Sucking along on the road less traveled

Nikon AF-S DX NIKKOR 18-200mm f/3.5-5.6G ED VR II

09/22/2009 01:50:50 PM · #351

Originally posted by Kelli:

LOL! Now that the challenge is over, remember me mentioning re using a title? Now I have two Sunset Drama's on my homepage.

lol funny. im surpirsed it doesnt happen more to the people who have like 200+ entries!

snaffles

Nikon D7100

09/22/2009 02:43:29 PM · #352

Originally posted by meyers:

Hey group,

My desktop computer suddenly stopped booting for me, likely because it found out I had a replacement "on the way." After much data transferring in my fragmented free time, I've managed to get all of my photography work (yay Aperture!) onto the external drive for my new mac mini (old one was a G5, circa 2002). What this means is that I can ponder taking pictures of things, and possibly chasing that elusive brown ribbon again.

Not to go all Mac/PC here, but the mac "boot up as a firewire drive" was invaluable in getting things moved around.

Getting this done soon was important, since we're expecting our next son in a couple of weeks! In case I fall behind on challenge results, I'm willing to share my python script which generates the post. My old web interface trick doesn't work; my hosted domain runs python 2.4 and my script using python 3. PM me if you're interested.

Ooh congrats on both the new toy and new son! Have a plate of brownies waiting in celebration :-)

Olympus OM-D E-M1 Mark III

09/22/2009 10:41:39 PM · #353

Originally posted by snaffles:

Originally posted by meyers:
Hey group,

My desktop computer suddenly stopped booting for me, likely because it found out I had a replacement "on the way." After much data transferring in my fragmented free time, I've managed to get all of my photography work (yay Aperture!) onto the external drive for my new mac mini (old one was a G5, circa 2002). What this means is that I can ponder taking pictures of things, and possibly chasing that elusive brown ribbon again.

Not to go all Mac/PC here, but the mac "boot up as a firewire drive" was invaluable in getting things moved around.

Getting this done soon was important, since we're expecting our next son in a couple of weeks! In case I fall behind on challenge results, I'm willing to share my python script which generates the post. My old web interface trick doesn't work; my hosted domain runs python 2.4 and my script using python 3. PM me if you're interested.

Ooh congrats on both the new toy and new son! Have a plate of brownies waiting in celebration :-)

awesome, awesome awesome! (son trumps toy, but toy rates pretty high as well!)

colorcarnival

Olympus 45mm f/1.8 M.Zuiko Digital

09/22/2009 11:14:20 PM · #354

Congrats Rob! Look forward to seeing new baby pictures :)

Originally posted by meyers:

Hey group,
Getting this done soon was important, since we're expecting our next son in a couple of weeks!

09/22/2009 11:49:54 PM · #355

Ok, LadyK, my dear. You need to go apologize to your parents for anything you've done to upset them!! (it's been a kid-heavy day, today, and you're the only kid I can pick on!)

09/22/2009 11:57:28 PM · #356

Originally posted by vawendy:

Ok, LadyK, my dear. You need to go apologize to your parents for anything you've done to upset them!! (it's been a kid-heavy day, today, and you're the only kid I can pick on!)

what did i do? sorry, im freaking outabout nudes:/

meyers

Canon EOS-6D

Canon EF 50mm f/1.4 USM

09/23/2009 12:05:55 AM · #357

N1n3 (or "9", in non-1337 speak).

Top shot goes to

AperturePriority

Canon EF 70-200mm f/2.8L IS USM

09/23/2009 12:22:01 AM · #358

Originally posted by LadyK:

Originally posted by vawendy:
Ok, LadyK, my dear. You need to go apologize to your parents for anything you've done to upset them!! (it's been a kid-heavy day, today, and you're the only kid I can pick on!)

what did i do? sorry, im freaking outabout nudes:/

nothing, you're just a teenager, so you must have done something!

(my daughter wasn't on the bus this afternoon, and that's after she left home upset in the morning. It was just one of those scary parent moments.)

Photologist

Apple iPhone 15 Pro Max

09/23/2009 01:22:40 AM · #359

Originally posted by meyers:

N1n3 (or "9", in non-1337 speak).

Top shot goes to AperturePriority

Woo hoo! Thanks!

