When I have sex with someone I forget who I am. For a minute I even forget I’m human. It’s the same thing when I’m behind a camera. I forget I exist.
— Robert Mapplethorpe
Please keep in mind that this post is more than 6 years old. Who the hell knows what I was thinking back then?! Damn kids... get off my lawn!
12 weeks.
I took Jenny’s advice and called the head of repair at Penn. He returned my call within about half an hour, after checking with the factory. They apparently had been waiting on backordered parts. But given the length of time so far, he says they’re trying to replace it instead, at the same price as the repair.
On one hand… nice. On the other, it makes me nervous. The quality difference between one lens and the next, even of the exact same model, can vary. And I loved the quality I got out of the original. Tack sharp with saturated colors.
We’ll see. Nothing certain yet, anyway.
Please keep in mind that this post is more than 6 years old. Who the hell knows what I was thinking back then?! Damn kids... get off my lawn!
We’re going on 7 weeks since I dropped off my broken lens at Penn Camera to be fixed. So I thought I would bug them again since I was out running errands. The promised me a week ago they would call Tamron and check on it, and call me. Never happened.
“oh… yes… let me call them… I’ll call you later when I hear back. Really.”
They did call this time. “Tamron sent us an estimate. But we didn’t get it. But now we know. So…”
So it can be repaired. But really… how fucking hard is it to remember to follow up on something you’re getting paid for? Either company. “We asked for an estimate a month and a half ago… I wonder where it is?” Or… “We got this lens sitting here. Not sure what to do with it ‘cuz we asked these guys what they wanted, like… a month ago!”
Please keep in mind that this post is more than 6 years old. Who the hell knows what I was thinking back then?! Damn kids... get off my lawn!
It’s come up in several discussions with friends that they don’t always bring their cameras into questionable areas, or places they could get damaged. It’s reasonable. But for myself, my choice was always to bring the camera just about anywhere. I’d rather run the risk — especially since these are often the more interesting situations — and get some great shots. Cameras can be repaired, but moments can’t be relived.
Though honestly I wasn’t too worried about having my camera out in a nice hotel room in downtown Atlanta. But even so, while at Dragon*Con, a rather large, solid, intoxicated man landed on me, and knocked my camera to the ground.
A 3 month old lens. Ultra-wide angle, so not exactly cheap. By the next morning, when I went to pick up the camera, I noticed the lens body separating into two pieces. And it’s been getting slowly worse ever since. As of this afternoon, the auto-anything was dead. I couldn’t zoom, and it was still sagging.
Took it into Penn. $150 estimated repair, though that’s just their average for this kind of lens. 4 to 6 weeks wait. And even then, I won’t be surprised if it’s not salvageable.
Eh. I’m not really too upset. I did get plenty of wonderful shots that night with the lens. And none of the damage was intentional. Even in his drunken state, the first thing the guy worried about was wether he’d damaged the camera. It sucks, but life goes on.
Please keep in mind that this post is more than 6 years old. Who the hell knows what I was thinking back then?! Damn kids... get off my lawn!
Okay… so I’ve now had my camera strap from My Funky Camera for about a month now. (See previous post on this topic). I’ve had one photo shoot, and a long weekend trip that is probably my most intensive camera use each year. And to give it the highest possible praise, I can just say that during those events and most other times, I never really thought about the strap.
I never worried that it would break. I never worried that it would damage the camera. I never worried that it would slip. I never worried that it would get in the way.
I never had to think about it.
Don’t get me wrong, it still looks good. And given the construction, I expect that will last for quite a while. At the absolute least, I don’t look like a walking billboard for a camera company. And it stores well in my camera bag.
My only thought now is that I wish I had the wrist strap as well, since I so often simply wrap my neck strap around my wrist to secure it. Will have to give this serious consideration.
I do wish there were a couple less girly imprint options. It doesn’t need to be guns or bikinis or beer bottles or anything. But maybe a few without lovebirds or pink polka dots on them? That, plus a little more detail on their website, and I’d be happy.
Please keep in mind that this post is more than 6 years old. Who the hell knows what I was thinking back then?! Damn kids... get off my lawn!
Picked up a new toy, this week. Well, I picked up several, but this one is my favorite so far — a new camera strap.
The old strap — from Epic Software — itself was holding up fine. But the connectors for attaching it to the camera were failing one-by-one. The smallest leather straps actually snapped less than a week after I got the strap. But not big loss. I just merged a couple of the metal bits. But in the last month or so, the larger leather straps have been failing as well. One is already gone. And while I CAN again just merge a couple metals connectors, I lose the capability for the strap to swivel, so it inevitably becomes twisted. And the last leather connector gets worse every day. Every time I grab the camera out of the bag, I cringe and wait for it to snap.
