Full of Thanks
I'm thankful for my friends, both in-real-life and electronic. It's something I don't acknowledge nearly enough but something that is absolutely true and should be said more often.
I'm lucky to have friends who are helpful, intelligent, honest, and nearly as insane as I am. Nearly...
So, thank you friends for being who you are and for, in many ways, making me who I am: someone who has friends like you. Yeah, that's sappy, but so what? I know you'll understand. 
Uh oh…
When 
helloheather, nathan, and I spent part of the weekend at the Marriot, our Canon A80 did a strange thing. At high-ISO, when the camera was trying to "gain-up" the LCD to approximate the shot (as 99.9% of all digital cameras do) strange horizontal lines appeared in the images. At first I though it had something to do with the humidity/moisture from the pool-area getting into the camera body (as the body is partially open due to the camera being dropped 3 times).
The problem seemed to go away on its own by the next day which certainly seemed to indicate a moisture issue.
But it happened last night, and most certainly there were no pools around.
(click for a resized version of the original image)
In this example, the lines appear vertical because the camera was rotated 90 deg for the shot. I also used the "Equalize" feature of Photoshop to more clearly define the lines. For a copy of the original file click here: IMG_3619.JPG
The lines showed up intermittently in images last night and eventually disappeared. This morning the camera is presenting the lines in images, but again, only when the camera attempts to "gain-up" the LCD.
At this point the camera simply cannot be trusted for indoor photography which sucks because it's been our carry-everywhere camera for so long. I'll continue to use it for my photography walks during lunch but beyond that it would seem the A80 is not long for this world...
Because I'm a geek, here are some stats:
First photo: Dec 1, 2003
# of photos by Dec 1, 2004: 9545
# of photos by Dec 1, 2005: 17918
# of photos by Oct 21, 2006: 23490
We've more than gotten our moneys worth, that's for sure.
Magdalena Abakanowicz – AGORA
A new collection of sculptures was unveiled in Grant Park recently. The installation is by Polish artist Magdalena Abakanowicz and is called "Agora."
http://www.abakanowicz.art.pl/
Agora 01
These 9 foot tall steel sculptures are hollow and open to the back. Some are arranged in lines following each other while others seem to be milling around in confusion. It's very strange to walk amongst them.
Agora 02
From work to the south end of Grant Park and back put my lunch hour walk at 3.4 miles. So both my legs and eyes got a work-out today.
Chicago Public Radio dot com – 11/15
One of my recent series of B&W photos was chosen for the photo of the day on ChicagoPublicRadio.com
“Northbound 35″
I saw an elsebound train
On the overpass
In the driving rain
Every ticket costs the same
For where you can't go
Chorus:
Mustang horses, champagne glasses
Anything frail anything wild
It’s the price of living motion
What's beautiful is broken
And grace is just the measure of a fall
http://www.jeffreyfoucault.com
"Northbound 35" is included in the SXSW 2006 music download, which is full of amazing artists. Jeffrey Foucault stands above most of them lyrically and musically. He provides full mp3s of some of the songs from his albums on his website. I highly recommend checking them out.
You can get "Northbound 35" by clicking here
I voted! (x2)
A baby from Illinois wouldn't be much of a baby if he or she didn't vote early and vote often! Nathan is certainly no exception.
Canon G7
A lot of noise (har) has been made over the lack of RAW file capture with the Canon G7. And, for the most part, I have to agree with the comments: Canon has shot themselves in the foot. They have mis-judged the market in order to try and force people into their DSLRs.
Anyway, the Luminous Landscape review of the G7 is up here:
http://luminous-landscape.com/reviews/cameras/Canon-G7.shtml
Attention Grabbing
On Flickr if your thumbnails are not chocked fulla high-saturated color or extreme contrast, people won't look at your images.
Regardless of the quality of the final image, if you can't grab someones attention with a tiny cropped thumbnail, the image will not likely be noticed.
Ok, yeah, so I'm generalizing. But even though I try and look beyond the thumbnail, I catch myself behaving this way too. The more "friends" one has on flickr, the more groups one belongs to, the more likely (IMHO) one will be to skim images, rather than really look closely.
In order to combat this behavior I've changed how I use flickr. Instead of logging into the site to view new images from friends or groups, I now read the corresponding flickr feeds by way of Google Reader.
The advantage to this is that the feed shows a reduced size image of the original, not a 100 pixel crop. I can better judge which images I want to take a closer look at and, as a result, have a better appreciation of what is being posted. So far its working really well. By actually using flickr less I feel I'm more connected to the photographers that share their photos in the same groups.
6-word Science Fiction
Can a story be told in just 6 words?
http://wired.com/wired/archive/14.11/sixwords.html
Some of the responses are very clever, some are so-so.
But it seems like a really interesting idea. Can 6 words build a story in the readers mind? What happens when 6 words interact with a persons memories, experiences, and emotions? What sort of images are stirred up?
So, I thought I would have a go at writing my own. I didn't stick with science fiction-themed stories, simply because I know I'm not that clever. Here are the first four:
The shutter clicked; she hadn't smiled.
The cold warmed him. Homeward bound.
Music washes over his lifeless body.
Telephones ringing. An empty office. Lunch?
It's a start. Maybe more later.