I wanted it to be similar to my ribbon winner (which was also a roman number) . . .

On the ribbon winner, I took my time and shot it over the course of a couple of evenings.

On this one, I really, really rushed it. You can't even begin to imagine how much I rushed it. The sunset on that particular day was something like 6:57 pm. This was the day of the submission deadline--and remember, out here in California, the deadline is 9:00 pm.

So, on my way home from work, I bought the wooden numbers at around 6:15 pm. I got home, changed into my beach clothes and then hammered the two numbers into a small board. I didn't paint them black like I did previously (not enough time). By the time I left my house it was 6:40 pm. I parked my car at the beach at 6:45, ran across the sand to the edge of the water, turned on my GPS photo geotagging receiver, placed my subject on a mound of sand, set up my tripod so that my camera was a few inches above the sand, dialed "M" on the camera, set all the settings, and began shooting at 6:53, trying out various angles and sun placement. That's the reason I had the camera so low--to get the sun inside the "X".

It wasn't until I got home (around 7:30 pm) and transferred the image to my computer that I realized that this was Basic Editing! I knew I had a ship visible offshore in the background, but thought I could digitally remove it. Oh well. :-(

I proceeded to transfer my GPS location settings to each RAW capture (using the sidecar XMP files). I did some minor ACR RAW tweaks and converted to TIFF, then used CS3 to crop and save it to JPG. I uploaded my first version at 8:02. There were only 58 minutes left and if I took too much time to post-process, I at least wanted to get something submitted. Now that I had something submitted, I was starved, so I had a bite to eat and then began my formal post-processing. I finally finished and uploaded my final version at around 8:55 or so. Whew!

By the way, for those that commented on the non-level appearance of the composition, trust me, it is level. The tops of the numbers are level, but the horizon appears a bit slanted 1) because I captured the image at an angle to the shore, 2) because of the sand is not completely level in the background (a slight incline), and 3) the "mountain" in the background is actually the Palos Verdes peninsula which is about 500-600 feet in elevation (125-185 m). I think the combination of those factors make it appear a bit unlevel.

I'm surprised no one commented on the washed-out sun. I didn't notice this until I was post-processing, and really don't like it at all.

Also,

KarenNfld,

ttreit, and

sekarmalathy--you guys have a great memory! ...by noticing that it was probably me that submitted that entry.

purifier: Yes, it is "nine" in another language...vulcan!

tanguera: This is in Sunset Beach, California (Orange County)

Finally, thank you all that commented, thank you all who voted, and thank you "Team Suck" for such a prestigious award!! :p

Message edited by author 2009-09-23 01:50:24.

Melethia

Canon EOS-80D

Canon EF 24-105mm f/4.0L IS

09/23/2009 06:30:42 AM · #360

LOL! Les, first off, congrats on the top TS score and a very good placing in the challenge. But you do know the whole "transfer the GPS location settings" and "9 in vulcan" is just a tad bit on the geeky side, right? :-) (Hey, I was once a geek - lost the bubble, though and am reverting. I hate cell phones and gave up my downloading account... it's sad.)

Hipychik

Sony Alpha a6000

Sony 16-50mm f/3.5-5.6 E-mount

09/23/2009 07:05:01 AM · #361

I'm all moved into my house but I haven't had time to enter any challenges. I need to get back into it so Michelle (

colorcarnival doesn't take over the whole Olympus E-520 page! Dang woman! I can't take my eyes away for a minute!! LOL

09/23/2009 09:13:23 AM · #362

Originally posted by vawendy:

Originally posted by LadyK:

Originally posted by vawendy:
Ok, LadyK, my dear. You need to go apologize to your parents for anything you've done to upset them!! (it's been a kid-heavy day, today, and you're the only kid I can pick on!)

what did i do? sorry, im freaking outabout nudes:/

nothing, you're just a teenager, so you must have done something!

