym to fit my underwear. Oakley makes the shades that transform a tool. You'd hate for the kids to think that you'd lost your cool. I eat my candy with the pork and beans. (Weezer please don't sue me).

I tried to fix the pringles can lens and, to my dismay, I cannot seem to get the glue to hold. I'm not sure if it's the particular glue I bought or if the plastic just doesn't bond well. I have some awesome glue that I love at home, so I'll pick it up next time and give it a go. The main problem with the lens as of now is that it cannot support it's own weight. Not even a little bit. If I don't hold it at all, and I mean all, times then it will fall right off the camera. I cannot have that happening, so until I have a little confidence in it it is going to sit on the desk.

I am going to try one more time tomorrow to wake up early. It's 11:26 as I write this, and I need to wake up at about 7:30. That's almost eight hours of sleep, so I should feel fine in the morning. Right? The past two nights when I tried to do that I only got about six hours of sleep. Maybe that's why I failed both times. There's only one way to find out.

To conclude tonight's short blog, here's the picture of the day, and it's a good one.

Ah, see?! I told you. Thats creative right? I have been thinking about this idea for a while, as many photographers undoubtedly have. What makes this photo stand out to me though, is that he did not make the puddle the picture. Instead, the building is the center piece and the road/puddle simply reveal that the building is a reflection. Also, notice where the yellow stripes are. Right on the thirds. Same with the top of the building. The shot is wonderfully composed, as well as exposed. There was definitely some processing in photoshop, but even so this seems like it was a great shot right out of the camera.

A thought occurred to me that I should probably be giving credit to all these nice photos I show. You can see more of this gentleman's work here.

I hope everyone had a great day. Hopefully I will be taking pictures and developing tomorrow, so I should have a nice blog for everyone. Goodnight.

Early Wake Up Fail and Flickr Why do You suck so Much?

Today's music selection was easy. Enjoy.

Wow I am tired. Today was like was almost a bizarro-Friday. Normally I wake up refreshed (I get to sleep the latest on Friday's) and ready for work. I wound up dragging myself out of bed twice, not ready to get up either time. Additionally, work usually flys by on Fridays. There is always so much to do that I don't notice the time crawling by. Today I was stuck on the register though, so I was pretty much just standing there for five hours. Pretty uneventful. Saturdays and Sundays are always busy, so hopefully the weekend will go by much faster.

The tattoo idea is still lingering in my head. I cannot seem to get rid of it. I'm still looking for someone to draw it out for me. I want to really get a good visual before I take any kind of next step. The artist will draw it out, but usually they require a nonrefundable down payment. Basically if you don't like their idea, you're out $30 - $50, if not more. So that's really not an option. Hopefully I will find someone who can draw decently and have them sketch it out for me. Then there is the million dollar question of where to put it. I know I want one on the inside of my upper right arm, but I don't know if this is the one. I cannot imagine the graphic would work well there, it's too boxy. I want to save that area for something more flowing and smooth. So again, I have no idea where to put this sucker. The forearm is really appealing to me, but I don't have the balls to put a tattoo somewhere I cannot cover it up. I know that would come back and bite me. Perhaps my chest? Back? Those are such wide canvasses that I feel like I would question the placement afterwards. Who knew this would be so difficult.

I still need to take a lot of pictures of textures and lines. I don't really know what the point of that is (I'm sure I'm missing something obvious) but I will keep forcing myself to do it. I haven't picked up the film camera in a few days now, so I really need to get on that. I also need to take it back to where I bought it so they can fix the viewing screen again. The image I see is a little cropped, so it's hard for me to compose a shot where I want the lines right on the edge of the frame. Slightly obnoxious, but not deal-breaking for a fifty dollar camera. I could have done much more damage cost wise. I have been thinking lately about higher quality film cameras. Not about getting one, but about what makes them better. I guess it's just the features they offer, but even that doesn't seem to add up. My cheapy can do as much as some of the really expensive film cameras. Maybe not as fast, maybe not as simply, but even so; it gets the job done. Is the slight difference in speed really worth all that extra money. I must have this explained to me, because I'm just not understanding.

