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Showing posts with label pictures. Show all posts
Showing posts with label pictures. Show all posts
November 8, 2009
October 28, 2009
October 21, 2009
Nicholas & Jordana Taylor: First Dance
More to come as I "develop" the pictures I took at their wedding in WV. But I really like this one. Nicholas needs to do a better job shaving for big days like these ;-)
October 11, 2009
September 29, 2009
Digital Similarities
So those of you who know me know that I used to produce digital music ... techno ... or attempt to :-) It was basically a four-year process/ordeal where I tried way too hard to create music with the goal of DJing it out, getting a song signed to a label, or something along those lines. I gave it up in late 2007 right before I moved to China for various reasons, one of them being I was finding I was having to force myself to sit down at the computer and do it. I gave it up and haven't stressed out about it since.
Now I find myself getting more and more into digital photography. I downloaded a thirty-day trial of this program called Adobe Lightroom, which is essentially a digital darkroom (hence the product name) for raw image data from your camera. e.g. it gives you lots of control over how the image turns out. It also features an extensive "asset management" system, which is a fancy way of saying it helps you organize and categorize your photos to find them easier later or to share w/others (via a slideshow, web album, etc). It's such an intuitive and easy-to-use program. I opened it for the first time last week and began touching up some of my existing photos; I was able to see the results immediately, which was great positive feedback and led to me using it more and more over the weekend. I'm pretty sure I'm going to buy it when my trial period is up. Unlike a lens, it is useful in a variety of situations :-)
Then this weekend I was working in the program when I realized how similar the light histogram was to a parametric EQ. They literally are the same thing -- a graphic representation of how your photo/sound is composed of different frequencies (of light or of sound, it doesn't matter which), and which you use to adjust the particular frequency content of your material. From there a tumble of realizations came out. The whole process is the same! You generate some input data (either a picture from a camera or a sound from a synthesizer or sampler), fire up a software program or two to tweak and arrange it, combine it with others, get it just how you like it, and then you have the output data which you share with other people.
So I started thinking, why do I feel so good about photography whereas music was a struggle? Probably several reasons:
I really like the way that one turned out.
Now I find myself getting more and more into digital photography. I downloaded a thirty-day trial of this program called Adobe Lightroom, which is essentially a digital darkroom (hence the product name) for raw image data from your camera. e.g. it gives you lots of control over how the image turns out. It also features an extensive "asset management" system, which is a fancy way of saying it helps you organize and categorize your photos to find them easier later or to share w/others (via a slideshow, web album, etc). It's such an intuitive and easy-to-use program. I opened it for the first time last week and began touching up some of my existing photos; I was able to see the results immediately, which was great positive feedback and led to me using it more and more over the weekend. I'm pretty sure I'm going to buy it when my trial period is up. Unlike a lens, it is useful in a variety of situations :-)
Then this weekend I was working in the program when I realized how similar the light histogram was to a parametric EQ. They literally are the same thing -- a graphic representation of how your photo/sound is composed of different frequencies (of light or of sound, it doesn't matter which), and which you use to adjust the particular frequency content of your material. From there a tumble of realizations came out. The whole process is the same! You generate some input data (either a picture from a camera or a sound from a synthesizer or sampler), fire up a software program or two to tweak and arrange it, combine it with others, get it just how you like it, and then you have the output data which you share with other people.
So I started thinking, why do I feel so good about photography whereas music was a struggle? Probably several reasons:
- I've been practicing the process for generating pictures (photography) for the past few years, whereas I had to learn how to generate sound all from scratch, and all at once.
- I'm a visual person, and viewing photographs comes more intuitively to me than listening to music.
- I get more immediate positive feedback from photography, because I see the faces and places that I shoot and that triggers memories.
- Pictures are more easily accessible to your average person than a techno track :-) Which means I can share photos with everyone, the whole world, whereas w/music the only people who really cared were other friends of mine who were techno DJs.
- I am coming to this on my own terms (more naturally/holistically) instead of the rush & stress I put myself through w/digital music (e.g. get rich & famous as a techno DJ). In fact the whole reason I bought this laptop was to make music! How quickly that went away, haha.
- I tried to do way too much too quickly w/digital music. I tried to not only learn how to generate and shape sounds, but also how to arrange them into a cohesive track. That is a REALLY complicated task; you're talking music theory and sound engineering at the same time, both of which are pretty advanced topics for your average lazy bastard (me :-)
- Photography is a very social activity; you're out in the world, taking pictures of people and places and things. W/digital music you're stuck sitting at a computer for hours a day -- it's only when you have a finished product that you get to share it in a social environment (at a gig).
- It takes a good 5 minutes to listen to a song and decide if you like it. Whereas w/a photo I pretty much know instantly -- I have a strong gut reaction to photos & other pieces of visual art that I like.
