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By MICHAEL PERKINS
REFLECTIONS, OF ANYTHING, ON ANYTHING, ARE DECEPTIVE in the way they seem to store information in a photograph. We tend to think of them as perfect mirror images of something, a complete yin to something else's yang. But if reflections are twins of a sort, they are seldom identical twins, as the duplicate is almost certain to be an imperfect copy of the original.
Consider the "mirror" idea. Anything reflected in one is, at the very least, reversed. And then we go further: are there any spots or streaks on the mirror? Did a strange bounce of light create a flare or a prismatic break of color that doesn't occur in what's reflected? The truth is that even a mirror reflection is not perfect but a reasonable replica. Next, let's consider using another reflecting surface, from water to marble to other types of glass. Now the reflections are even more adulterated. We see them through floating junk, through dirt, through bounced reflections of other things, and so on.
As photographers, we often don't regard a reflection as anything but a handy design element, a decorative, if flawed, supplement to the thing we primarily want to show. But on occasion, the thing we have set our sights on is compromised or less than effective, while the reflection, although more abstract, even backwards from our original intent, can become the part of the picture we re-set ourselves to showcase. It's an element of how we see (or don't see). We automatically make the adjustment in the viewpoint between portrait and landscape orientations, and yet overlook something as simple as inverting an image, to make its passive "bottom" an active "top", as seen here.
In the thumbnail of my original shot of a 1920's-era lobby (above at left), the people above the floor clutter the scene to such as extent that the lobby loses its power as an image. There are also some pronounced exposure and contrast issues.However, with the photo flipped on its head, the luxuriously patterned Art Deco floor blends its own design patterns with an ethereal rendering of the people that changes not only the frame of reference but the very intention of the picture, especially with the distracting top half of the original cropped away. It's a mix of the imperfect reflection material (the floor) and its ability to re-interpret all of the more literal stuff from the first version. All this to say that, instead of regarding reflections as mere duplicates of worlds, we should and can regard them as separate worlds of their own, with distinctly different stories to present to our cameras.
By MICHAEL PERKINS
AS PHOTOGRAPHERS, WE ALL HAVE THEM, whether we parade them defiantly or sequester them in locked drawers. "They" are our Orphan Images, the photos that never quite made it to the finals. Our strange little camera creatures, the ones that fall outside every arbitrary category of success. Our guilty pleasures. Or, in most cases, concepts that Seemed Like A Good Idea At The Time.
We've written about these underloved ones before here in The Normal Eye, these pictures that may not even be technical failures but which somehow qualify as….odd. So. Very. Odd. And still I come back to the subject because there is something addictive about even our mistakes. Maybe especially our mistakes.
Many of them frustrate us. The compositions that didn't quite sell our idea. The light that failed. The idea we didn't take quite far enough. Did I mention bad light?
Strangely, we harbor a special warmth toward our orphans. We may even convince ourselves that they really are "great". Or that they're misunderstood, which means that they somehow failed to make themselves understood. Sometimes an idea that comes close, but still comes up short, inspires a bittersweet affection in us. They are the kids that got cut from Little League at the last second. We, or the pictures, tried so very hard. To be in the presence of greatness is breathtaking, while being in the presence of almost-greatness is often heartbreaking.
After you've been shooting for a while, you seldom take any picture without some kind of basic intention. And that means that the resulting image can't really stand alone anymore. It's always linked, and contrasted, with the thing we wish we had done. If we missed by a mile, we can accept that perfection is a journey and be a bit philosophical about the whole thing. Missing by inches…well, that's another thing entirely.
I don't know why I like this picture. I mean, I understand completely the mix of components I was going for. And yet, I can't defend it vigorously to anyone else. I know it's…off. But not far enough off to land in the junk bin. Just off enough to drive me a little bit crazy.
Ella Fitzgerald once said that the only thing that's better than singing is more singing. And I guess I feel the same about making pictures. Whatever's wrong with your photos can, or might, be cured by your very next one. Or not. That's the tantalizing, and maddening part of the photographic learning curve. It's complicated further by the fact that you're not merely trying to master your gear, but yourself. Seeing how very close you came to being the best you is tough. But most failures are not outright flops but qualified successes, and that little tweak in how we perceive our imperfect work is the only thing that also makes the whole deal worthwhile.
By MICHAEL PERKINS
I REMEMBER WHAT A MAD MIX OF SKILL AND DUMB LUCK IT TOOK ME to score any usable concert images in the glory days of film photography, which has been one reason why, for both economic and mental health reasons, I tended not to attempt them too often. I have known several people over the decades who simply kill at such work, and their abilities leave me as stunned as a caveman who has just discovered fire. Such people are masters of light, wizards of journalism, and maybe, just maybe, unofficial auxiliary members of the bands they cover. They're that linked in.
Many years and many technological advances later, one of the barriers to my becoming a great concert shooter has vanished, in that, in the digital era, I can at least afford to try a lot of things without putting my wallet on the endangered species list. And perhaps that fact has, in turn, also safeguarded my mental health as well. 'Cuz, since I can now shoot, and shoot, and shoot, I can flail away until I actually produce something worth the effort, improving my overall demeanor and putting me once again in harmony with cute puppies, adorable babies, and unicorns. Of course, I have expanded my play area in recent years to include more offstage/backstage images, not only because they are technically easier to control, but because they contain something that stage performances may not: that is, unguarded, candid moments, or the exact opposite energy seen during a concert.
As a case in point: many current artists are making a bigger percentage of their touring "take" from on-site music sales than in earlier eras, and so the good old autograph table experience frequently offers the occasional relaxed moment. It doesn't have the same drama as a classic shot of a guitar god shredding his way to immortality, but it almost counts as street photography, depending on what kind of energy you're trying to capture. I myself enjoy the greater freedom to grab more of the miracle moments in a show, but I also find it liberating to work both ends of the gig.
By MICHAEL PERKINS
ONE OF PHOTOGRAPHER RICHARD AVEDON'S MOST PERSONAL (and most controversial) projects involved the documentation of the deterioration and death of his beloved father. In a similar vein, Annie Leibovitz chronicled her partner Susan Sontag's brave but ultimately unsuccessful battle with cancer. Both series are riveting and heartbreaking, truly valiant attempts by artists to face the most terrifying aspect of life, namely its end. I admire both works, as I do many others that traffic in the same aims.
But I just can't bring myself to photograph my own father (who turns ninety at this writing) in that way. It's not that I lack the courage. Or the curiosity. I might even possess the clinical detachment it would require. But if photography has meant anything to me, it's been about focusing on what's most important. And the impending end of Dad's life is of no importance, especially if compared to the quality of the life he has lived. I just can't make despairing pictures of him. Not on purpose, anyway.
Technically, I could easily record tender, textured studies of how fragile his marvelously gifted artist's hands have become. I could dwell endlessly on the inexorable appetite of time in robbing him of his balance, his eyesight, even, occasionally, his memory. But while any of those factors might produce pictures that were poignant, even eloquent, they would not be true to the spirit of the things that have animated and excited him over a lifetime. Ideas. Passions. Projects. A love of every manifestation of the artistic impulse, from the avalanche of books that littered every corner of our house to the lazy summer Sundays when he and I would lay on a sheet on the living room floor near the box fan, put My Fair Lady on the hi-fi, and be transported to 1910 London. Life is certainly, to a degree, about setbacks. But it's also about being indomitable. Yes, that's it. I've slung a lifetime of compliments in Dad's direction, but indomitable is the word that finally sums him up. Hemingway once said that a man can be destroyed, but not defeated. God knows I've been around to see the world take a whack at accomplishing the former process. Gladly, I have never witnessed the latter. The trips down to the canvas don't count. The journeys back up from the canvas do.
The image seen here began as an experiment with a particular art lens of mine. It's based on selective focus, which means that you create pictures that actually conceal and much as they reveal. That means a less-than-reliable rendering of aged skin, a gauzy interpretation of the harder textures of aging. As for the sunglasses, while jaunty, they are not an attempt by the Chief to be cool but rather a very needful protection against over-loading his eyes with harsh light. And still, the overall affect, at least to me, is relaxed, comfortable. In this picture, I see no Sick Old Man. I see (or choose to see, maybe) an update on the dashing blockade runner I grew up with. The borderline shy smile, the posture of someone recalling a really good story. It's the central nugget of his personality, which survives intact to this day, even if the machine that carries it around throws more cogs than it used to.
Photographs of such a man have to be resilient, even defiant. I grew up with too many instances of his quoting Dylan Thomas' exhortation to "rage, rage, against the dying of the light" to snap pictures of him as weak or downhearted. And, of course, the man who loved that poem still bubbles up, even in conversations that are mostly about trouble or turmoil. Earlier this week, to change the subject from Time's latest assaults on him and Mother, I mentioned that I had sent my sister "something you can use on your birthday."
A pause, then:
"That'd be the motorcycle, right?"
"Yes", I said, laughing with gratitude and relief, " but I didn't pop for the sidecar. I thought it would be too showy."
Joe Cool was still on the job. And as for that Time Machine thing, you can take it and stick it.
Happy Birthday Daddy/Dad/Pop/Poppa/Daddy
I OFTEN FEEL THAT HABIT IS THE GREATEST POTENTIAL THREAT to the creative process. Once an artist approaches a new project through the comfort of his accumulated routines, he's well on the road to mediocrity. If you find yourself saying things like "I always do" or "I typically use"…. you're saying, in effect, that you've learned everything you need to learn in terms of your art. You already have all the ingredients for success. The ideal exposure. The perfect lens. The optimum technique. The Lost Ark…
Dangerous business.