Flickr sucked again tonight, so I will be giving everyone a photo by one of the greats. I am not in any kind of position to critique this gentleman's photo, but I can talk a little about what he did and what makes him so great.

If you don't know it instantly (perhaps a little shame on you), this is a wonderful photo by Ansel Adams. One of his most famous in fact. It's called Tetons and the Snake River. What made him such a great photographer was that he had an intimate understanding of light. It helped that he had all the time in the world, but basically what he did was walk around Yosemite (and other places) and look for 'the perfect shot'. He would see a landscape and could invision in his head what kind of light would make the perfect picture. If it was there, he would take it. If not, he would wait. And wait. And wait. He would come back day after day to find that perfect picture. Eventually, he would get it. This is really a mind set that, I feel, many photographers have gotten away from. Off camera flashes and studio lighting are great tools to have. They allow for pictures that might otherwise be impossible to capture. However, some have become completely relient on such tools, almost like crutches. They walk around with blinders, missing all the photos that are laid out naturally right in front of them. That's not who I want to be in my career. I want to learn to see light like Ansel Adams did. Maybe one day (with plenty of luck).

I am going to go to sleep now with the perhaps somewhat foolish idea of waking up early and taking pictures. Goodnight everyone.

Contact Prints and Pringles Lens?

Good evening everyone. How about some gansta rap tonight? You know, because I'm so thug. Enjoy

If you listened to that, congrats. My roommate sang nearly every lyric perfectly. A little concerning.

I learned how to make contact prints today. That's where you take all your negatives and lay them on photo paper. Then you hit it with light and it makes a print of all your negatives, that way you can look at them and decide which ones you want to print. It was the first time I was able to work in the actual dark room. Unfortunately, we only learned how to make contact sheets, we didn't learn how to actually print. It's a little frustrating since we would have today if it weren't for my school panicing and shutting down when it got a little chilly. Lame. Oh well, only one more week. I'll have to keep myself busy by developing film and making more contact sheets in the mean time. Only three weeks until my first critique (that's like the test) so I suppose the more negatives I have to choose from the better.

On another photography related note, I made a pringle lens tonight. That's exactly what you think it is, a lens from a pringles can. Well, basically it's a lens inside a pringles can, turned backwards, so that you can take pictures of things supper close up. No pictures tonight because it's not quite finished. Also, it makes me pretty nervous having a pringles can attached to my camera, so I am trying to limit the amount of time it spends on it. Once I can really get the technique down though I will try and post some pictures for everyone to see. The problem with being that close to something is that all the depth of field goes out the window. I will need to find some objects that are nearly flat in order to get any worth while pictures from it. Perhaps on money. That might be interesting.

I almost passed out today in philosophy. She was doing that thing again where she spends thirty minutes saying the same thing ten different ways. It's almost like you understand it perfectly the first time she says it but somehow in the end you are confused. Feature writing was great though. We had another guest speaker and she was terrific. Her entire lecture was full of enthusiasm, not to mention she had a lot of great advice on how to interview people. I'm probably going to e-mail her, mostly because I need a follow up for the story we're writing on her, but also because I genuinely have a ton of questions. Anything you asked her she could bang out an answer really quick, like she didn't have to think about it at all.

Alright, flickr really made me work for this one. I honestly must have a solid three hours invested in finding this picture, so I hope you all like it as much as I do.

I discovered that the blog has been cropping the images, but I can fix it. So hopefully in the near future I can get some better images. There really isn't a lot to say about this picture except that it's beautiful. I love night photography; it makes everything so mystical and fantastic. There's something to be said about people who do it well. I only wish they would have fixed the perspective so the building wasn't leaning back. Maybe they didn't have a tilt-shift lens, but photoshop can pretty easily fix that. Too bad.

That's all for tonight. I'll talk with you all tomorrow.