And even if I was willing to live with that, because I’m now down to metal bits connecting the strap to the camera, it has been scratching the hell out of my camera body. While I’ve never been one to baby my equipment, I don’t feel the need to purposely deface it either.
Older cameras just had small swivel points with just a single small hole in them for mounting a strap. So ring connectors made sense. But newer cameras almost universally have slots for attaching straps. These nylon strap connections are less damaging, more flexible, and usually last longer.
But since I had neither the thin straps nor the sewing machine to attach them, I just went looking for a new strap. Can’t stand the straps you find at most camera stores or online shops. They’re all either flat black straps, or the come with the manufacture’s name emblazoned on them in bright, bold 150pt type. But almost no one makes more interesting straps. Epic’s straps were great looking… very retro. But I wasn’t interested in going through the same problems again. A little searching, though, and I finally found My Funky Camera. A woman who apparently buys the parts and makes her own straps — neck or wrist. Thy sounded pretty good, and I found some good reviews online. Her website is a bit lacking in details, but I figured it was worth the minor risk. My order arrived yesterday. Initial impression: I was impressed. It was actually made of much sturdier material than I expected. And it did indeed have the nylon attaching straps. I’m dubious about how long the extra neck padding will last, but it looks good right now, and could be easily removed later. It fit easily only to the camera. It looks great. I have a shoot tomorrow, and a major trip coming up in a couple weeks, so I will be putting it though it’s paces.
Please keep in mind that this post is more than 6 years old. Who the hell knows what I was thinking back then?! Damn kids... get off my lawn!
While looking at pictures of a photographer who recently died, I notice in dozens of photos, he is never holding a camera. Old pictures of photographers… say… 1800s through approximately 1960s, when you saw a “candid” picture of a photographer, they had a camera in their hands or in front of them. But now? Not so much.
Please keep in mind that this post is more than 6 years old. Who the hell knows what I was thinking back then?! Damn kids... get off my lawn!
I was looking at the shadows as I walked back from getting lunch today. I noticed the difference in shadows between the tree leaves verses unnatural structures, like signs and buildings and stuff. It eventually occurred to me, the shapes of the light through the tree leaves amounted to a natural occurring bokeh effect. It wasn’t something I had heard of before. And google searches don’t turn up much.
But if you look up pinhole cameras on wikipedia, you find out that Aristotle and Euclid both wrote about tree-filtered light being essentially pin-hole camera technology.
So I’m only a few millennia behind the curve.
Please keep in mind that this post is more than 6 years old. Who the hell knows what I was thinking back then?! Damn kids... get off my lawn!
I went ice skating last night, for Sarah’s birthday. Which was fun, itself. I haven’t really skated much since grade school. And I got my balance fairly quickly. Never once did I fall on my face. But that’s mostly because I stopped myself by smashing into the wall, shoulder first. It must have been a minor spectacle, because everyone looked at me like I was crazy. I suppose the fact that it shattered the front of my skate didn’t help much. I’m still a bit sore today, but mostly when I stretch or sneeze. No great pulsating bruises or anything fun like that.
Bad this week: My power adapter for my laptop choosing to die for no particular reason. It worked just well enough to keep the computer running, but not to charge the battery. But…
Good this week: Apple replaced the adapter under warranty in less than 24 hours.
Also good this week: Dave and Shannon helping me to get a new web server up and running. I’m hoping to put all my clients who ask for help finding a server on there. Not only does it give me a bit more control and a LOT more options, but I could concievably make a little money off it. Not much, but every little bit adds up.
And recent “meh”: I picked up a free external camera flash from the freecycle mailing list. a REALLY nice flash. Tilt, swivel, programmable, fill flash, etc. About 23 years newer than my current flash. And it powered up just fine. But… despite being only a couple years old, it was never built to handle digital cameras. So while it would focus and program itself just fine, it refuses to fire.
Poo.
For now I’m holding onto it. First, I don’t know anyone who shoots film anymore that doesn’t already have better equipment. And since it can be slaved, it can still act as a secondary flash. Plus, one of my goals is to get a Canon AE-1 to play with. Ought to work fine with that.
Please keep in mind that this post is more than 6 years old. Who the hell knows what I was thinking back then?! Damn kids... get off my lawn!
Thanks to Stephanie, I went to the ‘yardsale’ the Washington Photography School was holding this weekend. I could have gotten in a lot of trouble there… but I generally behaved myself.