And, if a kind of self-satisfied inertia is death-on-toast for artistic growth, then the most valuable tool in a photographer's goodie bag is the ability to archive and curate his own work…..to keep a solid, traceable time line that clearly shows the evolution of his approach…..including the degree to which that approach has either moved along or stood still. That means not only hanging on to many of your worst pictures but also re-evaluating your best ones…..since your first judgement calls on both kinds of images will often be subject to change. Certainly there are photographs that are so clearly wonderful or wretched that your opinion of them won't change over time. But they constitute the minority of your work. Everything in that vast middle ground between agony and ecstasy is a rich source of self-re-evaluation.
Revisiting old shoots doesn't always yield hidden treasures. Sometimes the shot you thought was best from a certain day was best. But there may be only a hair's-breadth of difference between the winners and the also-rans, and, at least in my own experience, the also-rans are where all the education is. For example, in the image seen here of my wife taken almost ten years ago and re-examined recently, I know two new things: first, I now know precisely why, at the time, I thought it was the worst of a ten-frame burst. Second, at this stage, I realize that it's actually a lot closer to what I currently find essential about Marian's face than the shot I formerly regarded as the "keeper". I'm just that different in under a decade.
As you grow as a photographer, you will revise nearly every "must" or "never" in your belief system, from composition to focus and beyond. As life molds you, it will likewise mold the ways you see and comment on that life. An archive of your work, warts and all, is the most valuable resource you can consult to trace that journey, and it will nourish and inform every picture you make from here on.
By MICHAEL PERKINS
THE WORD "APPROPRIATION" HAS BECOME A PERMANENT PART OF THE ACTIVE VOCABULARY OF VISUAL ARTS, and I am never consistently sure how I feel about it.
Like the term "found object", things labeled as "appropriated" from other works seem to cast a shadow over photography, or over its potential for originality. Can the artist ever really produce a thing that is completely new? And if so, does it make him dishonest to re-use something that's been any part of someone else's work? Can you generate an image that shows, for example, a frame from a motion picture that someone else directed? How about a random glimpse of a frozen moment from a television show? Are those who admire a painting in a gallery and snap an image of it plagiarists? Additionally, the entire web-era issue of intellectual property complicates the question even further. Even if a photographer's motives in "appropriating" are artistically pure, is he/she creating a tribute….or perpetrating a theft?
I have seldom dipped my toe into this particular swamp, mostly since I want to create work that is as personally unique as possible. I certainly love the idea of "standing on the shoulders of giants", but I don't like to think that it's because I'm too weak to walk under my own power. So let's analyze an instance in which I try to straddle both sides of the tribute/theft debate.
What you see here is a most particular exercise with a very specially selected image. The original picture, as seen within the page frame, is an illustration from The Practice Of Contemplative Photography by Andy Carr, a book designed to train the reader's eye to see in less conventional ways, to examine the gulf between conception and perception. The authors, Andy Carr and Michael Wood, have deliberately set forth a series of exercises created to force photographers to develop alternatives method of seeing. What I glean from this is that they don't want to hold any single photographic approach as sacred….perhaps even those they themselves put forward as artists.
The composite image seen here is an attempt to take Michael Wood's beautiful picture, a minimalist shot which shows a single orange leaf balanced on a ledge, and imagine what kind of picture might be a visual sequel to it. I used a Lensbaby Sweet 35 optic to keep the original photo's sharp focus on his leaf, which, as it trails down the stream of added orange potpourri pieces, transitions to softness….as if, in a dream, the leaves might be seeming to erupt out of the page. So, if you're keeping score, the starting photograph is shown in the context of the book in which it originally appeared, with added objects that I have arranged for a new overall photo-creation of my own. Please note that in every single posting of this picture, I have given specific credit to the original artists/authors, and represented it as an appropriation, the use of elements not my own for a re-imaging that is my own. I would never seek credit for the original Wood image: it did serve, of course, as a springboard for something else. And, if at some time, I am asked by said creator to remove any and all traces of my composite from public platforms, I would acquiesce immediately.
Ever since Warhol began making silkscreens of photographs shot by other artists, which he then showed as Warhol "works", this argument has mostly led to…..more arguments. And, as stated, I seldom find myself in this particular playpen. It's simply too tough to be sure of all my motivations.
By MICHAEL PERKINS
I CALL IT NO–FUNDAY, the painful exercise of poring over photographs that I once considered "keepers" and now must reluctantly re-classify as "obviously, I'm an idiot." For any photographer, self-editing one's output is just the kind of humiliation one needs to keep on shooting, if only to put greater distance between one's self and one's yester-duds.
To make the shame of disowning my photographic spawn even worse, I find that, more often than not, technical failure is usually not the reason I'm lunging for the delete button: it's the weakness of the conception, a basic lifelessness or lack of impact that far outweighs any errors in exposure, lighting, even composition. In other words, my worst pictures are, by and large, bad because they are well-executed renditions of measly ideas.
In my mental filing cabinet, I refer to these images under the acronym SLIGIATT, or Seemed Like A Good Idea At The Time. The image above is a perfect example. This shot, taken inside the underbelly of a WWII bomber, presented a ton of lighting challenges, but I spent so much time tweaking this aspect of it that I neglected to notice that there just isn't a picture here. It tells no story. It explains nothing. It's just an incomprehensible jumble of old equipment which lets the eye wander all over the frame, only to land on…..well, what exactly? But, boy howdy, it is well-lit.
SLIGIATT photos are, of course, necessary. You have to take all the wrong pictures to teach yourself how to create the good ones. And mere technical prowess can, for a time, resemble quality of a sort. But technique is merely craft, and can be had rather easily. The art part comes in when you're lucky enough to also build a soul into a machine. As Frankenstein figured out, that's the difference between being God and playing God.
By MICHAEL PERKINS
OUR VERY HUMAN DESIRE TO MAKE OUR PHOTOGRAPHY TECHNICALLY FLAWLESS can be observed in the results you can glean from a simple Google search of the words "perfect" and "photos". Hundreds of tutorials and how-tos pop up on how to get "the perfect portrait", "the perfect family picture", "the perfect sunset", and of course, "the perfect wedding shot". The message is all too clear; when it comes to making pictures, we desperately want to get it right. But how to get it right…that's a completely different discussion.
Because if, by "perfect", we means a seamless blend of accurate exposure, the ideal aperture, and the dream composition, then I think we are barking up a whole forest of wrong trees. Mere technical prowess in photography can certainly be taught, but does obeying all these rules result in a "perfect" picture?
If you stipulate that you can produce a shot that is both precise in technique and soulless and empty, then we should probably find a more reasonable understanding of perfection. Perfect is, to me, a word that should describe the emotional impact of the result, not the capital "S" science that went into its execution. That is, some images are so powerful that we forget to notice their technical shortcomings. And that brings us to the second part of this exercise.
Can a flawed image move us, rouse us to anger, turn us on, help us see and feel? Absolutely, and they do all the time. We may talk perfection, but we are deeply impressed with honesty. Of course, in two hundred years, we still haven't shaken the mistaken notion that a photograph is "reality". It is not, and never was, even though it has an optical resemblance to it. It became apparent pretty early in the game that photographs could not only record, but persuade, and, yes, lie. So whatever you shoot, no matter how great you are at setting your settings, is an abstraction. That means it's already less than perfect, even before you add your own flaws and faults. So the game is already lost. Or, depending on our viewpoint, a lot more interesting.
Go for impact over perfect every time. You can control how much emotional wallop is packed into your pictures just as surely as you can master the technical stuff, and pictures that truly connect on a deep level will kick the keester of a flawless picture every single time. The perfect picture is the one that brings back what you sent it to do. The camera can't breathe life into a static image. Only a photographer can do that.
By MICHAEL PERKINS
SOME PHOTOGRAPHERS' EQUIPMENT CASES ARE LIKE MARY POPPINS' CARPET BAG: once they're opened, you are just certain someone's going to haul a floor lamp out of the thing. I myself hate being laden with a punishing load of gear when on a shoot, so I spend as much time as possible mentally rehearsing before heading out, trying to take just one lens which will do 90% of what I'll need and leaving the rest of the toys at home. I developed this habit mainly because most of my work is done in a field orientation. Were I more consistently a studio homebody, then I could have everything I own just inches away from me at all times. So it goes.
What happens with my kind of shooting is that you fall in and out of love with certain gear, with different optics temporarily serving as your "go to" lens. I personally think it's good to "go steady" with a lens for extended periods of time, simply because you learn to make pictures in any setting, regardless of any arbitrary limits imposed by that lens. This eventually makes you more open to experimentation, simply because you either shoot what you brung or you don't shoot at all.
This work habit means that I may have half a dozen lenses that go unused for extended periods of time. It's the bachelor's dilemma: while I was going steady with one, I wasn't returning phone calls and texts from the others. And over time, I may actually become estranged from a particular lens that at one time was my old reliable. I may have found a better way to do what it did with other equipment, or I may have ceased to make images that it was particularly designed for….or maybe I just got sick to death of it and needed to see other people.
But just as I think you should spend a protracted and exclusive period with a new lens, a dedicated time during which you use it for nearly everything, I also believe that you should occasionally re-bond with a lens you hardly use anymore, making that optic, once again, your go-to, at least for a while. Again, there is a benefit to having to use what you have on hand to make things happen. Those of us who began with cheap fixed-focus toy cameras learned early how to work around the limits of our gear to get the results we wanted, and the same idea applies to a lens that may not do everything, but also may do a hell of a lot more than we first gave it credit for.
Re-establishing a bond with an old piece of gear is like dating your ex. It may just be a one-off lunch, or you could decide that you both were really made for each other all along.
