New Camera

Dallas as a walkable city

Last year I was at a conference in Dallas. I found it to be a bleak
city, lacking restaurants, people, art, and wi-fi. Last year, I
couldn't afford to stay at the conference hotel (Sheraton), so I
stayed at a divey place several blocks away, a terrible place also the
site a cheerleader camp was using (pulled the fire alarm at 2:30 am).

This year, I again couldn't afford the conference hotel, but I could
afford the Sheraton (got a great online deal straight from the hotel).
I also had my little iPhone with me, making the lack of Wi-Fi
inconsiquential. I was able to find restaurants and art, walking all
around the city. What a difference. Sometimes it feels like technology
isolates us. Sometimes it makes the world so much richer.

Sent from my iPhone

Alien roadmaps

This is what the laser printer made when it didn't like my image. I think it is a map to a secret alien location.

Broken typewriter

http://www.hardtoremember.org/dlog/?file=87jhn

Futility and angst

I have been rendering video for hours. Apparently videos that look beautiful on the computer screen and on the Internet seek revenge by looking terrible on televisions. Damn you, old techology! Why must I lower my standards to make my work available to the masses!

Anniversaries and iPhones

Today is our 4 year anniversary. To celebrate, we went to Indy & bought iPhones (?) and celebrated with Maggianno's. Oh, Maggoanno's, how I've missed you. Tonight, we have a picnic at the president's house. Fancy! This text is brought to you from my new phone while waiting for dessert.

Blog Guilt

I had meant to never let more than two days go by without making a performance for this site. (I didn't want a whole line of graves stone posts. People will get the wrong idea.) Let's say I have been reserving my performances for private audiences! But I didn't mean to let so much time pass! My excuses are quite real (lame)-- I finally took pictures to create an entry, but didn't have the upload cord with me. I had to write a job description for my fall student assistant. I had to run auditions. I had to go to that bar. I had to go see that naked play (Some Men). Eventually, I will find that cord and get that post up about small town cuteness. I promise. I don't know how many more graves will go by before you see it, but it will happen.

My favorite albums I am listening to around town are MGMT and the Moods. I am late to the party on MGMT (click here to see the HD music video-- it made me buy the album. Warning: long time to load and some hedonistic activities), as many of my favorite Internet personalities wrote about them months ago. But at least I have learned the error of my ways. The Moods are friends of mine in LA, and I am happy to say I was one of the first to that party, hearing their early practice sessions on an iPod, seeing most of their first shows, and I got the CD before it was released. Yes, that's how connected I am.

I only mention the albums for something to post, but there are days when I feel like good music gets me through the day. It's probably why I was so excited by this little "Mix Tape" thing in my sidebar over to the right. I can find any song I never owned and make fabulous music. People have been doing this on MySpace forever, I know, with weird little box-MP3 player things. But this actually makes it seem like a mixed tape, referencing the fine art of selecting songs and orders and the tone of the whole tape. I was never good at these things, because I would slap together an odd mix of music that made me feel certain ways (just for the glory of these songs making me feel things on command) and I tended to put contrasting emotions right next to each other. Offspring's Smash right next to Coldplay's Yellow followed by Madonna. I'll have to find that tape and try to recreate it one of these days. After I find a tape player.

Why t.v. is bad, even on the Inter-webs

I took a break yesterday, and decided to watch the season finale of House on the web, while sewing of course. The above scene, surely stolen from my own art, from Part 1. Part 2 prevented my sewing-- I couldn't see the needle and thread for the tears.

New computer/camera bag and a little CS3

One of the first things i ordered when I got here was a new laptop and camera bag. I had it all picked out already, but I thought I would be able to find a store here that had it in stock. Nope.

This bag is by the company Tenba, and it made to hold a 15 inch laptop and a camera with accessories. It has a heavy-duty, padded shoulder strap, a padded compartment for the laptop, and a removable, padded insert for the camera. The back is also padded for your hip's comfort. It comes in many stylish colors, though my choice was plum. When I first pulled it out of the box, I thought it was really heavy and was dismayed. Since then, I've gotten used to it and enjoy being able to drag lots of expensive things with me, without fear of them being damaged. I haven't taken advantage of all the pockets yet, with one exception. The front, left pocket is designated for the cell phone. It is one of the few carrying-things I have that doesn't immediately eat and disappear my phone!

On another technology note, this is the first animated gif I have made with Photoshop CS3. Animated gifs are falling by the way-side (where is that, exactly?), but I do like them for their kitschy, instant gratification. CS and CS2 came with a wacky software called ImageReady, meant for optimizing graphics for the web. It also made animated gifs, which is all I used it for (I used the "Save for Web" option in Photoshop for optimizing, and never saw another need, although I know there were). I even included it in my Digital Imaging and Web Design courses. Some of my flash students scoffed at it at first-- "why would anyone make those instead of just using Flash?" But they saw the light once they made them. They're fun! It's like using glue and crayons and scissors when you know you could be using markers and laser-cut punch-outs.

Anyway, CS3 has decided ImageReady was extrenuous and most of its features could be integrated into (eaten by) Photoshop. There is a new "Animation" window to accomplish this, and like ImageReady, you save a PSD version for editing, but like Photoshop, you simply use your "Save for Web" option to make the gif. It's so easy!

That's all for now. You know, this is the first thing I have ever written online that resembles a "review." Perhaps it is influenced by a certain company (who sells camera and computer equipment-- I do shop there) emailing me today and asking to put an ad on my site. My site could make money? Neat! My site would no longer be art and just be like all the other sites out there? Hm. Maybe I am too attached to the starving artist motif.

