Patience and Portraits

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I love taking pictures of people. Since I don't have a lot of experience taking "posed" or "portrait" type shots of people, the challenge I keep facing is that it's hard to find people patient enough to endure a photoshoot with me. I run around trying different things, changing the lighting or the perspective or the background. People tend to want a photographer who has experience with portrait photography, but the only way to get experience is to find people patient enough to let me practice. It's a vicious circle.

Flickr Slideshows

Apparently, as of yesterday, Flickr added a little more spice to their slideshows. You can now view video in a slideshow.

The part I like, (and this functionality may have been there for awhile now,) is that I can more easily embed native Flickr slideshows on a web page.

Very cool.

Yet Another Format

I know...  Another format... Here's the thing though... Ever since I killed the original blog, I've had a tough time deciding what I really want to do with this domain. I have no intentions of giving it up, so I figured I'd just use it to try different things.

So far, I really like Joomla as a CMS. As I explore it more, I may post things I like/dislike about it, tips and tricks I've found along the way, etc. Then again, I might not. At the moment, it seems to be a place to blog about my photos... Whatever. :)

Use the link on the left to check out the blog... I'll (hopefully) be adding more of the test and project areas as time goes by (and yes, the MacGyver section will be going back up shortly.)

Melted

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Melted
Originally uploaded by pdxsurreal

“You cursed brat! Look what you've done! I'm melting! melting! Oh, what a world! What a world! Who would have thought a good little girl like you could destroy my beautiful wickedness? Oooooh, look out! I'm going! Oooooh! Ooooooh!” ~Wicked Witch of the West

Apple MacBook Pro power adapter woes

A while back, I noticed the cord coming out of my power adapter had cracked a bit. I wrapped some electrical tape around it for support, and went on with my business. I have heard that the cords for these laptops are susceptible to damage, so I never wrap it around the cord hooks, or tweak it in any way. A couple of days ago, I noticed that I had to tweak the cord a bit to get the damned thing to actually charge my laptop. A pain in the ass, but still--I’ve had PC’s that had the same thing happen to their power bricks, so no biggie. I made a mental note to get permission from the powers that be to get a new power adapter.

Then yesterday morning, I noticed my laptop was almost dead, in spite of being plugged in all night. So I unwrapped the electrical tape, and found the wire all melted and smelling like electrical arcs (any arc welders will know what that smells like... Not that I’m an arc welder--in fact, I suck at welding. But I was around it quite a bit as a kid.)

I went into the Portland Mac store to see if they would exchange it--obviously it was a flaw in the product itself. My laptop was out of warranty, so the guy at the service desk couldn’t really help me. He tried--he actually took some time to research it and see what he could do. The end result was, “Call Apple support and see if they’ll exchange it for you.”

So I called Apple Support and talked to Lori. She was extremely helpful. Just asked me several questions about whether or not anything catastrophic happened (house burn down, personal injury, etc.,) and said she’d have a new adapter sent immediately. She said I could expect it in 24 to 48 hours. Took my credit card info just in case I neglected to send the old adapter back to Apple, and that was that. About 20 minutes later I got an email with her contact information just in case I had any questions.

Last night I got an email from DHL saying that my adapter had shipped, and this morning at around 11am, it arrived at the office.

At any rate--it’s always easy to write up a big long bitch-session when something goes wrong. So I thought I’d write about something gone right. Granted, if the power adapter had torched my apartment, fried my laptop, or killed my cat, all the customer service in the world wouldn’t have made me write something nice. But since things didn’t go that way, I thought I’d give a nod to Apple’s customer support.

“Why, anybody can have a brain. That's a very mediocre commodity. Every pusillanimous creature that crawls on the Earth or slinks through slimy seas has a brain. Back where I come from, we have universities, seats of great learning, where men go to become great thinkers. And when they come out, they think deep thoughts and with no more brains than you have. But they have one thing you haven't got: a diploma.” ~Wizard of Oz

Weisendanger Falls

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Weisendanger Falls
Originally uploaded by pdxsurreal

I've been watching some of the [pdx] Flickr folks posting amazing waterfall photos lately. One of them, Tildabelle took me up to Weisendanger Falls last weekend to show me the ropes. Apparently, the key is in the filters... A circular polarizer filter and an ND filter were necessary to cut enough light for a long (6 seconds or so,) exposure. None of her filters fit my lenses, so she loaned me a couple of hers to try out. (Note to self: Need 10-22 lens.)

I'm pretty sure I'm hooked. Just need to stock up on filters.

For anyone interested, Weisendanger Falls is up past the top of Multnomah Falls. Just head up the trail, and keep going. It really isn't that far. If your kids can make it to the top of Multnomah (mine made it when she was 10,) then they can definitely make it to Weisendanger.

The views are incredible, the water is clear and cold, and the whole hike is just a series of great photo-ops.