By MICHAEL PERKINS
FIFTY-PLUS YEARS INTO MY LOVE AFFAIR WITH PHOTOGRAPHY, I now regard my earliest concept of a "good picture" as I regard other ideas of my youth….that is, seeing how I viewed the world given the limited scope of my own experience. When I first started making my own pictures, my models were drawn from the pages of the then-dominant photo magazines, like Life, Look, and National Geographic. Thus, for me, "good" photographs served either the reportorial functions of a news assignment or the color-saturated visions of landscape lovers. And that, for me, back then, was more than enough.
Both these kinds of images favored a fairly literal translation from the actual into the photographed: interpretation and abstraction was not anything I gave serious thought to, since I wanted my simple box-camera creations to look like "real photographs". Art photography certainly existed, but very much at the edges of the culture. Most museums, by the early 1960's, had still not mounted their own photographic exhibitions. Most popular photography, shaped by a large middle-class consumer culture (think Kodak Instamatic), was candid and personal in nature. Most people wanted Grandma to look like Grandma, unfiltered through any Warholian irony, commentary or experimentation. It was still a compliment for someone to say of your pictures that they "looked like a photograph".
Strangely, one of the things that revised my thinking on what was "good" was an increased awareness of the works of some of the first photographers, pioneers who sweated mightily to wrangle the infant media into something like reliable performance. In their work with ever-changing combinations of plates, media, lenses and emulsions, the first photogs' breakthrough photographs often failed from a purely technical viewpoint, producing irregular patches of light appearing randomly like islands in a sea of shadows.
But what these wizards' first attempts often achieved, almost by accident, was the first real abstraction in photography: pieces of reality, rather than its totality: hints of the truth which invited speculation, examination. New questions were posed: what was missing, and did it matter if it wasn't there? Could a photographer, in fact, deliberately extract parts of the "whole" picture, letting the minimum speak for everything that was left out? I gradually began to wander in search of answers to these questions.
There are times when a picture speaks louder the less it says. My original orientation to "good" images, seeing them as the most faithful translation of the literal onto film, expanded gradually to include whatever visual language communicates best in a given picture. Sometimes, in some very key instances, it helps to think like the first practitioners, who discovered, however haphazardly, that mere reality sometimes comes up short.
How charming it would be if it were possible to cause these natural images to imprint themselves durably and remain fixed upon the paper! And why should it not be possible? I asked myself. –William Henry Fox Talbot
By MICHAEL PERKINS
IMAGINE THAT, IN ADDITION TO MAKING THE AUTOMOBILE PRACTICAL AND AFFORDABLE, Henry Ford had also been the world's foremost racing driver. Or that Rembrandt had also invented canvas. The history of invention occasionally puts forth outliers who not only envision an improvement for the world, but become renowned as the best, first models for how to use it. The early days of photography saw several such giants, tinkerers who nudged the infant technique forward even as they became its first artists.
Unlike the telephone or the incandescent bulb, there was, for the camera, no single parent, but rather a series of talented midwives who massaged the young art from exotic hobby to mass movement, the most democratic of all art forms. Thus, William Henry Fox Talbot (1800-1877) was not the first person to use light and chemistry to permanently fix and preserve images. But, without his contributions, printed photograph might never have evolved, nor would the negative, the easiest method for printing endless numbers of copies from a single master.
Talbot's work began as a way to improve upon the daguerreotype, which dominated the photographic world in the early 1800's and which was, as a positive image printed directly on glass, literally one of a kind, barring duplication or distribution. If photography were to be widely practiced, Talbot reasoned, a practical method had to be created to allow photos to be made from photos.
Talbot's first attempts consisted of ordinary typing paper coated in a solution of salt and silver nitrate. The resulting silver-chloride mixture was highly sensitive to light, darkening as it was exposed, and registering the light and dark values of a subject backwards, as a negative. However, over the long exposures needed at the time, the darkening process often accelerated to make the image completely black, so Talbot had to experiment with other chemicals to render the process stable, to develop just so much and then stop. The next step was creating what would become the first chemical developers, allowing for shorter exposure times and more vivid images printed from his paper negatives.
Various refinements in the "calotype" process followed, along with a hash of bitter patent battles between Talbot and other inventors evolving similar systems. Interestingly, along the way, the need to demonstrate the superior results of his products had the accidental side effect of making Talbot himself one of the period's most practiced early photographers, giving him equal influence over inventors and artists alike.
In time, Talbot's calotype system would be further improved by coating glass with collodion, making for a sharper and more detailed negative from which to create prints. The final step toward universal adoption of photography would be George Eastman's idea for a flexible celluloid-based film negative, the process that ushered in the age of the snapshot and put a camera in Everyman's hands.
By MICHAEL PERKINS
ONE OF THE MOST GRAPHIC DEMONSTRATIONS OF THE DIFFERENCE BETWEEN YOUR EYE AND A CAMERA'S occurs by accident for most photographers, with variations in the reading of white balance that make the colors in an image look "wrong". While our own vision looks at everything in the world from light blues to medium greys and instantly converts them all to "white", the camera makes looks at all those variants and makes what can be called its best guess.
All light has a temperature, not a measure of heat but an index of which colors combine to deliver hues of a certain intensity and range, and white balance helps photographers manage color more effectively. Film shooters, especially those using sophisticated flash technology, eventually develop an instinct as to which kind of light will deliver the hues they seek, but, as the digital era tracks onward, many more of us simply rely on our camera's auto settings to deliver a white that strikes us as "correct". And when auto white balance fails to deliver the goods, we can override it and select other settings that compensate for incandescent light, shade, cloudy skies, and so forth. We can also create a completely custom white balance with little fuss. Think Dad looks better with a green face, like the true extra-terrestrial that he is? It's at your fingertips.
The fun starts when you use white balance to depart from what is "real" in the name of interpretation. WB settings are a fast and easy way to create dramatic or surreal effects, and, when you have enough time in a shoot to experiment, you may find that reality can be improved upon, depending on what look you want. In the top image, taken during a long, lingering sunset at sea, I had plenty of time to see what my camera's custom WB settings might create, so I bypassed standard auto WB, then amped up the reds in the sky by clicking over to a shade setting, resulting in a deep and warm look.
For the second shot of the same scene, I wanted to simulate the look of a sky just after sunset, when the blues of early evening might take over for the vanished sunlight, even providing a little radiance from a pale moon. One click to the setting and you see the result. Now, of course, I've just switched from one simulation of reality to another, but playing with WB in a variety of lighting situations can help you tweak your way to fantasy land with no muss or fuss.
Tweaking white balance is basically lying to your camera, telling it that it is not seeing what it think's it's seeing but what you want it to think it sees. You're the grown-up, you're in charge. "White" is what you say it is. Or isn't.
By MICHAEL PERKINS
THE RESURRECTION, ABOUT TWENTY-FIVE YEARS AGO, of several low-end, cold-war-era plastic cameras as refurbished instruments of a kind of instinctual "art" photography has influenced even the digital and high-end photo markets, with light-leaking, optically sloppy toys like the Holga, the Diana and other "lomographic" devices shaking up the way many photographers see the world. Thus have these technically challenged little cameras, designed as children's playthings, changed the conversation about what kind of formerly dreaded optical flaws we now elect to put back in to our work. Lomo shooters' devotion to their craft has also meant a reprieve of sorts for film, since theirs in an analog realm.
But even digital shooters who don't think of themselves as part of the "lomography" trip can dip a toe into the pool if they like, with filters on phone apps labelled "toy camera" which simulate light leaks, film-era "cross-processing" and the color variations caused by cheap plastic lenses. There are also companies like Lensbaby that manufacture all-new plastic optics designed to lend an element of creative control to what, in lomo cameras is largely random. The good news: you can, in effect, put defects into your pictures….on purpose.
Plastic lenses are generally much softer than glass lenses, giving a kind of gauzy appearance to your shots, so if you're a fan of razor sharpness, they may not be your dish. More importantly, they produce a much higher amount of what is called "chromatic aberration", which is more understandable under its nickname "color fringing", since that more accurately describes how it looks. If you want a reasonably clear science-guy breakdown of CA, here's a link to keep you busy this semester. The main take-home for most of us, though, is that the effect takes what would largely be a smoothly blended rendering of colors and makes them appear fractured, with the "fringe" look most noticeable along the peripheral edge of objects, where the colors seem to be separating like the ragged edge of an old scarf.
Why should you care? Well, mostly, you don't have to. All lenses have a degree of CA, but in the better-built ones it is nearly undetectable to the naked eye, and can be easily processed away in Lightroom or a host of other editing suites. But people who are choosing to use plastic lenses will see it quite clearly, since such optics cause different wavelengths of light to "land" in the focal plane at slightly different speeds, meaning that, in essence, they fail to smoothly blend, hence the "fringing" effect.
Of course, chromatic aberration may be exactly the look you're going for, if you want to create a kind of lo-fi, primitive look to your shots. In the cactus photo seen here, for example, taken with an all new plastic "art" lens, I found that the effect resembled old color printing processes associated with early postcards, and, for that particular image, I can live with it. Other times I would avoid it like the plague.
Plastic lenses, like any other add-ons or toys, come with their own pluses and minuses. Hey, if you're a ketchup person, then soak your plate with the stuff. But if you believe that it just louses up a good steak, then push the bottle away. Just that simple.
By MICHAEL PERKINS
I OFTEN FANTASIZE ABOUT STANDING UP AND OFFERING A TOAST at a banquet hall crammed with photographers, just because it's fun to play with what it might sound like….to see if I could strike some verbal chord that would resonate equally with everyone in the room, from the noobies to pro's. I constantly change the exact wording, but the sentiment in my head is always something like:
May the best picture you took today be your worst picture ever, ten years from now.
What did he say? Does he hope the masterpiece I captured today will someday be regarded by me as garbage?
