Photo of the Day (February 21, 2009)(Sorry so late!)
I went to the park down the street around sunset to try and capture some nice lighting on the lake there. Well, I couldn’t get to the stupid lake because I was wearing stupid flip flops and the stupid ground was not stupid friendly. In a slightly mopey manner, I started trekking around on the slightly more friendly trail when I noticed the grasses (wheat grasses?) and decided to reevaluate my photographic purpose. Originally I was just going to use one good shot. Recently, I have been seeing textured pictures everywhere. I have briefly read some “tutorials” (in quotation marks because they amounted to crap) and seen some fellow photographers amazing results and decided that I would give it a try. I tried. The end result is just me playing around in photoshop without paying attention to the newer techniques I have picked up. I wanted to see what I could accomplish on my own merit. This photo is a combination of 3 photos. The orginal; sunset with some grass, blue corners, and black bottom. The 2nd shot: photograph of one wheat grass (coming in from right side of frame). The 3rd shot: close up of a rock wall. I like the outcome but definitely feel that I have more to learn. Oh yes, a lot more.
KC photo of the Day!!! (February 21, 2009) (yes, from over a week ago…um, sorry)
We were taking a much needed out of doors break and KC was doing her usual rolling around on the grass routine. For those of you unfortunate enough to have never witnessed this act let me try to explain. KC is a 75lbs Golden Retriever but acts like she’s only a 10lbs Golden Retriever. The grass rolling game goes something like this. You and KC are sitting in the grass where she will, at some point, flop dramatically to the ground and proceed to roll over your legs while pushing her butt up in the air. Yes, you read that last bit correctly. Eventually she is just rolling back and forth across your legs sans (without) air butt. If you try and move she will follow (without actually getting up, she kind of belly scooches over to you). The game is immensely fun for KC but potentially painful for the human participent (consider that your first and only warning).
Photo of the Day!!!
I think it’s called the magic hour – that time of day when the sun is setting but casts a glorious glow on everything. Oh man, I hope that “magic hour” isn’t a euphemism for something dirty. Crap, I should look it up now. * INSTANT UPDATE: I was right. I like being right by the way
I normally don’t like the color yellow and I’m not to fond of orange either but at this time of day I could care less because everything just looks so warm and inviting. Even garbage looks nice. Okay, that may be going a bit too far but you get the idea. This little bench/window/wall scene was literally half a block away from where I used to live a few years ago. I would often walk past the parking lot that it sits in but never actually noticed how beautifully composed it was until today.I only wish the shadow on top wasn’t so harsh…Still glad I took the picture though
Oh, on a side note just in case you are still stuck on the magic hour thing; Trey Ratcliff (who is awesome btw) said that Iceland is in the magic hour all day long. I must move to Iceland. Todd, you are welcome to come with me (I’m bringing KC anyway so you might as well). I hope they have Cherry Coke in Iceland…
Matt POTD!!!
I love this time of day when everything the sun hits gets glowy. Matt is glowy. Also, his shadow is wicked long. I like wicked long shadows – especially when they are mine – they make me feel taller. Matt is already tall so i’m sure it made him feel like a giant. In a good way.
KC photo of the Day!!!
I am almost too jumpy to write. I met one of my favorite photographers tonight in person and i am just so happy right now. KC was being very vain today. I caught her admiring herself in the window outside work. Pretty sure she was giving herself the “up/down”
She was also very happy to go through the drive thru. She was seriously ready to jump out of the window – I had to roll it up real fast so she wouldn’t jump through the pick up window…
POTD (On time and posted before 11:00 pm, i am beside myself with happiness)
Someone had been spray painting props on the concrete slab behind my office building. The concrete slab with a random drainage tube sticking out of it. I think everyone should have a random concrete slab. Makes for interesting conversation. The conversation would go something like this:
Person: “Why do you have a random concrete slab?”
Me: “For breakdancing”
Person: “Oh, yeah. That should have been more obvious to me”
Matt POTD (Today!)(On Time)
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Matt came to hunker down in his old office for a bit today. He used to work in the fun zone but then defected to help out other departments. He visits often but the fact that he came in with work to do was kind of funny because usually Hunter and I are vying for his attention. Matt! Matt! Lookit! Matt!
MATT!
KC Photo(s) of the Day!!! (present day time!!)
KC was being so goofy today that one single photo wasn’t enough. Starting with the upper left shot: We were waiting for Michelle to come visit (Wednesdays are Michelle day) and KC was pouting because I wouldn’t let her outside (too many kids running around and KC likes to lick kids – sometimes they lick her back which is just weird). Michelle shows up and KC pays no attention to me – jumps up and down and spins in circles in front of Michelle (imagine a 75lbs dog spinning in circles while bucking like a bronco and you get a pretty good idea of how it went down).