My Mouth Hurts and Gels

I'm jamming to Weezer right now and you should be too. Enjoy.

I had to go to the dentist today. They took off my temporary crown and replaced it with the permanent one. This was supposed to make the pain stop, but it is still a little sensitive. Hopefully within the next few days I stop noticing it. I have been living with that toothache for so long now that it almost seems like a part of my life. I cannot wait for it to be gone.

I bought some color correction gels for my strobe today. For those of you who do not know, light gives off different color temperature. In other words, the light in the shade is much cooler than direct sunlight. Because the light from the strobe is a different color than light from say, a desk lamp, I cannot use them together. That's where the gels come in. If you place a colored gel over the strobe, it color corrects it to the correct temperature. This means my white balance looks good and I don't have any orange or green things in the picture. I haven't used them extensively yet, but maybe in the future I will post some shots with and without the gels so you guys (and girls) can see what the heck I am talking about.

I love Pandora Radio. To me, it is one of the greatest websites out there. Type in an artist or a song you're fond of and bam, Pandora introduces you to a slew of artist and songs that you will potentially like. The best station I have ever created is my Clint Mansell station. I have reached my monthly listening limit on three separate occasions due to that station. Additionally, I have thumbs upped and downed hundreds of songs to the point where it is extremely rare to get a song I do not like on that station. Needless to say, this golden station did not happen over night. I broke Pandora two days ago. I decided I would start a Cage the Elephant station, mostly because I have been listening to their new album quite a bit. Something wonderful (and possibly magical?) happened. Almost every song that came from that station was gold. Cage the Elephant, The Red Hot Chili Peppers, Cake, Beck, Bush, The Offspring, Queens of the Stone Age, Blink-182, and as I write this Johnny Cash is playing. Anyone who frequently uses Pandora knows that even on the stations that are extraordinarily catered to your taste, stinkers get thrown in there every once in a while. I have had a couple, but honestly, there is so much gold pouring out of this station the ones that are mediocre are easily forgiven. So that's how I broke Pandora.

I took a lot of pictures tonight. In my residence hall there was a record breaking competition. Not real records. It was actually more just a contest to see who could do what. In any case, I took many pictures of the event. Most of them are pretty noisy because it was not the best lit room and I needed to capture action shots (so the ISO had to be cranked up a bit). Again, for those of you less familiar with cameras, when you are in low light situations you sometimes have to make the sensor (the thing in the camera that records the image) more sensitive to light. This makes your picture much brighter, but consequently you get something called noise. It looks a bit like this.

All those little specs are what I'm talking about. Boo on this picture too for smacking her right in the center. We all know better than that by now right? Right.

I suppose I should talk a bit about Snowpocalypse II. That's right, there's going to be another blizzard in Houston. At least you'd think there was going to be. I don't care how panicky people get as long as they don't cancel school again. That would be the second week in a row I had missed my photography class, and I want to print bad.

I thought today I would post a food photo so I could ruin food photography for you all.

Mmmmmmm, looks tasty doesn't it? Well forget about it. First off: it's cold. And stale. And probably hasn't been preserved in hours. Unfortunately, most food you see in pictures is supposed to look good, not taste good. For shine, baby oil is usually misted onto the product. And those lovely steam wisp you see that make the product look nice and hot; guess again. That's pure cigarette smoke baby. I like my steaks smokey, but not that smokey (get it).

Anyway, just a few things to think about the next time you see that delicous meal on TV or in a magazine. Bon appetit.

Insert Clever Title Here and Why I Will Not be Blogging on Tuesdays

I have decided that Tuesdays are going to be my days off. It is a bit tiresome to write one of these every night. Because I am already taking two Tuesdays off every month, I am going to give myself the other two off as well. Maybe this will mean Wednesday's blogs will be much longer.

I have not forgotten about the Pandora story. Look forward to that. Also, I will continue to post daily music and photos, even on Tuesdays.

So, as always, Enjoy.