Well, yes, of course I do. At least I hope that for my stuff. If I still love today's work ten years from now, it will mean that I stopped growing and learning, like, well, today. Consider: I can't ever know everything about my craft, and can't hope to "top out" or reach perfection within my lifetime. And why would I want to? If today is the best I'll ever do, why not save time and money, smash my cameras, and consider myself done?
The entire point of artistic expression is that it is an evolutionary process. If I still took pictures the way I did at twelve, that would be like having been on a Ford assembly line for half a century, with one indistinguishable cog after another coming down the belt, and me adding the same screw to it, every day, for eternity. Photography appeals to us because, like any other measure of our mind, it will be in flux forever. It's divinely uncertain.
And I want that uncertainty. I want the good shots that come on lousy days. I need the images that I made when I had no idea what I was doing. I crave the betrayals that camera bodies, lenses, changing weather conditions or cranky kids will hurl at me. Edward Steichen often referred to the act of refreshing one's work as "kicking the tripod", and, like that seismic shock, your own morphing ideas of how to do all this will benefit from an occasional earthquake.
Do great pictures always come from adversity? Of course not, or else my morbidly depressed friends would be the greatest photographers on earth. However, the sheer careening instability of life pretty much guarantees that the things that thrill you about today's shots will make you shake your head ten years down the line, and devise different ways of solving all the eternal problems.
And so, a toast…to the great pictures you made today, and to the day that you can barely stand to look at them.
By MICHAEL PERKINS
WHAT MAKES A LENS GREAT, AT LEAST FOR ME, is the degree to which I can forget about it.
The best images come from being able to shoot decisively and in the moment. That means knowing instinctively what your lens is good at, and using that information to salvage more pictures. Such knowledge only comes from repetition, trial and error, patience, and all those other tedious old-school virtues that drive people crazy but drive their work to perfection. And, eventually, it means you and the lens must think and react as one, without a lot of conscious thought.
I only know one way to get to that point with a given piece of glass, and that's to be "monogamous" with it, using a given lens for nearly 100% of my work for long periods of time. Shuffling constantly from lens to lens in an effort to get "just the right gear" for a particular frame actually leads me to be hyper-conscious of the limits or strengths of what I'm shooting with, to be less focused on making pictures and more focused on calculating the taking of pictures. I believe that the best photos start coming the closer you can get to a purely reflexive process. See-feel-shoot.
If you've never chosen your own version of a "go-to" lens, one that can stay on your camera almost always, and give you nearly every kind of shot, I would suggest biting off a fat space of practice time and trying it. Snap on a 35mm and make it do everything that comes to hand for a day. Then a week. Then a month. Then start thinking of what would actually necessitate taking that lens off and going with something else. And for what specific benefit?
You may find that it's better getting 100% comfortable with one or two lenses than to have a passing acquaintance with six or seven. The above image could have been taken with about five different lenses with comparable results. But whatever lens I used, it would have been easier and faster if I had selected it because it would also work for the majority of the other shots I was to attempt that day. Less time rummaging around in your kit bag equals more time to take pictures.
Every time there is a survey on what the most popular focal length in photography is, writers tend to forget that the number one source of imagery today is a cell phone camera. That means that, already, most of the world is shooting everything in the 30-35mm range and making it work. And before we long for the "good old days" of infinite choices, recall that most photographers born before 1960 had one camera, equipped with one lens. We like to think we are swimming in choices but we need to make sure we're not actually drowning in them.
Find the workhorse gear that has the most flexibility and reliability for what you most want to do. Chances are the lens that will give you the best results isn't the shiny new novelty in the catalogue, but just inches away, right in your hand.
By MICHAEL PERKINS
PHOTOGRAPHERS, LIKE ALL OTHER UPRIGHT BIPEDS, LOVE PRAISE. None of us are so jaded that we don't like to get a gold star for an image or an idea; after all, that's why we do this. However, as borne out by the simplest Google research, there is one sentence, which, although intended as a compliment, will send the average photographer into a seething simmer. You've heard it. Maybe you've even said it.
Repeat it with me:
Gee, your pictures are so good. You must have a really great camera.
Sadly, this sentence is intended as a thumbs-up, a certification that "ya done good". However, it unfortunately lands on the ear sounding like, "Lucky you. Despite your basic, hapless ineptitude, the magical machine in your fist created art that was so wonderful, not even a clod like you could prevent it from happening.Congrats!"
When I am told that my pictures are good because I have "a really good camera", part of me wants to extend the idea of tools=talent to other fields of endeavor, as in:
"Thanks. I can hardly wait to buy a $3,000 oven so I can become a master chef."
"Thanks, I'm eager to get some $200 brushes so I can paint a masterpiece."
"Thanks. I'm planning to tie a blanket around my neck and recite 'I'm Batman' several thousand times so I can be a crimefighter…."
Photography isn't about tools. It's about patience, perseverance, vision, flexibility, humility, objectivity, subjectivity, and, most importantly, putting in more hours than the next guy. It's about exercising your eye as you would any muscle that you've like to tone and strengthen. It's about sitting 24 hours in a duck blind, hanging by your heels from a helicopter, avoiding incoming gunfire, charming grumpy children, and learning to hate things in your own work that, just yesterday, you believed was your "A" stuff.
If equipment were all, then everyone with a Steinway would be Glenn Gould and everyone with a Les Paul Gibson would be, well, Les Paul. But we know that there is no success guarantee that comes with a purchase warranty. Many cameras are great, but they won't wake you up at 4am to flush out a green-tailed towhee or climb a mountain to help you snag a breathtaking sunrise. Tools are not talent. And the sooner we learn that, the less we'll start thinking our work will start to shine with the next new shiny thing we buy, and teach ourselves to make better pictures with what we own and shoot right here, right now.
By MICHAEL PERKINS
THERE IS A GLOBAL RACE, ACCELERATING RAPIDLY SINCE THE DAWN OF THE DIGITAL AGE, toward better, faster image sensors in cameras great and small, as we wage the eternal photographic battle against the limits of light. It's one more reason why this is the best time in the medium's history to be making pictures.
It's hard to express what a huge game-changer this is. Film-based photography advanced the science of gathering light in slow fits and starts for more than a century, with even some of the most popular consumer films rated at very slow speeds (Kodachrome) or, if faster, extraordinarily high grain (Tri-X). Suddenly, the world's shadowy interiors, from stadiums to basements, give up their secrets to even bargain-priced cameras as ISO ratings for sensors climb and noise/grain abatement gets better and better.
The above image, taken inside the U.S. Capitol building in Washington, would have, in film terms, required either a full-open aperture (making a consistent depth of field from front to back tricky), a slow exposure (hard to go handheld when you're on a tour) or a film rated at 400 or above. Plus luck.
By contrast, in digital, it's a casual snap. The f/5.6 aperture keeps things sharp from front to back, and the ISO rating of 250 results in noise that's so low that it's visually negligible. The statue of television pioneer Philo Farnsworth is dark bronze, and so a little re-contrasting of the image was needed in post-editing to lighten up the deeper details, but again, the noise is so low that it's really only visible in color. As it happens, I actually like the contrast between the dark statue and the bright room better in monochrome anyway, so everyone wins.
The message here is: push your camera. Given today's technology, it will give you some amazing things, and the better you understand it the more magic it will produce. We are just on the cusp of a time when we can effectively stow the flash in the closet except in very narrow situations and capture stuff we only used to dream about. Get out there and start swinging for the fences.
By MICHAEL PERKINS
Okay, Wang, I think that's enough pictures of the parking lot. —Rodney Dangerfield, Caddyshack
IF YOU WERE TO EXPRESS TODAY'S PHOTOGRAPHIC FREEDOM IN TERMS OF FIREPOWER, it would be fair to say that many of us have come to shoot in a somewhat scatter-shot fashion, like someone sweeping a machine gun. Indeed, digital allows us to overshoot everything to such a degree that doing so becomes our default action, because why would you take one picture of your child digging into birthday cake when fifty will do just as well?
Some over-shooting is really what pro photogs used to call "coverage" and is actually beneficial for particularly hard subjects. Awe-inspiring sunsets. A stag at bay. The fiery burst from a Hawaiian volcano. Such subjects actually warrant a just-one-more approach to make sure you've thought through every possible take on something that can be interpreted in a variety of ways, or which may be vanishing presently. But that's a lot different from cranking off four dozen clicks of the visitor's center at Wally World.
Shooting better isn't always assured by merely shooting more. Instead of the machine gun technique, we might actually improve our eye, as well as our ability to strategize a shot, by limiting how many total tries we make at capturing an image. My point is that there are different "budgets" for different subject matter, and that blowing out tons of takes is not a guarantee that Ze Beeg Keeper is lurking there somewhere in the herd.
So put aside the photographic spray-down technique from time to time and opt for the single bullet theory. For you film veterans, this actually should be easy, since you remember what it was like to have to budget a finite number of frames, depending on how many rolls you packed in. Try giving yourself five frames max to capture something you care about, then three, then one. Then go an entire day taking a single crack at things and evaluate the results.
If you've ever spent the entire day with a single focal length lens, or fought severe time constraints, or shot only on manual, you're already accustomed to taking a beat, getting your thinking right, and then shooting. That's all single-take photography is; an exercise in deliberation, or in mindfulness, if you dig guru-speak. Try it on your own stuff, and, better yet, use the web to view the work of others doing the same thing. Seek out subjects that offer limited access. Shoot before your walk light goes on at an intersection. Frame out a window. Pretend an impatient car-full of relatives is waiting for you with murder in their hearts. Part of the evolution of our photography is learning how to do more with less.
That's not only convenient, in terms of editing. It's the very soul of artistry.
