June 2 -- in the park
June 4 -- blue porch
Sunday, June 6, 2010
Art-A-Day
June 2 -- in the park
My new toy part 2
My new camera, an Olympus Stylus 7030, lasted five days out of the box before it developed a fatal flaw. Seems that the little door that opens up to let you plug in the USB cable fell off and disappeared. Unfortunately, only half the door disappeared – the half that lets you get your fingernail under to pop it open. The half of the door that remains tightly shut protecting the cable interface is still there.
Note lack of little door over the off-white plastic area on the left. I suppose you could try opening the inner plastic door with needlenose tweezers, but that would be no fun.
If you can't get to the cable interface, you can’t access your pictures, nor can you recharge your battery. (Minor obstacles.)
I took it back to the camera store (again, it pays to buy locally) and the clerk said she had another one of that same model lose its little door while she was standing at the counter selling it. We agreed this was a serious design flaw. My first thought was to upgrade to another Olympus with a better little door, bigger display screen, twice as much internal memory and 7X zoom instead of 5X.
I had to come back the next day with the box, all the cables, the battery charger, etc. By then I had talked with a friend and contemplated whether I really wanted to stick with Olympus. I have owned four Olympi (one film, three digital) and I do feel a certain fondness for the brand. I am comfortable with the way it organizes its options and controls and I want to spend as little time as possible learning new systems.
HOWEVER, I have sort of learned how to use the computer program that comes with the camera, and while I can see how some features might come in useful, I hate most of how it operates. It won’t let me resize my pictures to 800 pixels wide for easy loading to the blog. It makes me click through an elaborate menu of stuff I don’t want to do every time I transfer images from the camera to the computer – for example, the first thing that comes up is a map of the world so you can tag your pictures geographically. And its cool white-type-on-black layout is unreadable for me.
So yesterday I had a heart-to-heart with Kim, the best photo store clerk I’ve ever met, and we decided that I should abandon Olympus and get a Nikon. She told me to take all the photos off my new memory card, then pop it into the Nikon and reformat just to make sure no repressed Olympus memories came back to haunt me.
But wait! How could I take the photos off the memory card? My old Olympus uses a different kind of card, and the new Olympus wouldn’t let me download my photos before I brought it back, because of its broken door. Not to worry -- Kim gave me a card reader device for free! Another reason to patronize your local camera store instead of buying online.
So now I am the snakebit and wary owner of a Nikon Coolpix S6000, 14.2 megapixels, 7X zoom. The card reader worked – thanks, Kim! – but I still have a bunch of computer issues to work through, since my old Windows XP is too geriatric to support the Nikon software and I haven’t yet figured out how to edit the images.
In the olden days you bought a camera and went out and took pictures. Now you have to access a whole support system to make the camera work. Yes, I know I could give my soul to Google (or at least the part they don’t already have) and manage my pictures online, but I have a perhaps irrational desire to keep my images on my computer, not throw them into cyberspace and hope they don’t get into trouble. I’ll figure out something. Meanwhile I hope my new new camera behaves better and lasts longer than my old new camera. Keep your fingers crossed for me!
Note lack of little door over the off-white plastic area on the left. I suppose you could try opening the inner plastic door with needlenose tweezers, but that would be no fun.
If you can't get to the cable interface, you can’t access your pictures, nor can you recharge your battery. (Minor obstacles.)
I took it back to the camera store (again, it pays to buy locally) and the clerk said she had another one of that same model lose its little door while she was standing at the counter selling it. We agreed this was a serious design flaw. My first thought was to upgrade to another Olympus with a better little door, bigger display screen, twice as much internal memory and 7X zoom instead of 5X.
I had to come back the next day with the box, all the cables, the battery charger, etc. By then I had talked with a friend and contemplated whether I really wanted to stick with Olympus. I have owned four Olympi (one film, three digital) and I do feel a certain fondness for the brand. I am comfortable with the way it organizes its options and controls and I want to spend as little time as possible learning new systems.
HOWEVER, I have sort of learned how to use the computer program that comes with the camera, and while I can see how some features might come in useful, I hate most of how it operates. It won’t let me resize my pictures to 800 pixels wide for easy loading to the blog. It makes me click through an elaborate menu of stuff I don’t want to do every time I transfer images from the camera to the computer – for example, the first thing that comes up is a map of the world so you can tag your pictures geographically. And its cool white-type-on-black layout is unreadable for me.