Lacking Inspiration and Tattoos

What's that you say? More RHCP? Ask and ye shall receive. Enjoy.

Really nothing exciting to report today. Finally made some phone calls I have been meaning to make, as well as neglected others. My refund check will be available on Friday, which is amazing considering I need some extra funds. This photography class is becoming super expensive. Fifteen dollars every week (at least) on film. Not to mention I will begin printing soon and that will require even more for paper. AND I still do not have the $80 filters I need to print. Wonder where that money is going to come from. Oh well, it always seems to turn up when I need it, interestingly enough.

I reread the Apology today because I have a quiz over it tomorrow. Last semester, that never would have happened. I perhaps would have just picked it up tonight in order to cram for tomorrow. I couldn't tell you where all my motivation has come from lately but for whatever reason I just seem to always find the time I never could before. Or maybe I fill my time with productive things rather than time wasters. I don't bring my laptop to class anymore either, so even if the professor is painfully dry, I still have to pay attention. Funny how the little things that I never thought were big deals added up to really hurt me. I still find it a pain to write, but I'm not sure that will ever change.

I need to finish up shooting the roll of film I am on as well as shoot another roll. I am trying to avoid my typical park hangout (as much as I love it) just so I can have some variety across the board. There are some pretty nice places near where I go to school. I just need to drag myself out of my comfort zone and go to them. Also, I need to visit the local museums. I have to write reviews on something like seven different exhibits by the end of my class. Maybe that's not as hard as I think it is, but as of now it seems impossible. I can only think of two places where I can see photography exhibits. Both of them do not change their exhibits very often, so I don't really know how I will make it to seven before the end of the semester. I'm sure she wouldn't assign it if it was impossible though.

Alright. I had a tattoo idea last night when I left you. If any of you already know what a camera obscura is, then bravo to you. If you don't, I won't hold it against you. They're not common today, but interestingly enough it is a key invention in the photography time line. Here's what it looks like.

Simple enough right? When light passes through a small opening into a light tight box, a focused image is formed inverted on the wall of the box. Add a lens for a sharper focus and some sort of light sensitive material to the wall and you've got yourself a camera. You're asking yourself "What does this have to do with a tattoo?" Well, for a while I have had the idea of some sort of timeline tattoo, chronicling the changes of a certain item over the decades. I still like that idea, but I don't think it would work well with cameras since the early versions are so drastically different from today's (and the basic forms we know today vary so little that a tattoo wouldn't properly capture the minute details). So I thought to myself, what if I combined the simplest form of a camera with the most complex camera of today (kind of). Maybe not the most complex camera, but a DSLR. Anyway, if you can picture it, it would be similar to the image above but instead of a candle, I'd have a DSLR. I think it's a pretty cool concept, but like all things worth doing, it's worth taking my time and doing it right. Before I put anything permanently on my body I need to make sure it fits all my criteria. At the moment I think this one meets everything except the time table. I figure if when I have the funds to get it, and the image I want thoroughly laid out, I'll start doing my research on where I want to get it done.

Time for the photo of the day.

Please tell me you noticed something right off the bat. Perhaps that rule of thirds I keep harping about. Both her and her reflection are beautifully placed right on those lines. Once you start looking for that you'll find it everywhere. Advertising, TV shows, and Movies all use it. Probably because it works. Your eyes do not fall naturally to the center of the screen, but rather, to interesting subject matter around it. I like that it is in black and white. What would color have really added to the picture other than a distraction? Aslo, the black and white allows for the awesome contrast between her face and hair as well as her face and her shirt. Then again, I have been following her for a while on flickr, and she really doesn't take bad pictures. Or at least she doesn't post them.

Well I'm off to bed. Tomorrow I will tell you the story of how I broke Pandora and tricked it into only playing songs I like. 

DIY Lens and Hours in Photoshop

Fasten your seat belts, this is going to be a quick one. As always, enjoy some nice music while you read.