By MICHAEL PERKINS
MANY OF US WHO BEGAN THEIR LOVE FOR PHOTOGRAPHY IN THE DAYS OF FILM have never really made a total switch to digital. It just never was necessary to make that drastic a "clean break" with the past. Far from it: through the tools and techniques that we utilized in the analog world, we still carry forth viewpoints and habits that act as foundations for the work we produce in pixels. Photography was not "re-invented" by digital in the way that transportation was when we moved from horse to car. It was refined, adding a new chapter, not an entire book.
Digital is merely the latest in a historical line of ever-evolving recording media, from daguerreotypes to salted paper to glass plates to roll film. The principles of what makes a good picture, plus or minus some philosophical fashion from time to time, have not changed. That means that tons of toys from the analog world still have years of life left in them, especially lenses.
Call it a "reverse hack" mentality, call it sentiment, but some shooters are reluctant to send all their various hunks of aged camera glass to the ashcan simply because they were originally paired with analog bodies. Photography is expensive enough without having to start from scratch with all-new components every time a hot new product hits the market, and many of us look for workarounds that involve giving a second life to old lenses. New wine from old bottles.
Some product lines actually engineer backwards-compatibility into their lenses. Nikon was the first and best company to spearhead this particular brain flash, making lenses for over forty years that can be pressed into service with the latest Nikon body off the production line. In my own case, I have finally landed a Nikon 24mm f/2.8 prime, not from current catalogues, but from the happy land of Refurbia. It's a 1970's-era gem that is sharp, simple, and mine-all-mine, for a fifth of the cost of the latest version of the same optic.
My new/old 24 gives me a wide-angle that's a full stop more light-thirsty than the most current kit lenses in that focal length, and is also small, light, and quick, even as a manual focus lens. And it can be argued that the build quality is better as well. Photography is about results, not hardware, so how you get to the finish line is your business. And yet, sometimes, I must admit that shooting new pictures with legendary lenses feels like photography, as an art, is building on, and not erasing, history.
By MICHAEL PERKINS
EVERY YEAR AT THIS TIME, AS I HIT THE RESET BUTTON ON MY LIFE VIA SOME KIND OF BIRTHDAY RITUAL, I pause to wonder, again, whether I've really learned anything at all in over fifty years of photography. Surely, by this late date, the habit of shooting constantly should have assured me that I had "arrived" at some place in terms of viewpoint or style, right? And yet, I still feel as if I am just barely inches off the starting line in terms of what there is left to learn, and how much more I need to know about seeing. It's a great feeling in that it keeps things perpetually fresh, but I often wonder if I'll ever make it to that mirage I see ever ahead of me.
The aging process, and how that continually remaps your perception, is one of the least pondered areas of criticism as it pertains to photography. And that's very strange. We track the evolution of technical acuity over a lifetime. We date ourselves in reference to a piece of equipment we acquired, an influential person who crossed our path, or a body of work, but we don't thoroughly examine how much our photography is being changed completely because the person making the picture is in constant flux. How can we ignore what seems to be the biggest shaper of our vision over time? We don't even want the same things in an image from one year to the next, so how can we take photos in our maturity anything like those we shot in our youth?
Looking back to my first images, it's clear that I thought the mere opportunity for a picture plus the act of clicking a shutter would result in a good picture, a kind of "cool view+camera=art" equation. This is to say that, instead of thinking, "I could make a good picture from this", I was actually thinking, "this would be a good picture." I know that sounds like hair-splitting of the first order, but the two statements are, in fact, different. The first implies that the camera plus the subject will automatically result in something solid; it's a snapshot philosophy. The second statement is made by someone who has been frustrated by so many snapshots that he knows he has to step into the process as an active player. That realization can only come with age.
As always, my father's admonition that art is a process rather than a product emerges as my prime directive. When I look at the pictures made by a twelve-year old me, I can at least see what the little punk was going for, and I can measure whether I've gotten any closer to that ideal than he did. The trick is for old me to want it as badly as young me did, and when that happens, I forget how many candles are on the cake, and am just grateful that their light still burns brightly.
By MICHAEL PERKINS
THE FUTURE DOESN'T ARRIVE ALL AT ONCE, just as the past doesn't immediately vanish completely. In terms of technology, that means that eras kinds of smear across each other in a gradual "dissolve". Consider the dial telephone, which persisted in various outposts for many years after the introduction of touch-tone pads, or, more specifically, Superman's closet, the phone booth, which stubbornly overstayed its welcome long past the arrival of the cel. The "present" is always a mishmosh of things that have just arrived and things that are going away. They sort of pass each other, like workers at change of shift.
Photographically, this means that there are always relics of earlier eras that persist past their sell-by date. They provide context to life as part of a kind of ever-flowing visual history. It also means that you need to seize on these relics lest they, and their symbolic power, are lost to you forever. Everything that enjoys a brief moment as an "everyday object" will eventually recede in use to such a degree that younger generations couldn't even visually identify it or place it in its proper time order (a toaster from 1900 today resembles a Victorian space heater more than it does a kitchen appliance).
Ironically, this is a double win for photographers. You can either shoot an object to conjure up a bygone era, or you can approach it completely without context, as a pure design element. You can produce substantial work either way.
Some of the best still life photography either denies an object its original associations or isolates it so that it is just a compositional component. The thing is to visually re-purpose things whose original purpose is no longer. Photography isn't really about what things look like. It's more about what you can make them look like.
By MICHAEL PERKINS
FAR BE IT FROM ME TO DO A HATER NUMBER on photographic post-processing. We often pretend that the act of photo manipulation began at the dawn of the pixel age, when, of course, people have been futzing with their images since the first shutter snapped. We love the idea of "straight out of the camera" as an ideal, but it's just that…an ideal. Eventually, it's the way processing is executed in a specific instance which either justifies or condemns its use.
With that in mind, I do find that too many of us use faux b&w, or the desaturation of color images, long after they're snapped, as a kind of last-ditch attempt to save pictures that didn't have enough force or impact in the first place. Have I resorted to this myself? Oh, well, yeah, maybe. Which means, freaking certainly. Have I managed to "save" many images in this way? Not so much. Usually, I feel like I'm serving leftovers and trying to pawn them off as a fresh meal.
The further along I lope through life, however,the more I tend to believe that the best way to make a black and white image is to set out to intentionally do just that. An act of planning, pre-visualization, deliberation. It means looking at your subject in terms of how a color object will register over the entire tonal range of greys and whites. Also, texture, as it is accentuated by light, is particularly powerful in monochrome, so that part needs to be planned as well. Exposure, as it's effected by polarizers or colored filters also must be planned, as values in sky, stone or foliage must be anticipated. And, always, there is the use of contrast as drama, something black and white does to great effect.
You might be able to convert a color shot into an even more appealing b&w shot in your kerputer, but the most direct route, that is, making monochrome in the moment, is still the best, since it gives you so many more options while you're managing every other aspect of the shot in real time. It all comes down to a major philosophical point about photography, which is that the more control you can wield ahead of the click, especially with today's shoot-it-check-it-shoot-it-again technology, the better your results will be.
By MICHAEL PERKINS
WINTER IS A TIME OF MUTED COLORS, DIMINISHED SUNLIGHT and inner struggle. I've heard people refer to the leaner, darker months as the feeling of being shut up inside a box, almost like having yourself placed in storage. I would lop one side off of that polygon and say that, to me, it feels more like being locked in a triangle.
As a photographer, I feel as if, in winter, I sustain three distinct emotional "hits" about my work, forming the three sides of the triangle, all three pressing up against, and balancing, each other. These sides can be described as:
Not enough new or compelling ideas coming into my brain. A case of the "drys".
Too much re-evaluation of all of my images that failed, along with a big fat dose of recrimination.
A near-crippling sadness over the photographic opportunities, many tied to people now departed, that I simply didn't act upon, and which are now lost to me forever.
The first side of the triangle really isn't unique to winter-time. I experience fallow periods throughout the year. They just ache more when amplified by slate-gray skies and dead trees. The second is to be expected, since spending more time indoors means rifling through old boxes of prints and slides, asking myself what the hell I was thinking when I chose this exposure or that subject, and ending the entire process by pitching some of those boxes into the incinerator. A needed exercise, but hardly anyone's idea of a fun time.
No, it's the third side of the triangle which is the real killer, since the photos that haunt you the worst are always the ones you didn't take. Friendships pour additional salt into this particular wound, since, somehow, you never recorded quite enough of the faces which once were the common features of your world, and which time has, one by one, erased.
Your own personal list of pals-not-present grows steadily over the years, and the thought that you could have shot one less sunset to capture just one more portrait of some of them hurts. It's not as if your emotional souvenirs of them aren't burned into your mind's eye. It's not even that you might have done something magical or singular with their faces beyond another birthday candid. It's simply that once you could, and now you can't.
The triangle isn't all torture. Breaking out of it means taking arms against ghosts, and (as Shakespeare said), by opposing, ending them. You not only have to keep shooting, but keep shooting mindfully. Because when all of this that we call reality finally drains through our fingers, the scraps of it that we leave behind really can matter. Even with triangles, there's always one more side to the story.
By MICHAEL PERKINS
ANYONE WHO REGULARLY VISITS THESE PAGES already knows that I advocate of doing as much of your photography in as personal and direct a way as possible. While I am completely astonished by the number of convenience items and automatic settings offered to the casual photographer in today's cameras, I believe that many of these same features can also delay the process by which people take true hands-on control of their image-making. I regard anything that gets in between the shooter and the shutter as a potential distraction, even a drag on one's evolution.
Tools are not technique. Here are two parallel truths of photography: (1) some people with every gizmo in the toy store take lousy pictures. (2) some people with no technical options whatsoever create pictures that stun the world.
From my view, you can either subscribe to the statement, "I can't believe what this camera can do!" or to one which says, "I wonder what I can make my camera do for me!" The very controls built into cameras to make things convenient for newcomers are the first things that must be abandoned once you are ready to move beyond newcomer status. At some point, you learn that there is no way any camera can ever contain enough magic buttons to give you uniformly excellent results without your active participation. You simply cannot engineer a device that will always deliver perfection and perpetually protect you from your own human limits.
