Browse Month: April 2007

dodge and burn

img_5694.jpgJust got back from my second evening in the darkroom and it’s getting pretty fun. I took a new roll of b&w last weekend and had the roll processed in time for today’s class but I was a dummy and left it at home. *sigh* So we printed some of my negatives from 1995, which didn’t come out too bad. I guess I’ll get to play with the new negs next week. We spent a good 2.5 hours in the lab printing and processing. We’re just getting the basics down but I’ve already dodged and burned some of my photos to make them look a little more interesting. Fun fun fun!

Props to all y’all

It’s National High Five Day and I certainly gotta give it up to the members of our *isofosho* Flickr group. We’re on our third theme, “Lemme See Yo’ Ride“, and the first day of voting has gotten off to a good start. We average about 20 submissions each time and the photos have been really interesting. It’s so neat to see everyone’s interpretation of the theme.  It’s also fun to see which ones get voted for and why. So, here’s a *high five* to all my fellow photogs!! Keep ’em comin’!

If you wish to join, just log in to Flickr with your Yahoo! login address and ask to join our group. Some just submit photos, some just vote, some just watch the action, and some do it all! Come play with us!

Let’s walk to dinner!

Uh, that’s something you don’t normally hear in suburbia but that’s what we did tonight.  Jes and I went out to dinner with Jay and Nikki (our neighbors) and we walked there.  In New York City it comes so naturally but in a city where BMWs and minivans rule, it’s another story.  Luckily, we live close to a number of decent restaurants so we walked down to Lucca Cafe.  They serve tapas-sized dishes and a large selection of wines.  My favorites were the pappardelle and butternut squash ravioli.  We also tried a reisling and a pinot noir that were both pretty good.  Dessert was a banana cake with dark chocolate and a key lime mousse.  Yum yum.

lobsta time

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Our cousins from Thailand are in town this week so we, of course, have to go out to dinner!! So, we all met up for in the Westminster area for some messy Chinese-style lobster. I didn’t think I liked lobster before but this one was pretty good. Johnny also brought his special “friend”, Joy, who seems to be able to throw herself into our family antics quite well.

20 Weeks Left

duckies.jpgWe’ve got 20 weeks to go before the half marathon. I ran my four-mile long run today after a week of travelling and no running. I thought I’d be going super slow today but managed to finish with a 10:15 pace including stops at the street lights. Here’s the route I took today. I intended to do an “out and back” but surprisingly the ducks had enough water to swim around in the river so I kept going.

Spring has definitely arrived because the sun was pretty strong towards the end of my run. Pretty soon I’ll be seeing little ducklings swirling around in the river. Can’t wait! Let’s just hope there’s a little more rain in our future. The riverbed was looking pretty dry.

I took the photo on the left last spring. These ducklings were looking more like teenagers.

love the smell of those chemicals

Last night I started my 8-week darkroom class.  I also recruited my neighbor, Jay, to come along.  Once I stepped into the darkroom, the smell of the chemicals just gave me a nostalgic feeling of excitement.  I haven’t done this in about 12 years but found a bunch of old negatives and some unused paper in my stash so I was ready to go.  Last night we got a refresher on how the enlarger works, what the times were on the developing chemicals, and learned where all the supplies are stored.  Jerry, our instructor, did a demonstration on one photo and showed us how he makes test strips and how he dodges and burns a photo to get the exposure right.  He also surprised each of us with four free rolls of black and white film that he got from a Fuji Film distributor.  Sweet!  I didn’t get to print anything yet because we ran out of time but we’ll have plenty of time in the next 7 weeks.  Our class has only 4 students enrolled and get the whole darkroom to ourselves for 3 straight hours per week.  I also got a free pass to the open studio for the 8 weeks that we’re in the course.  Let the printing begin!!