Earlier in the day KC posed in her new glasses. They help keep the glare of her computer monitor to a minimum and keep her eyes from getting stressed out.
Matt also came to visit our office and taunted KC with a foot cookie. I can tell that my training has been working because it took her 5 seconds to grab for the cookie instead of her usual 3.
KC POTD!!! (February 24, 2009)(only a few minutes late)
Do I really need to have commentary on these pictures??? She was having a lot of fun jumping up and down for her stuffed (unstuffed) rabbit (dog?)(bear)(couldn’t tell what it was anymore). She’s really good at retrieving, just sucks at the giving back part. Oh well.
Daily KC!!! (February 23, 2009)
I had picked up up from my parent’s house about 24 minutes prior to this shot. It was the first time I had seen her head inside the car since we made our departure. She likes to stick her whole head out the window when we are driving. Not all the time, just some of the time. Not so much when we are going 70mpg. I think that makes it hard for her to breath and lick her own snot. But it’s creepy to watch her because her eye sockets puff out all around her eyes creating this nasty creepy effect. Did I mention it was creepy? Creeps me out! But she was happy so I was happy. When I stopped to get the mail this was the face I saw. How could you not love this dog? Oh, and the 4 years of photography classes did not teach me that I should always check 2 things before I take a shot: 1. ISO (it was too high in this picture) 2. Is my hand/camera somehow in the shot. Amazingly I passed college and still forget those 2 things. Sigh. ……………………… still sighing over here, nevermind me.
Matt POTD!!! (February 24, 2009)(yes, it’s actually on time)
We had an impromptu photoshop user’s meeting this afternoon. Frustrations abound. Nuf said. Thanks and goodbye.
Oh, and Matt got a new tattoo on his left hand. I think it’s some sort of inspirational message about gathering information and dates. It’s really beautiful, don’t you think?
MPOTD (February 23, 2009)
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We had the opportunity to take a photoshop CS4 awesomeness class in downtown Austin today (Mon.). We had our brains filled with knowledge and learned some mad photoshoppery skillz. The instructor, Dave Cross, was one of the best teacher’s I’ve had. He added just the right amount of humor to keep the class from being too tedious (tedious=cate gets sleepy). I’ve already forgotten half of what we learned but that’s just because my brain has malfunctioned and needs a reboot.
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Photo(s) of the day Friday, February 20, 2009
Some of Todd’s family came to visit for the weekend and it was imperative that we show them some of the cooler features of Austin. We started the evening at the Draught House Pub. This place is like nothing else. It’s part tailgate, part bar, and part dog park. We popped the trunk on the Hyundai, pulled out some lawn chairs and just relaxed with KC and our beers for a bit.
The next place on the list was Ginny’s, home of Chicken Shit Bingo. Unfortunately we missed Chicken Shit Bingo by about 2 days. Actually, fortunately. Yes, fortunately.
Then we went to dinner at a local Indian restaurant. Nothing says Texas like some delicious Indian food.
Finally after all that we headed over to Brooklyn Heights Pizzeria for more beer and some Karaoke. Only problem is that 3 out of the 4 of us weren’t in the Karaoke mood. Being ever resourceful, I grabbed one of the chefs, Jamie, and begged and pleaded for him to sing with Todd. Luckily he is awesome and really sweet so he did (even though he’s never done Karaoke before!)(THANKS JAMIE!). So they belted out one of the best renditions of Beastie Boys “Fight for Your Right…” that I have ever heard. I never knew Todd was such a good singer…(Jamie was awesome by the way)
KCPOTD!!! (from Friday, February 20, 2009)
Everyone was just loving on KC today. She didn’t enjoy it one little bit. Not at all. She never enjoys being the sole object of someone’s attention. She hates it actually. She is just nice and puts on a smile but on the inside she is sighing heavily and rolling her eyes (she can roll them on the inside, it’s a ninja trick). On the outside, she is just waiting for a cookie.
Matt Photo of the Friday, February 20th!!!
I am just not going through my pictures from the past few days. On Friday Matt needed to take a nap. At my office naps are often taken under desks; specifically, my desk. He enjoyed the spot so much that he fell asleep much to KC’s chagrin. Yes, KC can have chagrins. Chagrins all the time… OOOOh, bad joke of the day (chagrin=she grin…get it???) Sorry. Little sleep and headache=bad jokes.
KC tried to fit under there with him but in the end she just settled for in front of the desk instead. Eventually I had to kick both of them out because there was no magical way for me to work remotely from across the room – the mouse and keyboard would reach but my old eyes would not be able to see and we would have some questionable photoshoppery as a result. Yes, I made up that word.
Photoshoppery: to commit acts of photoshopping.