Innovators never innovate by surrounding themselves with the comfortable and the familiar. For photographers, that means making decisions with your pictures and living with the uneven results in the name of self-improvement. This is a challenge because manufacturers seductively argue that such decisions can be made painlessly by the camera acting alone. But guess what. If you don't actively care about your photos, no one else will either. There may not be anything technically wrong with your camera's "choices". But they are not your choices, and eventually, you will want more. The structure that at first made you feel safe will, in time, start to feel more like a cage.
Tools are not technique.


text:
My young blog's best of:
About the characteristics of e-culture:
"One of the greatest things about e-culture is creativity. The web allows you to have hundreds, if not millions of platforms just waiting for you to display your artworks, your videos, your writings, etc.
But is it just about that? Is there more to the web than being a mere platform, a technical device enabling people to share content?"
(Thou shall be creative, Sept. 08)
About learning English online:
"The second interesting thing about watching tv shows online are the comments you can make while watching the show. For instance, some discussions can be pretty heated on YouTube. I remember reading about people discussing abortion while watching a teen drama called "The Secret Life of the American Teenager" and birth control and how some are pro-life and some are pro-choice, etc. So, you can try and make your own point, thus practicing your written English."
About music:
"Basically, a music mash up is mixing at least two songs (for instance an Elvis song with a Block Party song), and therefore making a brand new song."
On tv shows:
"# 1 - BATTLESTAR GALACTICA (Sci-Fi)
I know it might seem extremely geeky at first sight (and for the record, I hate the word 'geek'), but BATTLESTAR GALACTICA is an astonishing hybrid show; it's a mix of sci-fi, political drama, fantastic genre and pure drama when it comes to the characters. Basically, the show is about the survival of the human race after its near genocide. The show is extremely realistic and the storylines are in no way similar to the ones in Stargate for instance. It's a really unique remake of the original show (which aired during the 70s') that tries to elevate the sci-fi genre to something like Aldous Huxley would have made, had he been a tv show producer rather than a writer. I've discovered it two years ago before the beginning of the show's third season and eventhough there are flaws and strange mystic storylines that I don't always like, this is by far what I considere TV at its best (and it has been nominated for Emmy awards on several occasions which shows there is more to it than spaceships and robots)."
On open-source softwares:
"So I would tend to say that commercial softwares can be somewhat lazy and rest under their laurels (which they were given and they did not earned). So for the users, it is good to be able to choose between several options, like being able to choose between Sun, Linux or Windows. It's the same as being able to choose between PCs and Macs. […] The article I found about Cloud Computing explained that they can spy on you and use your personnal datas like Facebook or Gmail. So you pretty much have to choose between free content and confidentiality. Internet is great to have options and try new things but it can use you for commercial purposes as well."
About Obama:
"It is smart because by 2050, Latinos will represent a third of the US population and in the last elections, like the video said 8 million latino voters didn't vote.
Add to this example, other viral music videos with Scarlett Johansson and Will.I.Am., and you understand that Obama has a real online communication strategy based on creating contents with stars that appeals to young adults. What annoys me with Obama, though I'm quite fond of him and his idealism and poised attitude, is the fact that he relies too much on hollywood stars. "
On dangers of the internet:
"The Internet is pretty handy, especially in terms of services: you can shop online, get access to free email accounts, join a community like our online Wiki 'SAY WE'… But it can also be dangerous as all things in life are if you're not careful enough.
For instance, every month there is a new case of identity theft and cybercrime. […] There is also the fact that cyberwars do exist too. A couple of years ago (or maybe last year), some high profile US and English organizations (belonging to the governement) were attacked by trojans. People suspected the Chinese governement because most IP addresses were Chinese… So cybercrime can go pretty far."
About violence on the Internet:
"Here you have a peak at some of the most outrageous deviances of the Internet. In fact, Internet magnifies borderline behaviours. For instance, I found out that people watch a sick version of porn called snuff movies where people rape other people and eventually kill them, all that while filming. I doubt it would have gone mainstream had it not been thanks to a platform such as the Internet…
It's unfortunate but for now the fact that the Internet is based on a lack of regulation and democratisation help the display of violence."

subset: commoncrawl


text:
Eldorar Alshamia:
The United Nations confirmed on Wednesday that they do not participate in the evacuation plans of the trapped people in east Aleppo, but they are ready for it.
United Nations Office for the Coordination of Humanitarian Affairs said in a statement, "The United Nations stands ready to facilitate the voluntary and safe evacuation operations of the wounded, the sick and civilians at risk from the besieged city.
Trapped residents evacuation operations remain suspended, while French Foreign Minister Jean-Marc Ayrault called for the deployment of observers to monitor the evacuation process.


text:
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- ThunderHead Creations Tauren BF RDTA - 2ml
ThunderHead Creations Tauren BF RDTA - 2ml, SS/Rainbow
within 10-30 business days.
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Product video
Product Introduction
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• Seven bright colors for selection
• 1 x Tauren BF RDTA
• 1 x 510 Squonk Pin
• 1 X Allen Wrench
• Spare parts
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3RD Party Review on ThunderHead Creations Tauren BF RDTA:
ガシガシ使えるし、これはこれでいいなぁというのが素直な感想。See more ThunderHead Creations Tauren BF RDTA review.
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1. Presale items are available for group buy; but they will be shipped out when we have them in stock if group buy succeed.
2. Some products like Joyetech, Eleaf, Wismec brands, Flash Sale devices, and items priced at more than $300, are excluded for group buy.
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7. The number of participants for a group depends on the value of specific item.
8. Once any cheating means found, we have the right to disqualify the participant from the group buy activity. The right to interpret belongs to Buybest.


text: This project had many layers to it. First we discussed abstract art and how it does not have to show anything in particular. So the first layer that the students were instructed to do was to choose a color scheme and paint their entire paper with shapes and lines in anyway they wanted. The second layer was to outline their shapes with either white or black depending on their colors and what would look best. The next layer was to add different types of funky paper over top. Lastly students cut their painting apart in 3 inch squares and then reassembled it onto a new piece of paper. And there you have your abstract collage.


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Gun-control advocates and critics are gearing up for a showdown on Gov. Deval Patrick's crime bill in the waning days of this year's legislative session.
Gun-control advocates and critics are gearing up for a showdown on Gov. Deval Patrick's crime bill in the waning days of this year's legislative session.
Saying the matter could come to a vote as early as next week, the National Rifle Association this week asked supporters to call members of the House Ways and Means Committee to urge them to oppose Patrick's proposal.
Meanwhile, organizations like Stop Handgun Violence have rallied and met with legislators to press them to bring the bill to a vote before the end of the session on July 31.
"We are going to push hard for the House and Senate to vote up or down, but vote," said John Rosenthal, a founder of Newton-based Stop Handgun Violence.
Patrick's bill would limit gun buyers to one firearm purchase per month. It also requires private gun sales to be recorded by a licensed dealer so the transaction would be included in the state's record-checking system.
It also would add felonies involving the unlawful possession, use or trafficking of a gun to the list of reasons a district attorney can seek a dangerousness hearing on whether a defendant should be held.
The bill would ban anyone who isn't a licensed owner from having handling a machine gun.
Patrick says it also would bring Massachusetts into compliance with a 2007 federal law by checking if a court has ruled someone mentally defective or committed them to mental institutions before they can buy a gun.
The proposal appeared to have died last month when a tied vote in the joint Judiciary Committee stranded its release to the floor.
Sen. Cynthia Stone Creem, D-Newton, objected to the vote count. Eventually House Speaker Robert DeLeo sent the bill back to the committee, which voted June 28 to release it, 6-5.
"We think there's time to get it done," said Mary Beth Heffernan, secretary of the Executive Office of Public Safety and Security. "We understand the speaker is committed to moving the bill and we look forward to the opportunity to fully debate it."
The proposal would help block the flow of guns to criminals, Heffernan said this week. Advocates for gun rights say it would do little to discourage illegal use of firearms while penalizing licensed gun owners.
The federal Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, Firearms and Explosives has estimated nearly 40 percent of guns used illegally in Massachusetts originate from legal gun owners in the state, Heffernan said.
Heffernan said the one-gun-a-month limit is meant to cut down on the amount of guns someone could buy legally and then hand over to someone else.
"We're trying to stem the so-called straw purchasers someone who can go into a gun show or a dealer, and they're buying guns for someone that is not by law allowed to buy guns," Heffernan said this week.
Rosenthal called the bill "life or death" for inner city residents. Middlesex County District Attorney Gerry Leone released a statement this week saying he supports Patrick's bill.
Jim Wallace, executive director of the Gun Owners Action League in Northborough, said there are already safeguards on the books that address some of the same concerns.
His organization supports a separate gun bill sponsored by Rep. George Peterson Jr., R-Grafton, which does not include the one gun a month limit.
It also would create a special state police unit to investigate gun crimes and create new penalties for people who break into properties to steal guns, supporters said.
"The governor's whole concept of reducing the crime rate is being handled in the wrong way," said Richard Callaghan, owner of Callaghan Firearms in Marlborough. "Education is much better than punishing the honest gun owner."
Callaghan said most guns used in crimes come from the black market, most originating from southern states.
Wallace said the number of licensed gun owners in the state has dropped from 1.5 million in 1998 to about 230,000 today, which he attributed to restrictive gun laws.
Rosenthal, however, said Massachusetts has a relatively low level of gun violence despite more lax firearms laws in many neighboring states because of its strict regulations.
