The portfolio page gets a refresh for twenty-twelve
One of the projects I wasn’t planning on tackling this month was to refresh the portfolio interface of the website. Last year I put a lot of effort into tweaking a little flash player to fill 100% of the screen- all for your viewing entertainment. Then a few weeks ago I began getting some odd feedback from people who visited the page. “Interesting,” “Very minimal,” “Why so much white?” and my favorite red flag; “The page seems to stop loading after the first two inches from the top.” So I had to take a look and sure enough, the ‘stretch to 100%’ instruction was being ignored on all the major browsers. Agh!
Wide Wide Wide Angle Photography
Most people call wide-wide-wide angle photography a panorama. Actually, I do also. I had www on my mind when I wrote the title.
Recently, Sony Ericsson released a Beta application for the Android 2.1< operating system which stitches numerous frames from the camera together to create a panorama. Very quickly, I might add. So for the past couple of weeks I’ve been playing around with the application. I put some of the more interesting results up here for you to have a look and let me know what you think. (more…)
‘I Cosplay’ Development Update
Lucky - Yukari Yakumo Portrait of a Cosplayer
It’s been nearly a month since starting up the ‘I Cosplay…’ project. Things are progressing well. It’s time to take a look at what worked and what didn’t, and where to go from here.
I mentioned that I’d come across a new lighting style using a ‘beauty dish’ as a key light. I like the effect but there was a bit more of a learning curve to using it than I expected. When mounted on a Speedlite, the fall-off point isn’t very far and depending on the flash head’s orientation, the unit returns various light patterns.
I found when positioned above and just to the side of the camera during the studio shots that if the person moved just a bit outside of the ‘sweet spot’ the result was terrible- such as a face in shadow or a blown out torso or arm. In the ‘sweet spot’ the lighting is great. The dish creates beautiful light and shadow (more…)
Looks like ‘Kickstarter’ needed a bit of a kickstart itself.
Well, that didn’t work. The ‘I Cosplay’ kickstarter project I mentioned a month ago is about two hours away from fizzling out. Kickstarter didn’t work for the job I hoped it would, which was to find supports willing to inject some much needed funds into the project. It did, however, succeed in some other ways.
I’ve reconnected with old friends and colleagues whom I haven’t heard from or spoken to in quite a long time. I found out a hundred or so people ‘like’ buttoned the project on Facebook. And…
No, I guess that was it. Just those two things. But those are two great things to accomplish! (more…)
PhotoWalk #4b – Liuhua Lake Park
On the last Sunday of March, the photo group got together for the 4th photo walk- around Liuhua lake. One of the things we like to do after each walk is come together, with a large media display, to look at our best images from the day and discuss our successes and set-backs during the walk.
It is a great chance to share our work, discuss our challenges, and possibly come away with new insight on how to do better the next time we are confronted with a similar situation in the field.
Well, it took two months to come together this time, but it finally happened. And it certainly didn’t disappoint! (more…)
The ‘cosplay’ project has 10 days to raise its funding – we can do it!
There are still ten days to get this project supported. ‘Like’ the page one more time on Facebook. ‘Tweet‘ about it once more time on Twitter. Forward the page to one more person in your contact list. This book and these people, the Cosplayers, are offering a fantastic and rare glimpse into the Chinese culture today that really shouldn’t be brushed past.
When I first read about Kickstarter.com on Lifehacker my reaction was ‘This is awesome! This is exactly what my project needs to get underway.’ (more…)
Faces, Places, and Something that rhymes with ‘ces.
Since Sunday, things here have been a whirlwind of new ideas sprouting into new projects. That isn’t the only thing happening around here, however. Updates on Essays and Gallery, the past week, have been a retro week for me- going back to life in the US, and the people, places, and events I photographed there before coming to China in 2007. Here’s a list of the stories and photographs that published since the first of May. (more…)
New Photo Documentary Book Project, ‘I Cosplay’, underway.
Wow, what a difference a day makes! Really. Did you read my last post about joining up with a group of ‘cosplayers‘? Well, I’m hooked. This is going to be my next book length project and to see it through, I turned to a new online ‘funds finder’ called Kickstarter.