So yesterday I had a heart-to-heart with Kim, the best photo store clerk I’ve ever met, and we decided that I should abandon Olympus and get a Nikon. She told me to take all the photos off my new memory card, then pop it into the Nikon and reformat just to make sure no repressed Olympus memories came back to haunt me.
But wait! How could I take the photos off the memory card? My old Olympus uses a different kind of card, and the new Olympus wouldn’t let me download my photos before I brought it back, because of its broken door. Not to worry -- Kim gave me a card reader device for free! Another reason to patronize your local camera store instead of buying online.
So now I am the snakebit and wary owner of a Nikon Coolpix S6000, 14.2 megapixels, 7X zoom. The card reader worked – thanks, Kim! – but I still have a bunch of computer issues to work through, since my old Windows XP is too geriatric to support the Nikon software and I haven’t yet figured out how to edit the images.
In the olden days you bought a camera and went out and took pictures. Now you have to access a whole support system to make the camera work. Yes, I know I could give my soul to Google (or at least the part they don’t already have) and manage my pictures online, but I have a perhaps irrational desire to keep my images on my computer, not throw them into cyberspace and hope they don’t get into trouble. I’ll figure out something. Meanwhile I hope my new new camera behaves better and lasts longer than my old new camera. Keep your fingers crossed for me!
Saturday, June 5, 2010
The other dark side of juried shows
I wrote the other day about my annoyance with entering shows with CDs, and said kind words about shows that allow online entries. Meanwhile Jeanne Williamson was writing about her annoyance with entering shows online. I guess you just can't win.
Photo thoughts 2 -- my favorite pictures
I wrote yesterday about what I consider to be photogenic places, with some illustrations. I’m sure more than one of my readers took one look and said What is wrong with her???? Those are the ugliest pictures I’ve seen in ages.
I hit the “publish” button on that post immediately before I went out on my walk, and as I walked I meditated on what I consider to be a good picture. Of course, what you think is a good picture is probably a pretty decent window into your soul. So if I riff on what I like to take pictures of, I hope my soul turns out to be more attractive than my studio.
Probably my favorite category is pictures of what people do to their surroundings. I like architectural shapes and details, constructed geometric forms and patterns, work in process, roads and bridges, old buildings, shadows cast by or upon the built environment. I like funny statues that people put in their yards and stuff that they throw out for junk pickup. I like to find tables on the lawn and sofas in the alley.
I like the meetingplaces of manmade and natural; a glorious landscape is more interesting to me if there’s a house or a church or a road in the picture. And a patch of day lilies is more interesting if there’s a flagstone walk in front or a fence in back. I like the textures made by lichens on stone walls, by bricks on driveways, by wires against the sky.
Of course, as awesome as the power people have to shape their surroundings, nature always fights back, and I like to see that too. I like peeling paint and crumbling concrete, sagging doors and slumping roofs. I like to see weeds growing luxuriantly through cracks in the sidewalk, reclaiming vacant lots or colonizing abandoned buildings.
And I like pictures with a little humor to them, with a little quirk, pictures that surprise you with unexpected juxtapositions or make you wonder how or why that came to be.
This is not the only category of photos that I look for, although I could easily spend the rest of my life shooting only in this ballpark. Tomorrow I’ll tell you about some other categories I like.
Friday, June 4, 2010
Photo thoughts 1 -- photogenic places
Since I embarked on my daily photo project at the beginning of this year, I am looking at the world around me with new eyes – could or should I take a picture of that? I have been pleased to discover a lot of photo ops in surroundings that otherwise would have seemed unremarkable, simply because I’ve been on the lookout.
I’ve already discovered that while you can find good photos in unlikely places, there are certain kinds of places that greatly increase your chances of a Kodak moment. In general, I find nice suburban neighborhoods to be the most difficult to photograph; everything is too boring and pretty. In a nice neighborhood your chances of a photo op are much better if there are alleys; even though things are still unremarkably nice, you’re a lot closer to them. And people let down their guard in the alley, where even the most expensive houses put their rejects and garden tools and construction materials on display.
older neighborhoods
nice neighborhood -- alley view
abandoned factory
back door -- bar by the airport
My husband helps tutor recent immigrants in an ESL program two days a week, and guess what – recent immigrants end up living and going to school in older and/or run-down parts of town. I like to go with him and walk for two hours while he tutors; it’s good for my fitness routine and I know I will get excellent pictures in this low-end but photogenic neighborhood.
