I toggle on/off the urge to use Adobe Lightoom as a catalog library and photo editor for the past 16 years. I paid one price for it back in 2007 and then they went to a subscription-based plan a couple of years back. I moaned, groaned but eventualy relented and shelled out for it every year.
For now, I am going all-in with VSCO (Visual Supply Company,) as a photo host and photo social network. VSCO is an anti-Instagram alternative with zero advertising, and zero BS that comes with social media. It is designed for creators and always has been.
Instead of a subscription-based Adobe Photoshop, I’ve been enjoying Pixelmator Pro. Then there is Darkroom and Snapseed and… those are some powerful tools for my mobile photography film lab.
Chances are in a few months that I’ll toggle Adobe back “on” but for now, I’ll be saving money and am done with them.
In lieu of having enough time to go out and photograph something (anything!), I’ve been generating synthographs. Synthography is a method of generating digital media synthetically using machine learning. This is distinct from other graphic creation and editing methods in that synthography uses artifical intelligence text-to-image modeling to generate synthetic media. By using prompt engineering, text descriptions as input to creating a desired image. In simple terminology- type what you want to see and your artificially intelligent tools will create the image. Neat.
One of the biggest mistakes readers make is assuming that all books should be read from the first page to the last page in an unbroken sequence. For non-fiction books, learning is non-linear. Non-fiction books are for thinking, not reading, and context is king. Break out the highlighter and pen to take notes in the marginalia. Argue with the author. Fiction should be read linearly while non-fiction benefits from non-linear reading. Finally, it’s important to engage with ideas messily and unpredictably, rather than assuming you need to have a rigid note-taking workflow.
Once upon a time, there was a camera in my hand every weekend off to explore and shoot. The camera was my passport and I went everywhere with it, including dangerous places I wasn’t “supposed” to go. I’ve noticed in the past year, however, that I just can’t be bothered. This bothers me. There is always something to shoot and yet, around here, I’ve seen it all and captured it. The last time I was excited about photography was on a return trip to New Orleans last year with the new Sony A7 mirrorless camera. But once again, it was ho-hum. The city wasn’t exciting as it used to be. The camera was just another camera.
For the past 365 days, I’ve tried shooting with only the Hipstamatic every day during “Snappy Hour”– that last hour before sunset with the golden rich colors. Yeah, it was a project but looking back now to me it was…boring.
Popular camera magazines have turned their printers off. A major photography website has shut down after 25 years. Most photographers are tired of watching or reading the same format hyped by journalists regarding the.next.big.thing. When you read/watch reviews of cameras you always hear about megapixels, shutter speeds, battery life, blah, blah, but not what sort of images are produced. No soul, just technology. There is more to photography than a large sensor or post-production digital editing.
I miss the hours spent with the film camera process of loading the film, advancing the next exposure, creating negatives, selecting the best images out of only 36 exposures and then running the images through the chemical fixer. Ahh those darkroom chemical smells!
Hold on…just spilled some pipe tobacco on the MacBook. Okay, where was I? I miss portrait photography in the way I want to make it. No wait, that’s for another post. Ahh yes, the wrap-up:
How do I get my mojo back? Do I go back to analog film photography and spend hundreds of dollars on film and film development? There is something to be said about the analog results- they have soul. Or do I sell most of my digital cameras and focus on just the one? Those brilliant but souless photos are more cost effective.
With the proper tools, anyone can make brilliant photos on the iPhone, but the computational photography takes a lot of the soul out of it too.
I am tired of the documentational photographs I’ve been shooting lately. I want to get back to making art. Maybe only then I can get my photo mojo back(?)
When you buy a new vinyl record nowadays, it comes with a code to download the MP3 digital version too. Why can’t we get a free e-book version when you buy a paper book?
Anyone wishing to explore artificial intelligence first needs to study philosophy.
Eastern works such as Tau, western works such as the meditations of Marcus Aurelius, the Bible, and other modern day thinkers.
To understand and explore artificial intelligence, we have to explore the implications or consequences for this understanding and knowledge of ethics, consciousness, epistemology, intelligent problem-solving and most importantly, free will.
While taking a couple of Stanford online courses on quantum theory, quantum computing and quantum mechanics, I was overwhelmed by the theories and possibilities. Quickly, those theories will become reality. An intelligent, conscious being driven by qubits and binary coding will exist. What would it’s role be? Will it have a place among us? Will it have the same rights and freedoms that we do?
Happy 4/4 day! It is April 4, 2023- time to start the second chapter for the new year’s resolutions. In the past 10 years or so, I have attempted a variation of resolution themes in an attempt to hold myself accountable, and all of them have had limited success. The first few attempts were centered around my resolutions and a monthly check-in by way of accountability. For ten years I would focus on what I called Groundhog Day Resolutions. The kickoff would always start on February 2nd or 2/2. This was a little over a month after the western calendar of New Year’s Day on January 1st.This year I want to do a variation of a monthly accountability check-in. I mentioned the “Groundhog Day Resolutions” and its limited success. While I believe the theory behind those initiatives were sound, the practice was not. So it’s time to have a re-think about the process.