I really like the way that one turned out.
September 22, 2009
Teaching Someone How to DJ
My friend David will start a job at an international law firm in a little over a month ... in the meantime, he's decided to use his (then-remaining) 40 days to learn/do something new each day. I participated yesterday (Day 7 for him) by teaching him how to DJ.
I really enjoy close-up, shallow depth-of-field photos.
I really enjoy close-up, shallow depth-of-field photos.
September 13, 2009
I Lied
No sooner had I posted about losing some Project365 pictures, then I re-opened Picasa and it decided to find them! How crazy. To celebrate, here's one of the photos I thought I lost:
My cousin Max, who lives in Philly, visited me over Labor Day weekend. We had a real blast -- I think he enjoyed his time in Austin and hopefully I've convinced him to move out here :-)
The photographic technique in the above photo is called a rear-curtain flash sync (also known as a second-curtain sync, which is what Canon calls it. In it, the flash fires twice -- once at the beginning of the exposure (to assist w/focus) and again at the end of the exposure. This means if you have a long enough shutter time, your picture will contain trails/blurs -- like all long exposures do -- but because the flash fires at the end of the exposure, the picture also has at least one sharp image in it. In this case you can see that Max moved his head to the right during the exposure, but because the flash fired at the end (freezing the action for a still shot), the whole picture isn't blurry.
I love this effect -- I also used it here.
My cousin Max, who lives in Philly, visited me over Labor Day weekend. We had a real blast -- I think he enjoyed his time in Austin and hopefully I've convinced him to move out here :-)
The photographic technique in the above photo is called a rear-curtain flash sync (also known as a second-curtain sync, which is what Canon calls it. In it, the flash fires twice -- once at the beginning of the exposure (to assist w/focus) and again at the end of the exposure. This means if you have a long enough shutter time, your picture will contain trails/blurs -- like all long exposures do -- but because the flash fires at the end of the exposure, the picture also has at least one sharp image in it. In this case you can see that Max moved his head to the right during the exposure, but because the flash fired at the end (freezing the action for a still shot), the whole picture isn't blurry.
I love this effect -- I also used it here.
September 12, 2009
One Month of Project365
Well, amazingly enough I'm over a month into Project365 and have hit every single day. Talk about commitment. The only snag has been that my camera-to-PC transfer lost a few photos from last Saturday & Sunday, which kind of sucks because there were some good ones. But since I actually took the photos, I'm not too upset :-)
Here's a nice picture to add to the "sky" collection:
It's been fun so far ... and it's definitely been doable because of my macro lens. Because of that, I can come home after work, take a picture of something at extremely-close range, have it fill the lens, and have the picture turn out halfway interesting. I don't have to think too terribly much about it.
Still, I'm already getting tired of that practice and it's only been a month! What I'm going to do is start taking my camera to work and then going different places after work to take pictures. I'm a big fan of variety, and that should help :-)
I'm still lagging behind in uploading photos, but I'm confident I'll get them all up eventually.
Here's a nice picture to add to the "sky" collection:
It's been fun so far ... and it's definitely been doable because of my macro lens. Because of that, I can come home after work, take a picture of something at extremely-close range, have it fill the lens, and have the picture turn out halfway interesting. I don't have to think too terribly much about it.
Still, I'm already getting tired of that practice and it's only been a month! What I'm going to do is start taking my camera to work and then going different places after work to take pictures. I'm a big fan of variety, and that should help :-)
I'm still lagging behind in uploading photos, but I'm confident I'll get them all up eventually.
August 30, 2009
Project 365 Continues
Seems to be the thing to do 'round these parts on Sunday nights.
Note: The shot w/the car was made possible with my new macro lens that arrived Friday :-D
And of course more here.
Note: The shot w/the car was made possible with my new macro lens that arrived Friday :-D
And of course more here.
August 23, 2009
Project 365 Rolls Right Along
Cake in a bowl.
Bill enjoying his new light-up ball toy that my parents got him.
Diana's outdoor plants that I watered while she was away.
August 16, 2009
Eyes and Books
So I woke up this morning and my right eye was all crusty. I looked in the mirror, and this was staring back at me:
Kinda looks like I got knocked around in a bar fight or something, haha. But really it's a sty. I went to the hospital and got some medicine for it, in addition to advice about warm compresses every so often. Good times! My parents didn't even mind that it canceled our planned trip to Salado. Instead, we went to Half Price Books where I ended up blowing some money on this stuff:
Oh, yeah, more stuff to add to the backlog of items to read. I'm currently reading this, then I have to read and review this (I promised the author I would; she is a fellow technical writer/blogger in Austin), and then it's on to other things. Oy!