Today was a pretty normal day. Woke up, went back to sleep, begrudgingly woke up again, took a shower, went to work, came home, spent two hours on flickr. The usual.

I did also spend a little bit of time going through the DIY photo archives. I managed to find an interesting post about how to make your own lens out of any concave or convex pieces of glass. Daily readers will know that I happen to be the proud owner of a very nice piece of concave glass, so wouldn't you know it I decided to make my own lens. The images are fuzzy and allow me to take some pretty neat macro shots, but I need to tweak the finished product a bit more before I post any pictures I'm willing to put my name on.

Additionally, I spent quite a few hours in photoshop tonight. I wasn't doing anything inparticular, just typing random words into google and seeing what images came up. If I was inspired I would make something. Here is one of my creations.

My roommate affectionately named it Barrack O'thulu. Two guesses why.

I heard I missed a football game today? Probably nothing exciting.

As per the new segment here is a flickr photo I found interesting tonight.

Talk about being in the right place at the right time. This photo has the rule of thirds we talked about yesterday covered, as well as all the parallels paralleled. The little girl in pink really draws your eye. I will admit that her looking up at the man does make this photo seem a little too perfect. Perhaps it was staged, but I prefer to think that someone happened to be in exactly the right place at exactly the right time. Call me naive. It is cropped a little since I have to take screen shots of these. Flickr is a little funny about people yanking their images. Hope you all enjoy it anyway.

Told you this would be a quick one. It's back to photoshop for me. Goodnight everyone

Wedding Photography and Why I will Die at 30

It's a RHCP kind of night. Enjoy.

I'm going to die at thirty. Don't worry, I've accepted it. I just love Whataburger catchup so much. The problem is, it's so much better when you dump a salt packet in there. That's right, a whole salt packet. It's delicious, really. I wouldn't lie to you. Consequently though, I will die in about ten years.

Moving on. I was thinking today about wedding photography. I am by no means good enough (nor well enough equipped) to photograph weddings, but perhaps once I have more of a portfolio built up I can be an assistant for someone. I would even do it for free, I just want to learn and get the experience so that one day I would be abe to do it myself. I think it's something really special to capture that day for someone, not to mention there is plenty of money to be had. I definitely do not want to make a career out of it, but I think it would be an interesting thing to do for a while. 

On another photography related note, I still love my new lens so much. Everything I want to be in focus is perfectly sharp, while everything I was to be blurry is super creamy. It's a wonderful feeling to have so much control over the image right out of the camera. If I could only better my composition I feel like I would be on the road to true creativity. My problem, as of late, is that I cannot seem to figure out what should and should not be included in the image. Later on when I look at the pictures I always seem to be saying to myself "Well why did you put that in the photograph?" or "That sure would have looked better taken from down low". It's a shame really, because it's probably the biggest thing holding me back from getting some great shots. Oh well, I guess no one learns in a day.

Interesting lady at work today. On our particular credit card machine you must push 'cancel' to process the transaction as credit. When you press enter (like you would at some other stores) the machine makes a 'anh' noise, almost like if it were correcting a dog or a child. Well I am am checking this woman out and all of the sudden I hear 'anh' 'anh' 'anh' 'anh' 'anh' 'anh' 'anh' 'anh'. This lady is just going nuts all over the enter button. I asked her if she wanted to run it as credit and told her that if she did she would need to press cancel rather than enter. Her reply? "No it's enter!" I stood there watching her for a moment listening to the machine scolding her before she finally decided to try cancel, to which the machine responded. She then proceeded to tell me that it was stupid and that they shouldn't have changed since last week. I just let her have that one. Crazy lady.

I was reflecting on my blog title today and realized I don't really post daily photos. The music is covered, but not enough photos. I figure since I spend about two hours on the flickr explore page every night I will start posting a photo from it and talk about what makes it a good photo (or what I like at least). Go!