In 2023, I am writing a book on it. This year I am thinking of each month of this year as its own chapter in a book. I’ll do a chapter review on the same date that corresponds with the month.
Example: The book will start on February 2 (2/2) and will go on until March 3rd or 3/3. On 3/3 I will conduct a review of the previous month, and so on and so forth. With the chapter review, I’ll throw in some chapter highlights (in blue) of the previous month in hope that by the end of the year (11/11), I’ll have written a book I can be proud of.
Here is a quick list of things I want to do for the new year:
Learn Spanish
More meditation & yoga
Organize the photo Archive as a database
Minimalism/essentialism
Quit smoking
No alcohol
Lower BP
Lose 20 pounds
Learn Spanish
No es un buen mes para aprender espanol. My goal of properly learning Spanish kicked off on December 28, according to DuoLingo, my language app. After doing lessons 65 days in a row I burned out. The lessons are sporadic and when I have the time or desire to, say maybe twice a week.
💬
Chapter Three Highlight: tengo que hacerlo mejor en esto!
Meditation and yoga almost daily.
Fail. Not one yoga session all month so I have to get disciplined here.
🙏🏼
Chapter Three Highlight: I can feel the tension so its time to up my practice!
Yoga & Meditation programs with Apple Fitness+
Photography Goals
Non-existent. I have had zero time to photograph anything meaningful due to the day job. Sure, I still take daily pics during “snappy hour” when prompted but nothing to proudly display or print. Photo organization has mostly not even been on my mind.
📸
Chapter Three Highlight: The cameras are getting dusty.
Minimalism and essentialism
How have I been adding stuff and not removing it? Yes, the purchases were work essentials but nothing has gone out the door either.
🗑️
Chapter Three Highlight: Time to trash the place.
Quit smoking
What are you looking at?
🚭
Chapter Three Highlight: On hiatus.
No Alchohol
What are you looking at?
🍺
Chapter Three Highlight: On hiatus.
Lower Blood pressure
Priority one with results. I started taking BP medicine to help recuce the tension. Too soon to tell if it is having any effect but I am hoping. Less, salt. Less sugar. Less eating out. Increase my cardio with more walking, yoga. All of this should help me lower my weight and eventually those readings will come down.
❤️
Chapter Three Highlight: Lower blood pressure!
Lose 20 pounds
In the past few years, I maxed out at 217.4 pounds. That isn’t great for a 5’7″ frame. When starting this initiative last month (2/2), I was down to 204.4. Currently (3/3) I am down to 193. So glad to see some results and hope the remaining 12 pounds will not be too difficult. My goals is to get down to 185 pounds. 175 is better, but let’s be realistic. The issue here is nutrition. The job has me out in the field for 8-10 hours daily and the temptation to eat out is strong. But the job is also a physical one so I should take advantage of all that lifting and walking.
👟
Chapter Three Highlight: 24 pounds lost so far. Mission accomplished but now I want to get down to 185. 8 more pounds to go!
It’s time to get to writing a new chapter. See you on May 5th (5/5) for a review of Chapter 4.
I’ve had the opportunity to make a few backgrounds for the iDevices and wanted to share them at no cost if you are interested. Good for any device. Just click here to download and save to your screens. Let me know what you think and maybe even send a screenshot with them installed?
Hi! In case you are new around here, I am Chris. If you are new around here, here is something About Me and why you should read my newsletter. In this letter, I share what’s on my mind, my latest writings, articles worth reading from around the web, my recommendations & sometimes my photography.
The first edition of the newsletter is here, so thanks for subscribing! I’ll try to keep it concise and interesting.
Did you know that one of the possible origins of the April Fool tradition goes back to 1500’s France? When they switched calendars to celebrate the new year on January 1 instead of April 1, the spring equinox, a lot of people were slow to catch on or recognize the change. Those people were the butt of jokes and hoaxes because they still celebrated the new year on April 1st. These gags included having paper fish attached to their backs and called “April Fish.” As in an easily caught fish or a gullible person.
I finished a novel called “Station Eleven” which is now a series on HBO. Following that up with “Sea of Tranquility” that sums up three distinct time periods but are somehow linked.
If you enjoy vintage sci-fi stories, there is a podcast called “Relic Radio” Sci-Fi that re-broadcasts radio dramatizations from the 1950’s- 1960’s. It is amazing that the same hopes and fears are realized back then and now. We haven’t changed all that much.
Currently watching the Battlestar Galactica space drama remake. This is a brilliant series that touches every aspect of human ethics, emotions, religion, politics all while fleeing annihilation from the relentless, equally brilliant Cylon race…the machines that humans created.