(my daughter wasn't on the bus this afternoon, and that's after she left home upset in the morning. It was just one of those scary parent moments.)

oh grawr wendy. you know she did it to freak you out right? well maybe. thats something i would do it i was in a really crabby mood. and yeh, whenever you need to take some mommy anger out on a teenager, im not too hard t find and dont mind in the least:)

09/23/2009 09:30:00 AM · #363

Originally posted by LadyK:

Originally posted by vawendy:

Originally posted by LadyK:

Originally posted by vawendy:
Ok, LadyK, my dear. You need to go apologize to your parents for anything you've done to upset them!! (it's been a kid-heavy day, today, and you're the only kid I can pick on!)

what did i do? sorry, im freaking outabout nudes:/

nothing, you're just a teenager, so you must have done something!

(my daughter wasn't on the bus this afternoon, and that's after she left home upset in the morning. It was just one of those scary parent moments.)

oh grawr wendy. you know she did it to freak you out right? well maybe. thats something i would do it i was in a really crabby mood. and yeh, whenever you need to take some mommy anger out on a teenager, im not too hard t find and dont mind in the least:)

naw, there was a new club, and she was excited about that. I'm sure she didn't want to miss any of it. Luckily I have a very good, very nice girl. I'm just very overprotective, and I was just getting home from work when I saw the bus pull up without her on it. It's just very scary being at mom (at times!) So I wasn't angry, I figured that's what had happened, but I tend to worry a lot.

Canon EF 70-200mm f/2.8L IS USM

09/23/2009 10:12:07 AM · #364

Ohmmmmmmmm

Ohmmmmmmmm

Ohmmmmmmmm

its going to be a rough day

Photologist

Apple iPhone 15 Pro Max

09/23/2009 11:01:55 AM · #365

Originally posted by Melethia:

Yeah, I've been in the tech business (I'm a software engineer) for many years. I was an employee of Microsoft for the past 10 years. I am also a gadget freak/geek.

I know I survived before cell phones, but wouldn't know how to survive without mobile devices today. ;-)

meyers

Canon EOS-6D

Canon EF 50mm f/1.4 USM

09/23/2009 12:11:04 PM · #366

Originally posted by AperturePriority:

Originally posted by Melethia:
LOL! Les, first off, congrats on the top TS score and a very good placing in the challenge. But you do know the whole "transfer the GPS location settings" and "9 in vulcan" is just a tad bit on the geeky side, right? :-) (Hey, I was once a geek - lost the bubble, though and am reverting. I hate cell phones and gave up my downloading account... it's sad.)

Yeah, I've been in the tech business (I'm a software engineer) for many years. I was an employee of Microsoft for the past 10 years. I am also a gadget freak/geek.

I know I survived before cell phones, but wouldn't know how to survive without mobile devices today. ;-)

I used to get by before "the internet", and even passed time calling up BBS sites with a 110 baud (not a typo!) modem, but not anymore!

Kelli

Canon EOS-D60

Canon EF 28-135mm f/3.5-5.6 IS USM

09/23/2009 12:49:43 PM · #367

Congrats Rob! Can't wait for pictures!

kashi

Nikon D60

Nikon AF-S Nikkor 50mm f/1.4G

09/23/2009 04:57:13 PM · #368

Originally posted by meyers:

I used to get by before "the internet", and even passed time calling up BBS sites with a 110 baud (not a typo!) modem, but not anymore!

I am SO happy to hear someone else use the terms BBS and baud ! I truly am not insane - these things really did exist.

kashi

Nikon D60

Nikon AF-S Nikkor 50mm f/1.4G

09/23/2009 04:57:42 PM · #369

Oh, and my lack-a-focial shot is up to 5.6 now.

colorcarnival

Olympus OM-D E-M1 Mark III

Olympus 45mm f/1.8 M.Zuiko Digital

09/23/2009 05:14:58 PM · #370

Originally posted by Hipychik:

I'm all moved into my house but I haven't had time to enter any challenges. I need to get back into it so Michelle ( colorcarnival doesn't take over the whole Olympus E-520 page! Dang woman! I can't take my eyes away for a minute!! LOL

heh, Terry - thanks for pointing that out. Pretty cool! Now get back in there and start claiming some spots :D

Canon 12x IS USM (S3 IS built-in Lens) -- 36-432mm (35mm EQ)

09/23/2009 06:22:17 PM · #371

70 challenges ive entered

woh

GeneralE

Canon PowerShot S3 IS

09/23/2009 06:24:03 PM · #372

Originally posted by LadyK:

70 challenges ive entered ...

Only 600 more to catch up ... ;-)