Richard Powell, Creem's chief of staff, said she supports Patrick's bill. Two other local legislators who sit on the Judiciary Committee are less sure.
Rep. Danielle Gregoire, D-Marlborough, said she supports Peterson's bill and views the one-gun-per-month limit as too restrictive. She also said supporters of Patrick's bill have not convincingly shown that guns used in crimes in Massachusetts originate from legal purchases here.
"Where I come from, there are a lot of sportsmen out there, and they need to have their rights protected, too," she said.
Rep. John Fernandes, D-Milford, was among members who reserved their votes, or did not weigh in on whether to release Patrick's bill from committee.
He said he generally does not vote in favor of advancing legislation in committee unless he is prepared to support it on the floor, nor against it unless he plans to oppose it.
Fernandes said he is concerned about city gun violence and machine guns, but is unsure he can support the legislation's one gun a month provision.
"There are legitimate concerns that have been raised," he said.
Still unclear is whether a recent Supreme Court ruling, which struck down a Washington, D.C., handgun ban, will affect Patrick's proposal.
Heffernan said she does not believe it's related.
(David Riley can be reached at firstname.lastname@example.com or 508-626-3919.)


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Chad … well stated son!
Dan, thank you for giving our son Chad, yet another chance to articulate his life's philosophy. This will be a gift to some and all will appreciate the gift he and his family are to us and so many others. We will pray for you as we do for all who battle CF.
Judy and Carl


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Let's talk about these shoes i'm wearing. They're from Jcrew's last year's fall collection. I left the house wearing a pair of black pumps, but they were squeezing my toe so badly, I had to take them off. They usually fit perfectly, but I think my feet were a bit swollen. I'll blame that on age. Luckily, I always keep a few pairs of shoes (pumps, sneakers, flip flops, flats, rain boots ) in my car trunk. I'm now going to change my back up pumps to black. You can never go wrong with those. Now on to the outfit.
I had these pumps in the trunk of my car.
Aside from the fact that I think they're so darn cute and dapper, one of the reasons I love hats/caps so much is definitely because they make bad hair day issues disappear. I had two meetings today, and getting my hair done was not a priority after dealing with my 9 year old and her morning drama.
I turned to my new go to cap from Jcrew to cover my uncombed and tangled tresses. A quick bun at the nape, hat and that was it. Some might think it's unprofessional to wear a hat to a meeting, but I operate outside that box. As time passes and I get older the little things like that don't seem to matter much, and I kinda like that feeling. I remember one day, when I was a teacher, one of the union representatives walked up to me and said, "you know hats are not allowed, right?" I looked at him and cooly said, "they're not?" and kept it moving. I couldn't imagine a me without hats.
| Shoes, Sweater & Cap: Jcrew | Skirt: FCUK |Hand bag: Phillip Lim x Target | Vest: H&M |


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Wednesday, July 31, 2013
Brain Freeze
Well, I finally did it - sort of. Like so many things in life, the first time wasn't exactly a charm, but at least I'm past the hurdle of taking the first step. I went on the air last weekend with CW and carried on a Morse Code conversation with a faceless stranger in New York! Frankly, it was terrifying, although he was so very, very nice. I would be more proud and excited if my brain hadn't gone flat on me -- no kidding, I had no idea what he was saying, the Code sounded like gibberish to me, even though I could clearly hear that he was going slowly for my benefit. Fortunately, I had my "Elmer" (a seasoned Ham there to help me) at my side, and he copied the responses for me and told me enough to allow me to make a semi-intelligent response. I had no problem at all TALKING in Morse Code (except for a few stutters), but my listening skills just disappeared. My Elmer taped the conversation to prove to me that I really do know what was said, I just couldn't listen properly in my panic, and of course he was right. So it was a good news/bad news kind of experience. And more evidence that I need to kick up my practice schedule! My Elmer says it's also more evidence that I need to go on the air more often to get over my serious case of nerves. :-P
5 comments:
- Kim@Snug Harbor said...
That is fantastic - the first time is always the hardest. Now that the initial shock is over, you will do better next time. Very cool!
- July 31, 2013 at 9:00 PM
- sue in mexico mo said...
I am impressed! You did something very few people can do and you should be proud of yourself. WOW!
- August 1, 2013 at 1:27 PM
- Grandma Yellow Hair said...
You just amaze me! Every time I come by for a visit I leave here with a smile on my face because you are not afraid of trying anything.
I love that about you.
Keep doing this and before long you will be as good as the others talking to you.
Hope your well. I am still sick with a stomach virus but after five days of it surely I am getting to the end. lol
- August 2, 2013 at 4:23 PM
- Carrie P. said...
morse code, that is fascinating.
- August 5, 2013 at 10:15 PM
- Unknown said...
Don't feel bad, my husband, also a ham, can send CW like crazy but can't copy it! It drives him nuts.
- September 12, 2013 at 3:51 AM
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Super hot news: Thanks to fantabulous reader Joel who discovered this huge stash of New Old Stock ceramic tile decorative "sizzle strips" for sale on ebay. These gorgeous sizzle strips were made by Mosaic Tile Company of Zanesville, Ohio, probably in the 1950s or 1960s. They are gorgeous. And at $3 each — I think they are a terrific deal. There seem to be many of each style. Each sizzle is 6″ long. Who is working on a vintage bathroom? Go get 'em, Retro Renovators!
After this fabulous discovery, I reached out to Ebay seller 86durango86 to see how he came to own all of these NOS liner tiles. He writes:
I work for a carpet/tile store in Northwest Indiana. My boss was going to throw this tile away about 5 years ago. So I snatched it up to sell on Ebay, only I put it in my storage and never got around to it until last week. I am regretful, though, because we used to have a semi trailer in back loaded with old tile. All the old avocado and pastel colors — but we pitched it all about 10 years ago. I was not as in tune with the value of vintage items at that time, so I really missed the boat at that time. Now I am always on the look out to rescue the beautiful art of the past. All of the accent strips are now listed. If I have fewer than 150 listed then that is all I have of that particular item…. and if I have 150 or more I have additional stock of those items.
Yowza — you mean to tell me there was MUCH MORE vintage NOS tile that was just tossed out? It is enough to break a girl's heart. Hindsight is always 20/20 though — I'm sure at the time it wasn't worth the cost of storage to most people. At least some of the coolest stuff was saved — thanks to 86durango86 for saving some of this awesome tile and for allowing us to add the photos to our vintage tile archive.
Check out the graphic below to see close up photos of all 24 varieties of vintage liner tile:
I know I'm starting to sound like an advertisement, but I promise I don't work for them… I'm out of state. If these vintage tiles are sold out in the color you like, B&W sells a "Deco Liner" which can be customized in the colors one wants. As of right now, a two color deco liner in any two colors would be $15.98 each. The pattern is on their website, you can ask for samples of colors you might be interested in from them and they will send you a price list. It is like the oval and diamond pattern sizzle stick. Someone online has scanned in a lot of their colors with their color codes, but the monitor changes them so it can only be a rough guide.
my kitchen is original 1950's and I would love to incorporate these swizzle pieces into the subway tile backsplash. can you direct me where to find them please. Thank you
I'm trying to find the link for these retro liners…I need the black & white deco one desperately. Help
We were just at B&W on Saturday and Jesse helped us estimate all our tile needs and costs or a 1920s bathroom redo. We also checked out the hand painted deco liners but the price for a single line around the room increased our total by $1000. One option is using a plain liner for most and a more elaborate liner choice for just the tiled tub base area using the Revival Classic Retro Liners from Mission Tile West. The website states they can make in any of their classic colors and most match B&W colors. Worth checking out. Gorgeous patterns and some match these swizzle sticks. Happy Redo!
Thanks for showing us how-much fun we can have with tile. Who knew?


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Asheville Greenworks of Buncombe County – Program Spotlight: Urban Forestry
Here at GreenWorks, we know that trees contribute to a better quality of life. Trees provide oxygen, improve air and water quality, reduce stormwater management costs, and offer important habitat to urban wildlife. In addition, studies show that they promote greater physical activity, reduce stress and improve mental health, and even lead to reduced crime rates.
|Asheville GreenWorks is committed to bringing these benefits (and more!) to our local communities through programs that increase our urban tree canopy and improve public access to greenspace. You can read about each of our Urban Forestry projects below, and click any of the photos below to find out more about a project.
|Food Tree Project
|The Food Tree Project works in partnership with communities in Buncombe County that lack access to fresh, healthy food options. We currently have 9 edible orchards providing residents with apples, pears, cherries, quinces, pawpaws, blueberries, and hazelnuts.
|Tree Nursery
|GreenWorks has established two native tree nurseries — one that supports our food tree project, and the other to grow trees suitable for streambank restoration. We've set an ambitious goal to plant 800 trees a year, but trees are expensive! This helps expand our community reach by lowering program costs.
|Bee City USA – Asheville
|Did you know Asheville became the first ever Bee City USA in 2012? In 2016, Bee City USA handed over the reins for the Asheville chapter to GreenWorks in order to shift focus to growing the national network.Under GreenWorks' leadership, Asheville continues to deepen its commitment to being a model city for supporting pollinator-friendly habitat. GreenWorks helps schools and communities establish pollinator gardens, encourages the planting of native species that attract pollinators, and coordinates Pollination Celebration Week in June each year.
|In partnership with the City of Asheville, GreenWorks manages a program for citizens to "adopt-a-spot" of public land, such as a small area of a park, a sidewalk "bulb out" or a section of greenway to maintain for three years. We encourage activities such as removing litter, weeding and spreading mulch, and planting perennial pollinators or edibles. GreenWorks provides guidance and support for any volunteers willing to put in the effort for taking care of a slice of their city.
|Treasured Trees
|Is there a tree in your community that you would like to recognize and protect? Consider nominating it for GreenWorks' Treasured Tree program. Through this effort, we aim to bring public awareness to valuable and irreplaceable trees, Increase tree owners' awareness of the unique importance of trees, encourage stewardship of our urban forest, protect trees from indiscriminate removal or irreparable damage during development, and raise awareness of the diversity, sensitivity and importance of the urban tree canopy.
|Do you like what you see and want to help us inspire, equip and mobilize more people and projects in 2019? Click below and get involved!
|Make a year-end gift and helpus kick-start momentum for2019 programs.