This project has got me so excited I didn’t get much sleep last night, literally. Here’s the gist of it- cosplay is a relatively young art form on mainland China. It is a pretty radical form of self-expression through performance art. This is not a place with a good track record for allowing self-expression to flourish and grow. Put all of that together and I see tremendous chance to peek into the positive future and the progressive development this country is heading towards. (more…)
Vegas may have Trekkies, but Guangzhou has Cosplay!
I’ve never been to a Star Trek convention. I missed my chance to see Burning Man. I have yet to stand on the cushy carpet of the MGM during CES. And none of these gatherings have much at all to do with one another. Why associate them? Because none of them are Cosplay, and that’s what we have here in Guangzhou- where I did just attend! On Sunday, YACA, the leading Cosplay convention organizer held their spring 2011 Cosplay convention.
(more…)
Macro Gallery Update: May flowers spring up from the showers of April
As foreseen and foretold- those horrid showers of April do indeed yield May flowers. In this case, the flowers were actually photographed in November, but hey, you wanted flowers- you get flowers. (more…)
Children of the Chinese Countryside.
Not long after I settled into Jiujiang, I took my first trip into the Chinese countryside, guided by an art major from the university. She introduced me to Ruichang, a town on the outskirts of Jiujiang. Ruichang suffered a major earthquake in 2005. Her family home was one of the few that remained standing. Unfortunately, the home was structurally weakened and her family was forced to abandon it.
I only saw the house pointed out from a distance across a farmers field. (more…)
Chinese Lions and Chinese Dragons and Chinese Kung Fu Children, Oh my!
It’s actually not as bad as it seems. In the first couple of months after arriving in China, Jiujiang hosted their second annual International Lion and Dragon Dance competition. During the opening ceremony there was a performance by children showing off their Kung Fu dance skills. The event lasted a few days and being the veteran outdoor athletic event photographer that I am…er, was- Teva Games, I didn’t miss a moment.
Hop pass the break for a link to the photos. (more…)
A new section of the site you probably couldn’t care less about comes out in a brand new skin.
Have you ever looked up at the night sky and the billions of stars above and asked yourself; “What’s this all about?” Yes? Me too! How about when you are gazing upon this snazzy website? No? Oh. Yeah, me neither. [insert awkward laugh here]
Well, if you were wondering; I just published the About section of the site, which answers that question a bit. It is also where you can toggle through my updated Curriculum Vitae. Now the heading for this post is making more sense, right? [pause and clear throat] (more…)
29,990 Photographs taken in 3.5 years in China
Remember the hit Broadway musical from the 1990′s- Rent? 525,600 minutes. That’s how they measured a year. That or they measured it in love. How do you measure life in love if love, according to home journals and advice columnists, is supposed to be timeless and we all know the life of every living organism is finite (for now)? Sorry, got off topic there.
Five hundred, twenty-five thousand, six hundred minutes or -what happened to the other 348.766 minutes, by the way? or, one photograph every seventeen point five hundred twenty-five thousandths minutes. I swear that .525 was just a coincidence. In any case, it doesn’t have the same rhythm when you put it to the soundtrack.
But it’s even crazier still to wrap my mind around the fact that since coming to China in September, 2007, I have captured 29,990 photographs. (more…)
The Portfolio gets its day.
And its day is called ‘full screen’ day. You may or may not know it, but the ‘cool’ factor behind the smooth display of photographs here is owed to Todd and his crew of great writers over at Slideshow Pro. It is that player which has been quietly powering all of the images available to see here.
Today, I’m happy to say that the sore spot that was the decaying code running the portfolio page has been vastly rewritten- all in Flash. (more…)
Lifestyle gallery update: College life in China.
Last week I showed you a university graduation in China- Jiujiang University’s graduation 2009. A day before that we took a look at Track and Field held in Chinese university.