Alright, so what do I like about this image, or rather, why did it stand out among the hundred or so I looked at before it. The first thing that caught my eye is that the car isn't dead center. The rule of thirds basically says that you divide the frame up into thirds horizontally and vertically. Where the lines cross is where the subject of interest should be. In our case, right where that ferrari is parked. Second off you 'll noticed that he paralleled is parallels. The street lamp and the line in the building make a nice cross section opposing the car. Thirdly, the car is a nice blue color against the other wise drab background. A black or white car would not have made this picture as well as the colored car did.

I don't really know how many people read this, but hopefully this new bit will be at least a little interesting to those of you that do. That's going to be all for tonight.

Closing Work Early and a Different Room

This just happens to be what is on as I type this. I like it, and the video it is set to is pretty powerful as well. Enjoy.

Have you ever found yourself deviating from a schedule that you are so engrained in that you have no idea what to do with yourself? That was me a few hours ago. My workplace decided to close early due to the blizzard, and as such I found myself home two and a half hours early, having not the slightest inspiration to do anything. I moved from one website to another, one corner of my room to another, looking for something to occupy myself with. I found nothing, however, because I felt so out of place. I shouldn't have been home that early, and my mind was kind of weirded out I suppose. Getting off early was a nice break though.

Perhaps inspired by the lack of inspiration, I decided to finally move my room around. I have been wanting to position my desk against my far wall so that when I needed a wall backdrop for pictures the wall I would use would be vacant. I need to only move several chairs now and I am ready to go. Additionally, when the curtain is open at the right time of day the sunlight falls right onto my new backdrop, providing some nice, natural light. I only took a few self-portraits tonight, but I have some more ideas in store for the future.

Ever since I used photoshop to turn my roommate into an olympian I have had a burning desire to make all sorts of creations with it. The harder the task, the better. I have this idea where I put my strobe into the microwave (not while it's on of course) and crack the door a little so that the light just creeps out. I would love for this to make like a beam of light. Then, miniature versions of myself and my roommate would be looking in, perhaps even walking into it. In photoshop I could make some shimmering lights or some vines growing out of it. I don't really know yet, I just have the picture so vividly in my head.

I have so many ideas in my head for what I believe would be great photographs, I just cannot seem to put them into the camera quite yet.

Short blog today, mostly because I am tired. Also, when I spend most of my day at work there aren't a whole lot of eventful things for me to talk about. I'll leave you with the finished product of all the self-portraits I took tonight. Hope you enjoy it.

Heavy Eyelids and Epic Snowstorms

I first heard this band (as many of you probably unknowingly did) during the Winter Olympics last year. Their song "Intro" was featured on a commercial with Apollo Ohno skating in a circle around the rink, eventually cutting the ice into a spinning disk. Anyway, enjoy the song.

Today, as many of my Thursdays are, was long. I woke up early to find myself wandering through the blistering cold with a few of the other editors. The school paper was ready this morning and we had to distribute it to all the drop spots on campus. One spot in particular rest on and area called the seal. It is in the middle of a walkway almost everyone takes to class, so it works out great as far as handing out papers goes. However, any time there is inclement weather (like today) it can be pretty miserable. Luckily, I was saved by the bell and had to run to class.

Philosophy, despite my initial thoughts on the class, is becoming quite exciting for me. We have been reading Plato's five dialogues (which are about Socrates) and I find myself absolutely enthralled. Socrates always seems to know exactly what to say and when to say it, an admirable quality to say the least. I have never doubted my decision to pursue a Theology minor until now. I have had three Theology classes as of my current standing, but I decided to take my Philosophy courses before finishing the minor. I am really glad I did because I might be changing my mind, especially if I am as interested in the other famous philosophers as I am in Socrates.

Feature writing was exciting as always. Well, for myself at least. I know some people are less interested in it. I just find features so fascinating. They're the most creative part of the newspaper. You're still providing news by giving all the important facts about what is or is not happening, but you do it by painting a vivid picture and evoking emotions in the reader. I think good feature writing is the key to good writing in general; if you can write a thoroughly descriptive story without being biased, you've truly done something special.