In other news, you will likely be seeing a lot more pictures from me in the coming ... year. I've decided to do something called Project365, in which I take at least one picture a day for the next year. I probably already average at least one picture a day, but of course I skip most days and make up for those w/photo-intensive days, like trips to NY (or China!) or whatever. But this will be a daily thing. I officially kicked it off on August 10th and, so far for the first week, have been keeping up with it quite nicely. The photos will be archived here on Flickr. I won't lie; part of the motivation here is to convince myself it's worth it to buy a nice macro lens or maybe an external flash :-) But I swear that's only part of it ...
Kinda looks like I got knocked around in a bar fight or something, haha. But really it's a sty. I went to the hospital and got some medicine for it, in addition to advice about warm compresses every so often. Good times! My parents didn't even mind that it canceled our planned trip to Salado. Instead, we went to Half Price Books where I ended up blowing some money on this stuff:
Oh, yeah, more stuff to add to the backlog of items to read. I'm currently reading this, then I have to read and review this (I promised the author I would; she is a fellow technical writer/blogger in Austin), and then it's on to other things. Oy!
In other news, you will likely be seeing a lot more pictures from me in the coming ... year. I've decided to do something called Project365, in which I take at least one picture a day for the next year. I probably already average at least one picture a day, but of course I skip most days and make up for those w/photo-intensive days, like trips to NY (or China!) or whatever. But this will be a daily thing. I officially kicked it off on August 10th and, so far for the first week, have been keeping up with it quite nicely. The photos will be archived here on Flickr. I won't lie; part of the motivation here is to convince myself it's worth it to buy a nice macro lens or maybe an external flash :-) But I swear that's only part of it ...
August 8, 2009
... a Beautiful Sky Blue
After a year of being in the dirty, smoggy mess that is Shanghai (and lots of other areas, like Beijing and Xi'an as well) -- with its metallic-gray skies, rainy weather, and towering skyscrapers that blot out the sun -- I find myself paying much, much more attention to a beautiful deep blue sky than ever before. Why do you think I bought the polarizing filter for my camera?
... and so on.
... and so on.
July 29, 2009
Proof that Nirvana Played a Show in Austin, 1991
In other news, you might notice that I'm up at 7:17 AM ... that's because Bill woke me up (again) and I decided to just stay up this time. Good news though!! I watched him take a dump and, without ANY help from me, he squatted properly on the toilet seat like he's supposed to do. Huzzah! All four legs on the seat, didn't miss at all, didn't fall in. I could tell afterwards he was confused about covering up his mess, but I took him off the seat before he could investigate any further and foul things up. Much petting, and a treat, followed. He's now passed out on the sofa.
This means training will go so much easier, since I don't have to teach him how to stand on the toilet seat. I just need to slowly decrease the amount of litter in there (it's already pretty low) and then slowly fill it up with water. I'll probably keep a small amount of litter in there for a few weeks to make sure he gets used to it.
w00t!
July 25, 2009
More NYC Pics
My friend Richard on the Cyclone at Coney Island.
Another ride in progress at Coney Island.
The Wonder Wheel, the ferris wheel at Coney Island.
I shouldn't have to explain this one ;-)
Plane rides aren't all bad ...
July 12, 2009
Back in Austin / NYC Pics
Just a small sampling of the flood of NYC pics that I took ... stay tuned to that link as I upload more over the next week. I'll be posting a couple more each day.
As always, click a picture to go to its page & browse related photos.
The Manhattan Bridge that connects Brooklyn to, um, Malnhattan across the East River :-) Bklyn is on the right. Notice the wedding photos going on!
Central Park.
Subway tile mosaic at the 96th street stop. All the stops have signs like these.
My parents came to visit me at the Guggenheim :-)
The Manhattan skyline as seen from walking across the Brooklyn Bridge. The tallest building, in the center, is the Empire State Building. The second-tallest one (off to the right of the frame) is the Chrysler Building.
My friends Suzan and Choyce were in the car ahead of us on The Scrambler @ Coney Island. Because they were moving at the same speed we were relative to the "background", I could steady the camera and take this picture quite easily.
More. Again, I'll be uploading more here throughout the week!
As always, click a picture to go to its page & browse related photos.
The Manhattan Bridge that connects Brooklyn to, um, Malnhattan across the East River :-) Bklyn is on the right. Notice the wedding photos going on!
Central Park.
Subway tile mosaic at the 96th street stop. All the stops have signs like these.
My parents came to visit me at the Guggenheim :-)
The Manhattan skyline as seen from walking across the Brooklyn Bridge. The tallest building, in the center, is the Empire State Building. The second-tallest one (off to the right of the frame) is the Chrysler Building.
My friends Suzan and Choyce were in the car ahead of us on The Scrambler @ Coney Island. Because they were moving at the same speed we were relative to the "background", I could steady the camera and take this picture quite easily.
More. Again, I'll be uploading more here throughout the week!
April 27, 2009
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