Category Archives: Photography

Up close and personal

David got me a lens for my camera that I had been drooling over for ages for Christmas.  It’s a 100 mm macro lens, which means that I’d be able to focus in on things much closer than I had been on my 50 mm lens.

But, its aperture doesn’t go as low (or as high?) so I don’t get as much light and haven’t had much success farting around with the new toy indoors, where it’s too dark.

So I’ve been a royal poop head and haven’t used it all much so far.  Which is great, because I’m an awesome person to give presents to.

Which is all preface to say that a month and a half later, I spent some time and tried out the new lens yesterday!

It was a really great day for some picture taking.  For just about anything, really.  It’s been crazy warm here in the Bay Area.  Like 75 degrees.  In February.  And yes, it’s California and all, but the weather is not usually that blissful here.  We still get crappo gloom and drizzle in the winter.  We just don’t get this:

My parents' house in New Jersey last week

But miraculously, unusually, wonderfully… instead, we’re having this:

So we had a gorgeous afternoon walking about two miles away to the next neighborhood over where we wandered around and stopped for libation.  And I got in a little quality time with my new lens.

I learned that I can take this picture of the handsome guy sitting across from me:
And this picture of the dude in the tuxedo t-shirt sitting about twenty feet away:
I think it’s a pretty good lens to have and I’m looking forward to getting my bearings with it.  And yesterday was a really good day for some bearings.  And for sauntering around with a nice fellow on a really nice sunny day.

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Depression Era Color

I love this collection of color images from around the country pre-Pearl Harbor.

The dark blur of people on the sidewalks is so neat.  And I’m a sucker for old-timey cars.

Another old timey car!  And the Golden Gate bridge!

How great is this?  The kids stand out so much against the monochrome blah of their home.  I love their bare footedness.  And the sweetness of the group huddled together.

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a less good day

It’s a bit of a less good day today.  But I did take a photograph for the first time in a long time.  Appropriately, I think this photograph feels like today should feel.
I pass this little Japanese maple on my street on the way to work every day.  Lately, in the incessant rain, the tree has been dotted with a thousand little droplets of rain that catch the 7 am light in this gorgeous pearly way.  I wanted to capture that – all the little drops together – but this is what came out instead.

I got another job rejection today.  It wasn’t a big deal or anything I was especially invested in.  But it seemed like a really good possibility.  And I couldn’t help thinking that this could be the one.  This could make it all better.  I know I shouldn’t get my hopes up; it’s too hard to be crushed over and over.  I just can’t help it.  I want the bad part to be over so, so badly.

Suffice it to say, I didn’t really like getting that news.  Especially since it came after I had only had the screening phone call with the HR lady that I thought had gone pretty well.  A phone call that my friend Laura agreed with me was an easy experience was was only in place to confirm that “you have a pulse.”

So there’s that.  And it’s Wednesday and it feels like there are still years to go before I don’t have to sit here and wait for someone who needs me to tell them that the thing they’re looking?  That thing they can’t find any mention of on our website?  Yeah.  It’s not there cause we don’t do it.  But let me know if I can answer any other questions at all.  Happy to help.  Byeeeee.

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Photographs by the blind

Sights Unseen

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winter in California

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Retro Techno

I’ve become obsessed with photography.  And like, all of my obsessions, I struggle with a paradoxically insanity of simultaneously believing in my own awesomeness and despairing that I won’t ever be good enough.  The obvious question is “good enough for what?”  To which, I would dance the dance of avoidance and skittering until I finally admit that I want IT.  IT being fortune and glory, of course.

I obsess over Twitter, checking and rechecking to see if I’ve made it on to Favrd.  My little heart weeps over and over that I can’t hang with the cool kids of Twitter fame.  I wish to be a good writer.  But wishing and composing 140 characters of quip is the extent of my willingness to be actually be a good writer.
I obsess over music, searching for one new unknown band after another.  I chase down leads based on “If you like ____, then you may like ____,” wasting hours, one dollar at a time.  And the next thing I know, my latest find is featured on Grey’s Anatomy and an Appple commercial.
Most recently, I have become crazed about photography, and this makes me cringe with sheepishness.  If there’s one thing I’ve learned in the past 2 1/2 years, it’s that everyone thinks they’re a photographer.  And oh god, now I think I’m one of them?  So here’s the thing:  I used to have a little Canon Elph, and then after I started to catch the bug, I bought a G9, which was a $500 camera that I replaced within 2 months with a EOS XS.  Which is to say, that I just started throwing money at my obsession and then I just started getting more and more obsessed.
I check Flickr non-stop to check how many views I’ve had, if there are any comments, and the cherry at the bottom of my shirley temple, if any photos have been starred.  I’ve started making contacts with strangers, and commenting on their photos, just because it gets them to comment back for me.  Admitting this makes me feel like such a loser, although if I could get dozens of complimentary comments and hundreds of views in aday the way it seems like everyone else on Flickr can, then I would embrace my loser like a long lost loser.
Anyway.
This is all just to preface that I got myself a new toy, and I LURVE it.  It’s a digital plastic camera called a Zumi, or technically, a Digital Harinezumi.  It takes retro style pictures with 70’s color and saturation, like a Holga or lomo camera.  And it is a tiny, wee little thing like a spy camera.
Meerkat using the Zumi!

Meerkat using the Zumi!

I don’t have to develop the film, and can just load the pictures from the miniature little memory card.  The pictures are definitely different, but cool.  The Zumi isn’t going to help make me a super duper photog, but I sure am going to have fun playing with it.  To hell with being awesome for a minute.
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