Focus on the Positive...but Develop from the Negatives

You know a Christmas scene's true aesthetics when you take away the saturated color and the beauty is still present... And the ability to see that presence is a gift.

3½" inch floppy disks. That's so 90s!    

"You do not choose your destiny. It chooses you" Mine did.

Why Celebrate Photography? World Photo Day captures a great reason on their site: "Photography surrounds us in every moment and yet, we often don't realize how powerful the images we capture every day can be. "Today, we can share memories across the globe in seconds. Photography is an invention that has revolutionized the way we see the world. We can visit places without leaving our home. We can share adventures with friends in another city and we can watch grandchildren grow up thousands of kilometers away. "There was a time when photography didn't exist." World Photo Day is certainly a great day for me to celebrate. Photography IS my "purpose, passion, & perspective." It has been a part of more than two thirds of my life. Even at times over the years when I was focusing more on video, Website coding, or design, I still enjoyed taking photos and working with them on the computer. My multimedia always revolved around photographs...

  Traffic light's 101st anniversary celebrated

Detours, dead ends, endless explorations You were my only destination

Seven years ago on this date was my first day working as a digital Photoshop artist at the actual photo shop. What can I say about seven years? What can I not say? ☺ When I started what I thought was to be a temp position for the summer restoring photos and scanning prints/ negatives, I never imagined I would still be there seven years later, doing ALL I do now. My second job that was to be the "fun, get some photography experience, one-day-a-week commuter" position today encompasses all of my multimedia degree. Yes, we do a lot of different stuff, but that is so me with my many interests. I didn't have to decide on concentrating on my artistic or technical side, both are incorporated here, so it rarely gets boring. There have been a lot of changes in seven years. Things have really changed this past year as I have become the head artist, solely responsible for completing and printing all the photo restorations/retouchings, graphic artwork, and digital imaging or...

Blast from the Past: Vintage Technologies That We No Longer Use  I happened to come across this article in which I could change the title to "Vintage Technologies I Still Use." Within the past two days, I have used: 9. Cassette Tape Recorders 11. Cassette Tapes 8. Reel to Reel 31. Slide Projectors 3. VHS Format 26. CRT Monitor 34. Polaroid Cameras 19. Walkman (well microtape recorder - close enough) 2. Betamax 35. Home Movie Projectors Today, I actually will be using: 6. Turntables 36. Vinyl Records In the past month, I have played: 39. 8 Track I have physically seen the device within the last two days: 1. “Super 8/8mm” Handheld Video Cameras 4. Laser Disc Players I still have these (or have access to): 18. Portable Televisions 20. Discman 30. Zip Drive 33. 3.5″ Floppy Disc 12. Boom Boxes 17. PDA’s 32. 8″ Floppy Disc 28. Typewriters 7. HAM Radio The list said Wang Calculators but forgot two other technologies I see daily...

Springing the clocks ahead for Daylight Saving Time:  The only time of the year you look forward to losing an hour of sleep!

I l♥ve the experience of imaging old photographs and negatives, as well as learning about vintage audio, video, and photographic mediums. It's handling a part of history that relates to what I do and who I am.  Saturday was an interesting day of historical photography for me. I have been working on imaging these 8x10 black and white glass negatives, which glass ones I have done in the past were always much smaller. At the end of the day, a few tintypes were brought in (Civil War era). It's been a year or so since I last handled any. There was a rush order to scan 126 negatives, (which the lady was told were 110s). I have actually been imaging a lot of both negs rece ntly, but the lady was happy to find someone who could do it. They were of her mom's wedding, which they never knew existed, and she started crying when she saw the 4x4 prints! I also learned more about developing times and dilution rates for various B&W films. Plus, first thing, I fixed my f...

Before there was "Be kind, please rewind" My recent project has been converting a radio news broadcast clip recorded on 8-track in the early 1970s to digital format. I am old enough to know eight-track cartridges play in a loop and won't rewind, but I learned the time length of the loops and the technical aspect of how switching "tracks" worked.

Isn't it amazing how it takes a few years of positive compliments from many people to repair the damage done by just one person's negativity? Each inspirational comment helps to lighten the scars a little more. But remember sores can suddenly itch while they are healing, so don't go and get the urge to poke at it. Even though the wound appears to be healed, you can still easily break the scab off and make the sore bleed all over again.