Retro Techno

Remember when t.v.s had rabbit ear antennae? You would be watching a show and if you changed the channel, you had to get up and adjust them for the new channel. Sometimes, you couldn't get that channel at all, unless someone held onto the antennae the whole show, sometimes even with a leg sticking up at a weird angle. At the climax of the show, no one in the room was allowed to move, least you miss the announcement of who-done-it.

Flash-forward to cell phones and you have the same thing. "Can you hear me now?" How many people do you know who have to go out on their lawns to use their cell phones?

Then there is the WiFi. I am living in a big, old building on one side of a giant bearing wall (really-- it's 2 feet thick), the WiFi router on the other side and on a different floor. The first day I was here, I set my computer on my desk, turned it on, got my e-mail, updated my blog, had a video chat session, and all was well. The next day, I could not get any signal at all. I moved the computer to the kitchen table, got my e-mail, updated my blog, etc. The next day, the signal was gone.

I periodically check for signal around the apartment. I can be sitting with my Ziggy on the bed, and suddenly it's there. I will update Twitter, then go to check that it uploaded, and the signal disappears.

This weekend, I have been working on projects at the kitchen table, and watching movies on my laptop at the same time (background noise). Suddenly, there was the Internet. So I started watching t.v. shows. It was a lot of fun, and it is much easier to process my 10,000 images of dead-people-graves with comedy on in the background. Every now and then, the signal disappeared, then five minutes or more later, reappeared. Since I am not moving, the computer is not moving, and presumably, the router is not moving, this has become a mystery and a cause for ridiculous superstitious behavior.

Some examples:

1. Sunday, I heard someone vacuuming in the building and the signal disappeared. The vacuum might have sucked up the signal, or there is electromagnetic interference. Could go either way.
2. This morning, the cats made an exceptionally stinky contribution to their box (which they refuse to bury) and I finally had to get up and bury it myself. The signal disappeared. Apparently, WiFi is stronger if there are uncovered cat feces in the room.
3. I was drawing out the lettering for my cross-stitch, and decided that font wasn't working. I erased it and started a new design...

You get the idea.

QUOTE OF THE DAY

"Computers are about trying to murder you in a lake."
- from the show, The Office

Cameras and Mothers

I had noticed a tiny 'light leak' in my dearest possession in the process of scanning my images. Not in every frame, but many, and going back many months. This morning, I shot a roll through both film backs, on mostly white walls to test this theory. I went out to shoot, came home to pick up the negatives, and then camped out in the basement to scan samples from each set. Alas. It is a real leak.

I was on the phone with my mother at the same time and decided to tell her about this, because it made me so suddenly sad. Somehow it came up that, yes, this was a camera my dad had given me, and yes, he would have bought it when they were together. I could feel the ground slipping out from under me, and I was going to tumble down that muddy filthy cliff no matter what I did.

But I still tried to save myself, to stop it.

As she began to try to reiterate whatever wrong in her marriage was associated with this camera, I spoke more loudly about how sad it was and it was rebuilt, and yes, I looked up the serial number and the camera was from 1967 after all, but still...

I don't think she heard me.
"It was after you were born, and I was working at the bank..."

"The camera was used, mom; it was made in 1967. Now I have to decide if I will buy another one for $2K along with the $2.5k for the scanner..."

"I don't know if it was used, but he bought it in 1980..."

I couldn't seem to sway her. She was determined to go there. I just couldn't take it.

What I would have liked to have said, I didn't. I hope you believe me when I say I have managed to say such things to her in the past with excellent results, but the energy was beyond me.

I wanted to say, "Look, mom, I get it. You hate my dad. You had a terrible marriage and you are going to hate him forever and ever and you have no intention whatsoever to get over it. I get it. But you know what? I am related to him and I always will be and you just have to deal with it. Now will you actually listen to what I am talking about or do I need to hang up?"

Instead I changed the subject and hurried to the end of the call.

I'm still sad about the camera.

This song by OK Go shuffled onto my iTunes as I typed this post. Serendipity.

Scanning

My laptop and I are in the computer lab, hooked up to a Nikon Super Coolscan 9000. It is diligently scanning away. I think each one takes about ten minutes. Yes, I have 25 to do. It's OK. What's funny is I am on my laptop in my spare time too. And when I upload pictures or the blog. Basically, it's my only friend right now.

It's not sad, I promise. Just a sign of the times. The device to make images, sort them, communicate, entertain, etc. is all under my hands as I type this. Do you see these words? Straight from the tips of my fingers pressing these beautiful silver keys.

I added a little slide show thing in the side bar (to the right). I have not downloaded my latest images from the camera yet, but these are some from the weekend. Sorry I couldn't figure out how to make them in the entry. I have a headache and that problem-solving challenge isn't compelling enough!

new template -- and homework for you!

i have finally broken out of the template. hooray! by purposely opposing my web design training and the look of "main stream" blogs, i expect all kinds of mad things to happen on different browsers and monitors! let's toast to spontaneous technological creations/failures!

the good thing about it-- i can now have much larger pictures and videos. yes, they will occasionally cover up columns and words-- that is part of the fun! expand your browser window if it is too much, or go look at it on a public terminal with a high-resolution monitor! i suggest the Apple store, public libraries, the Sony store, Fry's, etc!

send me a picture of you looking at the site in a public space and i will post it!