Classes were canceled today because of the epic snowstorm we had. You don't remember that? Me either.

Not knowing whether or not my Photography class was canceled (it is located on a different campus than my university) I decided to take a trip to the school and find out. Turns out they cancel classes just the same as my university, so I did not learn how to make contact sheets like I'd hoped I would. No matter, I was able to develop another two rolls of film. I still cannot seem to grasp framing. With my DSLR it was always so easy to just crop out unwanted factors in the image. In fact, in photoshop you can fix just about anything you don't want in a picture. Aside from just taking a stinker to begin with, digital photography is pretty forgiving. All I can hope is that my new found care in taking photo's will transfer to my digital photography, and rather than having to fix bad photos to make them look good I will just be making good photos better.

On a completely different, but I suppose somewhat artistic note, I have been putting more thought lately into a tattoo. It seems strange to me to be contemplating something potentially very expensive in a time when my money is definitely not over flowing from my bank accounts, but none the less, my mind continually wonders back to the subject. I know I want one, and I know where. My problem continually lies in what I want to get. At this point in my life there is honestly nothing I am passionate enough about to have permanently tattooed onto my body. I know they can be removed (kind of) and that by the time I'm older and likely to regret it there will probably be an even more sophisticated and painless way to remove them, but even so. The idea is just so permanent, and I wouldn't want to do it unless I was sure. The problem I keep having is when I finally do decide on something, I think about it so much that I am no longer interested in it. Kind of like saying a word over and over again until the word loses meaning and you're just focusing on the form itself. Perhaps if that happens then the tattoo wasn't the right one, but I start to wonder if that would happen with any idea, no matter how strongly I felt about it. The most important thing for me is that it have a significant amount of meaning. I'm not getting it for anyone else, so I don't care if it does not send a clear message, just so long as I know what it means.

Things to think about. Goodnight everyone.

Snowpocalypse and Why I Missed a Day

I'm not a huge fan of this band, but I thought I would give you a video from them. Enjoy this music from the Broken SNOWcial scene.

Yesterday was pretty busy. I have class from 9:35 - 10:50, and then another from 11:00 to 12:15. Those are the only two classes I have on Tuesdays, so they're usually pretty uneventful. Luckily for me, my new lens came in! It is everything I had imagined it would be. I can take pictures with almost no light and the background is always suuuuuper creamy. Amazing build quality and amazing pictures.

The excitement reminded my roommate of a promise I had made to him about photoshopping abs onto his body. Honestly that isn't as gay as it sounds. Last week he had seen some picture of a guy who had done something similar, except it was an absolutely terrible job. The abs were not proportional to the body and had been way blown up. This resulted in him having four large blobs on his abdomen. Needless to say, not what he was going for. I had told my roommate I could do a better job so he issued a simple challenge: Do it.

I'm sure you can guess what happened from there. I snapped a few quick pictures and spent the next two hours working some photoshop magic. Now the picture will never look entirely real simply because the light sources don't match up, but I think all things considered I did a pretty good job. Here's the finished product:

So what do you think? Pretty convincing eh? That's because they're real. This is what Zumba can do for you.

Later on the same night, I had to finish my layout for the school paper. My section, features, only had three stories but this was my first time doing things by myself. Turns out it wasn't so hard, mostly just time consuming. Making all the text and pictures fit just right seemed to take forever.

As the night went on more people showed up. Pizza and good times were had. Somehow we ended up starting this game where you put snow in other words. I think 'Snowpocalypse is what started it, and then SNOWtorious B.I.G. set the whole thing in motion. Three hours later there was a thread on one of the editor's fb that had two hundred snow word post. Some of my favorites were "Snowgasm, Snowkemon, Snowto Baggins, Supersnowva, and Snowtocol. 

That's honestly about all that happened. I was editing all night so I ened up not writing a blog. Since there are two edit nights every month I suppose I will be missing at least two blogs each month, but I don't think anyone will be too terribly upset about that.