I picked this camera up as soon as I saw it. I’ve been wanting to try out some Through the Viewfinder photography, and the glass on this camera’s viewfinder was in perfect condition, and huge. (Yes, yes, I was looking for a nice piece of glass).
Every piece of identification has been removed from the camera. All nameplates remove. There’s been some painting on the top, I think. But from what I can tell, the body, at least, is a 1928 Rolleiflex Original. But the viewfinder housing doesn’t match up. The body and lenses are such a dead-on match, though, that I have to assume this is either a poorly documented varient, or a well-done mod-job. (All future versions of the Rolleiflex changed distinctly, so it’s not one of them).
I haven’t gone out with it yet. Just tortured pixel with a few pictures.
Besides that, for myself I just picked up a couple polarizers and some color filters.
But oh… so much temptation.
Please keep in mind that this post is more than 6 years old. Who the hell knows what I was thinking back then?! Damn kids... get off my lawn!
All Stephanie’s fault:
Please keep in mind that this post is more than 6 years old. Who the hell knows what I was thinking back then?! Damn kids... get off my lawn!
Please keep in mind that this post is more than 6 years old. Who the hell knows what I was thinking back then?! Damn kids... get off my lawn!
Please keep in mind that this post is more than 6 years old. Who the hell knows what I was thinking back then?! Damn kids... get off my lawn!
I am a bit behind on my photography, in general. My pictures on strangeday are months out of date, though I keep my flickr account much fresher. And I spent much of the afternoon and evening going through about 8 months of photographs, (at a complete guess – 5,000 photos?), to find some for developing/printing. When I first got into digital photography, I pretty strictly kept only digital copies; the idea being of course that you could print off a new copy at any time. But maybe a year or so back, I sorted through my collection of film photographs. I can’t remember how many their were, offhand. Maybe 3 or 4 thousand? But I do remember the feeling looking at those glossy physical prints, that you just can’t replicate on screen. It’s so much more saturated, so clean, so real. So between that feeling, and the always possible coming of the end of civilization (half joking), I figured it was in my best interest to start having a selection of my digital photos printed once enough had accumulated. Today, I sent off 102 pictures to Kodak.
This batch of photos I went through today also spanned my shift from shooting in JPEG format to shooting in RAW format. In simple terms, it’s just a matter of what format the camera saves your files in. In JPEG mode, the camera interprets the image it captures based on some standard settings, and saves a reasonably sized image to the memory card. In RAW mode, the camera doesn’t interpret anything; but instead dumps the raw data onto the memory card to be interpreted later, presumably by your computer.
RAW vs. JPEG: The most direct benefit for me in shooting RAW was the amount of control I gained over my images. While you should always come up with the best shot possible before pressing the button, when you shoot RAW, you can always go back later and make technical corrections to the image. All those indoor pictures that always come out a bit orange? No problem. Underexposed your picture? No problem. Contrast? Channel Noise? Vignetting? No problem. You are just manipulating the same pixels, one way or another. But the two great benefits to doing the changes to a RAW file are 1) It’s so much simpler. If I want to adjust the white balance to get ride of a color cast, it only involves choosing from a pull-down menu of presets or using a slider. Exposure? Another single slider. And so on. Whereas much of the work on any other format image is done through the magic of curves and levels, which are practically black magik by comparison. And 2) When you’re working from the data in a RAW file, you have an unadulterated image to start with. You usually apply all your desired changes, and only then render a completed image. A JPEG on the other hand has already been interpreted and rendered once by your camera, without much feedback from you. Should you need to correct it, you’ll be saving again and introducing additional compression and artifacts each time. (Every time you save a JPEG, you lower its quality by varying amounts.) So RAW files are easier and higher quality. And while it may be all in my mind, I feel like I can correct a greater range of issues in RAW, that I might have been forced to give up on if they were a JPEG.
Looking through the photos today, I realized that there was a distinct and sudden improvement in the quality of my images at the exact moment I switched to shooting in RAW. To start with, you can never underestimate the importance of realistic color in photographs. While I’ve seen so many poorly colored images that they don’t really stand out any more, when I watch such an image being color corrected, there’s an instant when the image suddenly pops, and you just know this is the color it was meant to be. Color correction got to be much more important after I bought my 50mm f1.8 lens last year. The selling point for me with this lens was that I could take so many more pictures without a flash. But taking non-flashed images in those kinds of situations where you’d normally use a flash, you almost always end up with a color cast, (simply: it looks like you’re viewing the photo through a thin sheet of colored acetate). I kind of wonder if the sudden freedom from having to worry so strongly about color in my images let me spend more time thinking about a good composition, too?
