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Wednesday, February 28, 2007

Downtown Paris


Downtown Paris
Originally uploaded by homer4k.
One of my latest shots - this one came out really really well. Black and white can make ANYTHING look artistic!

Tuesday, February 27, 2007

I AM PUBLISHED!!!!

...or whatever you call it when someone uses your photo for something! Check out this link!!!


Monday, February 26, 2007

I spent the weekend doing several things, most notably winning at Bingo (and it wasn't Colby who won this time - it was ME!!! Ahh, the thrill of yelling out "BINGO!!!"). But I also watched two classic movies - Casablanca and Carrie, neither of which I have ever watched before.

Casablanca didn't impress me much - I was expecting something incredible, from all that it's part of pop culture. There were many many familiar lines of dialog - "Play it, Sam", "Round up the usual suspects", "Here's looking at you, kid" and more. But all in all, not a big deal.

Carrie, on the other hand, was a pretty interesting movie. Not the usual Stephen King stuff - the only gory part was when she got drenched with pig's blood (eww). And the mother was very creepy - what with her warped view of Christianity and tendency to stab her daughter. Anyway, Carrie is one of the few King books I have never read, either - I think I will take a stab at reading it sometime soon (oooh, bad bad pun). Oops, time to go to work!

Saturday, February 24, 2007

Mars Dog


Mars Dog
Originally uploaded by homer4k.
No, it's not what you think. Snickers didn't become the first canine to walk on Mars today. I took her to Pat Mayse Lake for a walk and to take pics. The winds were gusting 50-60 miles per hour, raising dust from West Texas into the air and carrying it over us. The white balance was all off, but I liked the effect. It reminded me of some of the photos I've seen from the Viking probes and the Mars Rovers - minus the trees and water, of course. And dog.

Zzzzzzz...

Hmm. I slept right through the storms that rolled through this morning - no pics or anything :(
Springtime is here in Texas, though - storms rolling in, trees beginning to bud out. Dad even told me he has daffodils blooming. It's this time of year that starts me thinking...road trip! That's how we wound up going to the Grand Canyon last year - I got that feeling and BAM - there we were. I'm feeling that way again right now. Of course, in March I'm going to Tennessee to see Johnny Cash's grave (among other things) but the really awesome upcoming trip to Yellowstone isn't until June. I kinda want to go right now! But it will still be cold. Oh well.

Lightning


Lightning
Originally uploaded by homer4k.
Still playing with Flickr/Blogger. BUT: There are severe storms on the way (supposed to hit around daybreak or so) - perhaps some awesome lightning pics in the making if I can make myself get up.

Not likely, unless there is very LOUD thunder!

Snickers


Snickers
Originally uploaded by homer4k.
This is just a test of Flickr's blogging feature - I made this post from Flickr straight to Blogger! Plus, this is one of my absolute faves of Snickers, what with the megasniffer effect of the macro lens.

Wednesday, February 21, 2007

A List...

Gee, not much posting lately. Of course, not alot has been happening - over the past few weeks, here is a partial listing of interesting bits of tid:

1) I got a teleconverter (2x) for my camera, so my 150 mm lens becomes a 300 mm lens - with a slight reduction in image quality. But it was much much cheaper than buying that $6,000 lens I had my eye on (!)

2) I got sick - went home from work Tuesday of last week feeling quite icky. I felt so bad I didn't walk for two days straight!

3) Speaking of walking, I have been spending my lunch break walking at a local park for the past three weeks (excluding sick days, lol). At least a mile at first, I am currently working on 2 miles per day this week. Soon, I may even start jogging!

4) Along with number 3, I have modified my diet, so to speak, and so the diet/exercise combination has resulted in a loss of 21 lbs as of the Tuesday morning weigh-in. Yay me!

5) I got a fisheye converter for my camera (same as number 1, but does the opposite. I believe it is a 0.42x converter, which means it increases the field of view, along with a slight reduction in image quality, but for much cheaper than a fisheye lens)

6) I joined a local photography group - we have a monthly 'contest' where we submit a photo taken during that month and we all decide on the winner. No photoshop allowed (that was my suggestion, otherwise I would blow everyone else away cuz they are mostly photoshop-challenged). On second thought, I should have kept my mouth shut - blast, foiled again!!

7) Addendum to number 6: Okay, it's not really a photography group, it was just an idea Mark had, but I thought calling it a group sounded cooler. Anyway, the 'members' include myself, Mark, Marion, and related children who like photography (Meredith). It may be small, but we could be open to new members - call us the Lamar County Photography Association (if that group already exists, we'll have to destroy them first - I'll let my Minister of Getting Rid Of Peeps I Don't Like handle that. Dee, where are you??)

I guess that's it for now!

Saturday, February 10, 2007

Photoshop Techniques

I learned a nifty and easy new PS trick to liven up photos recently. Basically, you take your image, duplicate it as a new layer, then apply a gaussian blur to the new layer so that basic shapes are still visible, but the details are blurred. Then change the mode to Overlay, and you wind up softly increasing contrast and saturation - here's a before and after.



Simple, but nice - and very effective on low contrast images.

A Pilgrimage

Some of you may know of my fascination with Johnny Cash - a somewhat recent thing, of course. I never listened to him much growing up, other than when Dad would hum Ghost Riders In The Sky to wake me up in the mornings (I was very young, ha ha). About two years ago, I saw the video to Johnny Cash's song, Hurt (originally by Trent Reznor (spelling?) of Nine Inch Nails). I have never watched a music video that had emotional impact - I was floored by Cash's video (and had to immediately download the song of course). The scenes of an old man looking back on his life of excess, and realizing that it was all for nought. (You could almost hear in the background something from Solomon - meaningless, meaningless, all is meaningless). Anyway, it completely shattered my preconceived notions about Johnny Cash being a old country singer. And I began to listen to some of his other songs as well.
When the movie Walk The Line came out, it grabbed my fascination as well - a good story, well worth a viewing (or multiple viewings, in my case). And last year, when I went to Arizona, guess what we listened to all the way there? Why, nothing but Johnny Cash (and the Walk the Line soundtracks as well). Good times!
Anyway, yesterday Colby had an idea that has captured my fancy - a weekend trip to Henderson, TN, to see the grave of Johnny Cash and June Carter. Almost like a pilgrimage, but more fun. And of course, we can listen to all the Johnny Cash music we want.


And by the way: if you are tired and sleepy when you wake up in the morning, take a hint from Dad and sit on the edge of the bed, feet hanging down, and hum the theme from Ghost Riders In The Sky - it really does help you wake up!

Saturday, February 03, 2007

Random....

Have you ever been in a situation where (during a conversation somewhere among a group) someone blurts out something totally random and unrelated to the main conversation? That's the impression I got after reading the following editoral (not written by Roy!) from the Paris News.

To the Editor:

This month I saved $598 on grocery and other items with sales coupons. I spent $139. I bought 279 items from Jan. 1 until Jan 28.

Martha Lane

Paris
Okay, let me get this straight. Martha was totaling up her coupon savings (as well as counting the number of items she bought) for nearly a month. She saw the total savings, and was apparently impressed by the figure, enough to tell the Paris News about it.

How bizarre and totally random! I guess Martha just likes to share the details of her life with peeps - or perhaps it was a thinly disguised promotion for the use of coupons? You be the judge!