Wednesday, June 2, 2010
The dark side of juried shows
Policing up my office today I came across a box of CDs on which people had submitted entries last year for a juried show that I was organizing. I reflected again on the collateral damage involved in digital jurying – namely the quantity of CDs and packing materials that are used once and discarded.
Theoretically digital images are so much simpler and efficient than slides. Any of us who have been entering shows for a decade still have drawers or boxes full of slides that will never be touched again, unless to make some found-object artwork that will reflect the distant past with pathos. Digital, by contrast, is stored once on your computer, instantly available to crop, label and send off to Ulan Bator for jurying.
Except that’s not how it works. You have to burn a CD, using way less than 1% of the capacity of the disk, package it in some kind of plastic or cardboard protector and go to the post office to send it off by snail mail. Many shows still tell you to enclose a self-addressed stamped envelope to get your CD back, except who in their right mind wants their CD back, since it’s useless for any other purpose? Even if you buy re-recordable CDs, is it worth the buck and a half or so in postage to get it back and reuse it?
And yet, this system seems beautiful compared to the process in a project I participated in a couple of years ago. For logistical reasons on their end that I did not fully understand, we had to submit 8 x 10 color prints of our quilts, in duplicate. For logistical reasons on my end, I had to go to Kinko’s and make those prints, at a cost in double digits!
The art show jurying world is going through radical change in this new age of digital media; giving up slides was a painful process and it’s clear that we’re still in transition. I give points to shows like Art Quilt Elements and Form, Not Function that allow entrants to submit their images online rather than on CDs. Even though these submissions can require many minutes of uploading, they’re far less hassle than the CD/mail approach. And of course they don’t eat up any tangible resources unless you want to send a check rather than paying electronically.
So I sorted through my pile of old entries and salvaged the plastic protectors; at least those are easily reusable. I hate the idea of simply trashing the CDs. I see so many of them discarded on the road when I walk and wonder what future archaeologists are going to think about finding zillions of still-shiny rings in the middens of 21st century civilization.
In Greece I saw CDs hanging from posts in fields, turning in the breeze, as shiny scarecrows. What a good idea! And yet I don’t think there are enough fields on the planet to use up all the CDs we burn, read once and discard. My artistic focus these days does not include creative re-use of old CDs, but if it did I would not suffer for raw materials.
Theoretically digital images are so much simpler and efficient than slides. Any of us who have been entering shows for a decade still have drawers or boxes full of slides that will never be touched again, unless to make some found-object artwork that will reflect the distant past with pathos. Digital, by contrast, is stored once on your computer, instantly available to crop, label and send off to Ulan Bator for jurying.
Except that’s not how it works. You have to burn a CD, using way less than 1% of the capacity of the disk, package it in some kind of plastic or cardboard protector and go to the post office to send it off by snail mail. Many shows still tell you to enclose a self-addressed stamped envelope to get your CD back, except who in their right mind wants their CD back, since it’s useless for any other purpose? Even if you buy re-recordable CDs, is it worth the buck and a half or so in postage to get it back and reuse it?
And yet, this system seems beautiful compared to the process in a project I participated in a couple of years ago. For logistical reasons on their end that I did not fully understand, we had to submit 8 x 10 color prints of our quilts, in duplicate. For logistical reasons on my end, I had to go to Kinko’s and make those prints, at a cost in double digits!
The art show jurying world is going through radical change in this new age of digital media; giving up slides was a painful process and it’s clear that we’re still in transition. I give points to shows like Art Quilt Elements and Form, Not Function that allow entrants to submit their images online rather than on CDs. Even though these submissions can require many minutes of uploading, they’re far less hassle than the CD/mail approach. And of course they don’t eat up any tangible resources unless you want to send a check rather than paying electronically.
So I sorted through my pile of old entries and salvaged the plastic protectors; at least those are easily reusable. I hate the idea of simply trashing the CDs. I see so many of them discarded on the road when I walk and wonder what future archaeologists are going to think about finding zillions of still-shiny rings in the middens of 21st century civilization.
In Greece I saw CDs hanging from posts in fields, turning in the breeze, as shiny scarecrows. What a good idea! And yet I don’t think there are enough fields on the planet to use up all the CDs we burn, read once and discard. My artistic focus these days does not include creative re-use of old CDs, but if it did I would not suffer for raw materials.
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