Of course, this was at the same time I had the sensor on my camera cleaned. All the dust on my sensor was very disheartening. Going through photos after a shoot always involved trying not to cringe at all the black spots. And more time was spent removing the blemishes from the photos than anything else. Again, it’s very freeing to no longer have to worry about that.
I will say though, that for all the benefits of digital photography, I keep remembering something I saw in a Gary Winograd documentary. They mentioned that he tended to sit on his film for a while before doing anything with it. He’d leave it for up to a year after shooting it, to get some emotional distance from the pictures. He supposedly didn’t want his mood from the shoot — good or bad — to affect his decisions on what was a quality image. In my recent work, where this has come back to me the most is from the fashion photo shoot. I spent two days going through about 900 photos, just to get something out there for people. I never claimed they were all the best images. They were actually just the “ones that didn’t suck”. But every time I go back through them for something new, I find myself winnowing them down, and casually reassesing what I think are the best. Not to mention, my color correction is substantially better when I’m working on limited sets or individual photos, rather than the obscenely large original batch. I occassionally wince and pray that the models and others don’t think I was really so sloppy. Every time, I fight off the urge to go back and edit the set down to just the best; because in this particular case, I think it’s more important to offer a large batch of raw materials to the people involved, than to massage my ego.
I love my photographs. I definitely consider photography to be an art form. But for me it’s all about capturing that perfect moment and freezing a memory in place. I love situational photography so much more than still or posed work, because you’re really grabbing something out of the air and making it permanant. I have plenty of art on my walls that I find beautiful and inspirational. But only the photographs make me smile. (Especially Heavy Metal Heather.)
Please keep in mind that this post is more than 6 years old. Who the hell knows what I was thinking back then?! Damn kids... get off my lawn!
I’ve been away. That is to say, “not available”.
(holy fuck I’m sick of the firetrucks)
It’s been a month, and it wasn’t particularly fun. One month ago, my computer started to die. My laptop started to die. From the first glitch to the final flash of life from the screen was maybe a bit over a day. That’s plenty of time to clone the whole damn thing, and futz around with it just enough to realize I wasn’t going to save it.
But this is hardly the first time. I have a stack of repair slips so thick they barely fit in their box. This is the first time since the warranty ran out. I really couldn’t do much about it, but it kind of ticked me off that it ran out while I was in the hospital. The current machine was already over 3 years old, so no one was going to insure it. But from past experience, I knew enough to keep a backup under the desk. It wasn’t fast and it wasn’t pretty, but it was a machine, and it meant I could keep working. And that’s what I did.
When I get busy, I don’t have time to worry about fixing stuff. I work for 16 hours, just to keep up. Then I eat dinner while watching something from Netflix, and go to bed. And maybe I just don’t want to face up to the loss of my exterior brain. Right up until this week, it still sat on the corner of my desk where I always worked with it. Taking up space. Always careful not to pile too much on top of it, in case something could be done to fix it. (geek-mourning). And even when I did admit it was beyond being worth fixing, I held out. I held out for rumors of new toys and new features from Apple.
Well that didn’t fucking happen.
Do you use a laptop? Do you use one religiously? Do you use it like a laptop, and not just a slick looking desktop? A laptop takes all those second-brain features, and makes them move right along with you. A desktop is a tool. A laptop is an opportunity, a possibility.
And I had lost my laptop.
I think it took about a week before I consciously realized what crap it was working with a desktop again. What crap it was being restricted to the desk and the chair. What crap it was that my spur of the moment thoughts were all dying on the vine. And what crap it was that I had to work around my tools, and not the other way around.
And I’m not that stupid. My backup machine isn’t even as powerful as my laptop was. A laptop that was already 3 years old. This, of course, is the cue for a couple jobs involving massive, fucking photo collages to come along. If you don’t know why that sucks, just imagine cutting fire wood with a steak knife.
My taxes were done. And all hopes of new toys were dashed when Apple announced a delay in shipment for at least 4 months. So I went ahead and with the help of a friend, I ordered a new laptop.
It’s just fucking beautiful.
It’s got every bell and whistle, and a few spinning pasties, for good measure. I absolutely cannot afford it, but I absolutely cannot live or work without it. I feel like I’m back reliving good-ole-days. Relearning what worked, and why I did certain things.
And now my camera is back. My other baby had gone away too. It had served me faithfully, suffering slings and arrows and dusty rooms. I finally got sick of spending more time touching up dust marks than doing anything else with a photo, and I sent it in to be cleaned. (This was while I still had … thought I had… money.) But my second baby… she is back. I missed her.