The Hoover Dam hides an intriguing secret connecting sky to ground and past to present, using a similar “as above, so below” system of measuring time displayed at the Giza Pyramid of Egypt.
Located on the Nevada side of the Hoover Dam is an monument dedicated to over 100 workers who lost their lives to the construction of the Hoover Dam.
Greeting visitors are two huge sculptures of winged celestial beings and the base with inscriptions, but not many people notice that the monument sits on top of a celestial map.
“Winged Figures of the Republic” on the Nevada side of the Hoover Dam 02/19/2019
This celestial map is embedded around the monument. It is a beautifully executed representation of the night sky for a specific day and time and it includes many decorative features, astronomical markings and curious labels.
Back in 1930s, when this was designed, only an astronomer could have made sense of this information; but today, thanks to computers and applications like Stellarium, this knowledge is available to the average person. Aligning structures to constellations or fixed points was common in the past.
What is unique about the Hoover Dam sky map is the beauty of the design and precision employed by its creator, Oskar Hansen.
According to Hansen, the reason for this monument and star map is –
“to preserve for future generations the date on which President Franklin D. Roosevelt dedicated the dam and the power plant.”
Hansen encoded information in his masterpiece that relates to and preserves a very specific place and moment in time:
PLACE (Hoover Dam)
YEAR (1935)
MONTH (September)
DAY (30th)
TIME (21:30)
But how did he do it?
36.016834, -114.738998 Hoover Dam, Lake Mead Nevada on 02/19/2019
The phenomenon results from the wobbling of the Earth’s axis, mostly to the mass of the Moon. An observer on the surface of the spinning Earth looking east at sunrise would see different stars rising at different times, the result being that over 25,920 years, the entire circle of the 12 constellations of the Zodiac will successively appear on the horizon at very predictable intervals. Approximately every 2,150 years (25,920 /12), a new constellation will rise.
The second place to look is north, to see the Pole Star, a different face on our clock. If you attached a laser to the axis of the Earth’s rotation, it would trace a giant circle on the celestial sphere. Stars which are on or near this circle successively become “pole stars” over a period of approximately 26,000 years. Currently, in the Northern Hemisphere, Polaris is the north star, but in 12,000 years, the axis will point to Vega. Neat.
“Man’s control over natural forces has grown in proportion to his increasing knowledge of the true nature of the Universe of which we are a part…Time, the intangible governor of all our acts, is measured to us by the external relations of our Earth to other worlds. Therefore, I thought it fitting to have the base of the monument rise from a finely wrought, marble terrazzo star map of the northern regions of the sky.
“The designer of the star chart…placed the bodies of our solar system in the terrazzo, correct to the minutest fraction of an inch in scale of the design. One versed in the abstruse mathematics of astronomy may calculate the precession of the Pole Star for the next 14,000 years by studying the design of the star chart. Conversely, future generations may look upon this monument and determine –if no other means are available – the exact date on which engineers and craftsmen of our generation completed this giant structure”.
I think it is fascinating that this piece of archeological history resides in the United States. It is a shame that there are not more structures, symbols and memorials that will stand the test of time for future generations to look back on.
Hi! In case you are new around here, I am Chris. If you are new around here, here is something About Me and why you should read my newsletter. In this letter, I share what’s on my mind, my latest writings, articles worth reading from around the web, my recommendations & sometimes my photography.
Every now and then I receive an email stating “I think your readers would be interested in _____.”
While I am grateful for the comments and feedback, that is not how this personal website works. Initially I write for myself and occasionally people agree with me and find it useful. Thank you! I can fill this website with all manner of interesting topics to maximize an audience but by then it becomes click bait. Instead, I write about topics and themes that I am interested and then others may find interesting as well then they decide to share it. See the difference? By all means, keep sharing topics of interest so we can all benefit. This is the heart of the social internet.
The articles I write here are infrequently consistent. They are written when time allows. When silent I am either working the day job or reading/researching topics of interest to myself and then saved for later use and sharing here or in the newsletter. Ah yes, the newsletter. Every member (free!), will get an inbox notification for each post created here. I’m contemplating a weekly round-up of the aforementioned topics of interest and sharing them. The format will loosely a bit like this:
An Image List of 5-10 topics, links, etc
Interesting article from web
Interesting article from web
Another subject
Link to interesting subject
What I’ve read
What I listen to
What I watched
A photo of something I discovered that week
A relevant video
Personal update
First, I check my website and see if there’s anything that I think is worth linking to. Then, I’ll check my log/journal for interesting topics, music, movies, or books, etc. Then, I’ll review my Twitter feeds that I’ve saved to share. After that I will scour the feeds I’ve saved in ReadWise, Matter or Feedbin.
I want to send out a newsletter to interested parties about topics that I have actually read and am genuinely interested in.
If you don’t already, you can click that subscribe button the website header or at the bottom of this article. I promise no spam, no advertising. Ever.