This new set of images takes us back to 2007, my first year in China, and into the everyday lives of Chinese university students. Hop past the break for a link to the gallery. (more…)
Lifestyle gallery update: City living in east central China. Second Edition
Earlier, I updated the Lifestyle section of the gallery with some examples of city life in China. Adding to that, here are some more examples of the sometimes extraordinarily unique aspects of life in China. Hop past the break for a link. (more…)
More landscape photos added to Landscapes
While going back through the 2007 catalog, I came across a few more photographs worth including in the Landscapes section on Gallery. Head over to the gallery for a look. (more…)
Another Week of April Showers and We’ll Have Some May Flowers
Is there any truth to that old adage? I mean, really, in some parts of the world April is a pretty dry month and still they have pretty flowers! Ok, maybe not in May perhaps, but then were just arguing semantics, aren’t we?
In any case, we have some beautiful photographs of flowers (some with showers showing), plants, and even a Luna moth, to look at in deep close stunning detail, while we wait for the rains of April to satiate our own little claims of terra and bring forth May’s gift. (If you read that last bit with a hint of Earl Jones, it sounds better.) (more…)
Jiujiang University Class of 2009 Graduated.
A deadpan headline, to be sure. In its defense, it is befitting of a ceremony that appeared so matter-of-factly. The graduation ceremony in Jiujiang was quick. It was moved up by an hour to help stave off the heat- the ceremony took place at the end of June. There were no chairs for the graduating students to sit during the speeches. Only a peppering of parents were in the stands to watch the event. About an hour after the students assembled and the faculty were seated, mortar boards were whizzing through the air and where a moment before, college students fidgeted and swayed from left foot to right foot, the newest college graduates of Jiujaing University stood proud with smiles and exhilaration. (more…)
Running really fast and jumping really high. Pursued criminal or Track and Field competition?
The answer is- Track and Field competition. OK, spoiler right there in the first line. Sorry, but really? You were going to go with ‘criminal’? For shame.
Jiujiang University’s annual track and field competition coincided nicely with the 60th anniversary of the People’s Republic of China in 2009. To celebrate, they jazzed up their opening ceremony. The competition lasted for three days and included all of the expected events- sprint, relay, long-distance running, high jump, long jump, javelin, … – you get the idea. (more…)
Pretty Flowers blooming in Spring
I thought about adding “Shocker” to the headline of this post, then thought better of it. I don’t know- “Shocker” just seems so bitter a term. And it’s hard to be bitter when we’re talking about flowers and the beauty of nature. That is, unless the flowers in reference are roses and it’s February 14th and the stupid florist with the stupid flowers who hikes the price of roses to a stupid amount at that time of year was stupidly sold out when I went to buy some at the last minute because I relied on my stupid task manager to remind me to buy them and it failed to remind me so I was left to buy the last stupid rose from a stupid convenient mart for a stupid exorbitant amount of money. Then, and only then, I agree- yes it is alright to add “shocker” in a headline such as; “Shocker: Florists Sell Out of Expensive Roses on Valentine’s Day.”
However, I digress. It is not February and we are not talking about roses. (more…)
Early Buddhists may have run out of paint- 50,000+ Buddha statues carved into cave walls.
Sixteen kilometers outside of Datong, a northern border town between China and Inner-Mongolia on the Chinese side, there sits, carved into the cave walls of the Yungang Grottoes, over 51,000 statues of Buddha and Bodhisattva. The Yungang Grottoes, or Yungang caves, are one of the three most famous ancient sculptural sites of China, aside from the Longmen and Mogao caves.
During my ’round China’ vagabond in the summer of 2009, Datong and the Yungang caves were my second stop. The first stop was Xi’an.
I didn’t count the number of statues I photographed. (more…)
Really Pretty Flowers Prefer Fresh Water in China.
It’s true! It must be true because the largest field of the most beautiful flower of Asia, the Lotus, is in China’s largest fresh water lake, Baiyangdian. Every summer in August, the lotus reaches it peak blossom. The lake is vast and the fields are only accessible by boat. In August, 2009, I visited the lake and it’s precious flowers. Head over to the gallery to have a look for yourself. Or wait until August and make the trek to see them in person. (more…)