And it feels like a new golden age of overly expensive toys. Everything is clean and snappy, and aims to please. My gawd, I’m in geek heaven.
(If you’re a real nerd, you noticed the dates and ages don’t match up, on my laptop. This is actually the third full machine in what I consider to be one computer. The first was stolen off the delivery truck. The second served me well for half its estimated life, before being replaced by the manufacturer with a newer model, after they scratched the screen fixing a error they made on a previous repair. And both machines I had in my actual possession had their guts swapped out multiple times. Five years total.)
Right… so now where was I?
Please keep in mind that this post is more than 6 years old. Who the hell knows what I was thinking back then?! Damn kids... get off my lawn!
I just came back from Artomatic. I was a bit worried with it taking place in Crystal City. Normally it takes place in abandoned buildings in run-down neighborhoods, letting them essentially do whatever they want to the building. But Crystal City is about as uptight, over-developed suburbia as you can get. But they did a good job. A ton of art, some good, some notsogood. My only regret is that there seemed to be less insane artists this year. Nobody really doing completely off-the-wall, freaky shit. Though I didn’t see much of the 8th floor… so maybe they’re all kept up there.
God damn, do I miss my camera. It’s been just shy of two weeks now, since I took it in to get it cleaned. Given that they estimated 1.5 to 2 weeks, if it isn’t back by Tuesday, I’m going to start bugging them
The freaks were out tonight, and there I was, camera-less.
Please keep in mind that this post is more than 6 years old. Who the hell knows what I was thinking back then?! Damn kids... get off my lawn!
Right on schedule, my building manager was fired today. Third one we’ve been through since I moved in here. They have a warranty only good for 2 years. At which point they’re not even serviceable. You just throw them out right away or they’ll begin to smell. Interesting timing though… since our assistant manager is due to take next month off. I sense bad things emanating from the future.
As if a premonition of todays events, I was attacked by a bus yesterday. Sitting at the bus stop in Bethesda, one of the Ride-On busses came down the highway. And the door fell off. Like that, stopping about 4 feet from me. Traveling at about 40 miles an hour, the bus continued on and ran over the door. And… kept going. Never stopped. Never came back. And there in the highway sat a bus door, in several pieces, surrounded by the traffic which had screeched to a stop around it. And we all just sort of looked at. The cars eventually moved on, and I pulled the pieces onto the sidewalk. Much as it would look really cool to see a car shred its undercarriage by hitting a giant metal frame and 4 foot long slab of glass at highway speeds… I just didn’t want to have to administer CPR. Yuppies have diseases, you know.
So, Keir, maybe the busses are working for the squirrels?
I so need a DVD burner, for backing up by photos, if nothing else. I had over 4,000 pictures in iPhoto, and burned 9 CDs just to get the archive back down under 2 gigabytes. I love my new camera. But bigger toys have bigger issues. Huge photos also mean it takes forever to copy the files off the camera using the USB cable. (An hour and a half for 200 shots). But today I found a brand-name firewire CF card reader for only 11 bucks. So I got that going for me.
So I was thinking today. And that’s always a well-known novel experience for me. Thinking about this work stuff I do. I’ve elaborated before on how much I love the control it offers. How much freedom I now have. How I now contribute, rather than leeching from the system. But as fundamental as it should have been, it never really occurred to me until this afternoon how much I like the creative part of it all. Many people go into business for themselves. Most frequently, it has to do with selling something, followed closely by offering your experience and advice in trade. But I actually create new things. Each jobs involves creating something brand new, that’s never existed before.To me, thats an incredibly fulfilling thing to be doing for a living.
So I was talking to Tonto the other day, while we walked. Earlier in the day, I had been thinking, for god knows what reason, about oral history. The method by which knowledge and history were passed along, person to person, by stories and repetitive telling. But that all kind of died out with the advent of television. Without going into the evils of TV in particular, it is true that people started spending less time together creating life, and more time in their own little world, observing a fantasy. What really struck me though, was how ‘blogs and journals are gradually starting to resurrect the idea of an oral history, albeit in written form. Message boards and journals are offering up technical answers. Memory archives hold the shared histories of families and groups. Individuals work through their past, and what it’s made of their present, right there in front of your eyes. It’s staggering, to imagine the sheer volume of memory that is online, now. And a little scary, in that so much of it tends to reside in single places, making it susceptible to loss. If the California is wiped out, the thoughts and stories of 10 million people may be lost. But the NBC homepage will be fine, thanks to colocation.
“boobies!”
(It still makes me smile.)
Please keep in mind that this post is more than 6 years old. Who the hell knows what I was thinking back then?! Damn kids... get off my lawn!