Volunteer for 2019Urban Forestry Programs.
Tags: asheville land management
SheVille Team
We are a one-of-a-kind magazine that provides local, regional, national and international information about women's lives and education, performing and visual arts and writing, the environment, green living and sustainability and regional Western North Carolina business, people and events. "Villages preserve culture: dress, food and dance are a few examples. As villages grow in population and turn into towns, local cafes make way for large American chains. Handmade leather sandals are discarded for a pair of Western sneakers. Due to its small size, a village fosters a tight-knit sense of community. Justpeace.org explains the meaning of the African proverb, "It takes a village," by stating that a sense of community is critical to maintaining a healthy society. Village members hold a wealth of information regarding their heritage: they know about the ancient traditions, methods of production and the resources of the land. When villages become dispersed or exterminated in times of war, this anthropological knowledge disappears. Large cities are not as conducive to growing and producing foods such as fruits and vegetables. Villages, on the other hand, usually have ample amounts of land and other resources necessary for growing conditions." The Importance of Villages by Catherine Capozzi Our Mission SheVille.org provides readers with information important to women's lives and well-being. We focus primarily on the areas of education & health, business & finance, the arts & the environment. We are particularly interested in local & regional resources, organizations & events.


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Introducing a business-focused twist on a classic WordPress theme.
Today we're happy to introduce Radcliffe 2, a refreshed version of a tried-and-true WordPress theme. We've optimized it for speed, and added new features specifically with small-business websites in mind.
Radcliffe 2 was a collaborative effort by several members of WordPress.com's Theme Team. We wanted to update the popular theme for a more mobile-centric landscape, and to add new features that our small-business customers need.
Some specific design considerations for mobile include:
Standard fonts: Radcliffe 2 uses system fonts — fonts that are already available on computers and mobile devices — rather than loading its own custom fonts. This reduces page-load time, since sites no longer have to load special font files, and benefits people browsing your site on mobile devices. Like with other WordPress.com themes, the fonts can be changed using the Customizer.
No sidebar: For a more consistent experience between desktop and mobile screens, Radcliffe 2 has a single-column, no-sidebar layout. This helps sites retain the same look and feel, regardless of the device used to load it.
We've tailored Radcliffe 2's other major features for small-business sites:
Logo Resizer: For a perfect fit, increase or decrease the size of your logo.
Style Packs: Looking for a different feel for your site? Style Packs allow you to customize your design to match your brand in seconds. Check out Modern Bauhaus, Vintage Paper, or the Upbeat Pop Style Pack options! Each pack includes unique colors and fonts that create a cohesive style.
Contact Information: This is an easy way to display your phone number, email address, physical address, and hours of operation in your website's header or footer. Mobile visitors can simply tap on your number to directly call your business's phone.
Featured Prompt: Create an eye-catching area with text, a linked button, and a background image to draw visitors to a specific area of your site


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Commentary on the Chinese Communist Regime's Second Acknowledgment of Taking Organs from "Executed Prisoners"
By Shu Zhen
(Clearwisdom.net) Speaking at a national conference of transplant surgeons in Guangzhou on November 14, 2006, Huang Jiefu, Vice Minister of Health publicly admitted, the human organs used for transplant in China, "Apart from a small portion of traffic victims, most of them are from executed prisoners." This information was immediately announced to the whole world through the November 18 edition of the English-language newspaper China Daily, the mouth-piece of the Chinese Communist regime. Its attempt is to hide the more shocking crime.
Epoch Times: Transplantation Society Silent as Doctors Murder
Statement on organ harvesting represents a 'baby step'
By Stephen Gregory
Opinion Editor
Cure begins with proper diagnosis. When the Transplantation Society evaluated the malady of organ harvesting in China, it failed to understand the true nature of the disease, and its diagnosis will never lead to a cure.
Ireland: Joint Committee on Affairs Issues Press Release about CPC's Organ Harvesting of Falun Gong Practitioners in China
(Clearwisdom.net) On November 23, 2006, Mr. David Kilgour, former Canadian Secretary of State for the Asia Pacific region, and Mr. David Matas, an international human rights lawyer, addressed to the Ireland Joint Committee on Affairs about organ harvesting of Falun Gong practitioners in China. Afterwards, the Joint Committee on Affairs issued a press release. Below is the text of the press release.


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My place to sound off on all things music, ministry, meals, and other miscellanea that fit my penchant for alliteration.
Saturday, January 7, 2017
Speak Comfort to Me
3 comments:
- Laura ClarkJanuary 8, 2017 at 7:52 AM
It is cool that you wrote this article because I'd just been thinking about those words. I saw A Christmas Carol at the Melodrama a few weeks ago and those words rolled around my head. Scrooge was asking for comfort before he was repentant for his actions. In that moment he wanted to hear that everything was going to be okay, even though it wasn't yet. So how do we offer comfort, without it being a false comfort? I was thinking about how the ghosts showed Scrooge the truth so he could mourn over his sin. He needed to see the pain that he'd caused before he could be remorseful. But at the same time we are called to extend mercy and forgiveness to others because we ourselves have received it. How do we offer comfort and truth at the same time? I've been thinking about these things a lot because I see so little mercy, especially from Christians online and in social media. Collectively we seem pretty judgmental. We should be people who offer comfort and hope. It's given me plenty to think about.ReplyDelete
Laura, great comment! I don't think we can extend comfort where there is no remorse. But we can change the way we see people and deal with them. I think of the story of Betsy, Corrie's sister in "The Hiding Place" who had pity on the Germans who were mistreating them. Her pity and love were expressed in her concern over the judgment they would face before God for what they had done. Or I think of Jesus on the cross, asking His Father to forgive His killers, "for they know not what they do." In both cases the guilty had no apparent remorse, but they were seen with compassion, even in their sin.ReplyDelete
As a Christian, I should be able to look at a torturer and experience a righteous indignation over his sin, a pity and compassion over his condition and his future if he doesn't repent, and a willingness to embrace him in love if he turns from his sin. I should be able to express all of those convictions to him before he ever repents. And if he does repent, I guarantee you he will need all the comfort we can give him or he will be overwhelmed with grief and spend the rest of his life in a dazed state of, "Oh God, what have I done?"
Somehow the Christian community (mostly in America, I think) has failed to learn that God loves all his enemies. Judgment is real and eternal and inevitable -- but only for those who reject His love by rejecting Jesus.


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Working from home is a dream for many IT professionals. It's great to imagine reducing your commute to a few steps down the hallway, wearing pajamas to work, and never having to deal with office politics again — not to mention being able to set your own schedule and rates, and making enough money to have an in-ground pool as your office.
But the fact is, while the work-at-home lifestyle is portrayed as easy and carefree, it's not so easy to actually work while you're at home, surrounded by endless distractions. It takes some serious discipline and practice to stay focused, but it can be done.
Here's a great collection of must-read advice for staying productive while you work from home.
Let go of telecommuting myths
When you work from home, you'll be your own boss and have plenty of free time — or will you? It's important to realize, especially when you're first starting out, that you'll have to work hard for several different bosses on all the freelance IT projects you take to reach success (but ultimately, you have the final say in what you do or don't work on).
Microsoft's Crabby Office Lady takes a look at common telecommuting myths, and offers tips on getting work-from-home to work for you.
Learn the 10 Commandments (of working from home)
From actually getting ready for work in the morning — even though you're not going anywhere — to making time for your physical and mental needs, this checklist is a must-read for anyone considering or already working in a telecommuting environment. The bonus commandment also helps you maintain your friendships, which will be invaluable when the isolation of working from home gets to you.
Thou shalt read and remember the 10 Commandments of Working From Home.
Find out if you're the work-from-home type
Telecommuting is not the right choice for everyone. If you don't work well without direction, or depend on interaction with other people to get you through the day, you may flounder when the only person holding you accountable and keeping you going is you. You also need to have a real working space, and the ability to separate your personal and professional lives.
Find out why Entrepreneur.com says that Working From Home is Hard Work.
Get the lowdown on eating well at home
A lot of people who work from home find their eating habits dropping drastically into the poor to disastrous range — they might end up constantly snacking at the computer, or "forget" to eat for hours (or days). It takes a little planning, but balancing your nutritional needs with your work-from-home lifestyle is essential for keeping up motivation and productivity.
Lifehacker discusses how to eat well while working from home.
Avoid becoming a hermit
Another common problem for telecommuters is the sense of isolation. Spending the majority of your day alone, when email may be your only contact with other people, can take a toll on your mental health, creativity, and ability to produce. Fortunately, there are many ways you can alleviate the isolation and still work from home successfully.
Inc.com discusses this and more with 8 Ways to Be Happy and Productive in Your Home Office.
Know how to work from home…with kids
For a parent, working from home can be a fantastic opportunity to earn a living without having to shell out for daycare and juggle transportation. The ability to have a flexible schedule and be there for your kids is priceless — but making things work when you're surrounded by little ones can take some extra effort.
One work-from-home mom shares her secrets to success in How to work from home without losing your mind.
Discover your personal productivity boosters
Everyone has different work habits. The best way to be successful as a telecommuter is to find what makes you most productive, and work it into your routine. There are plenty of out-of-the-box strategies that can help you keep things running smoothly in your home office.
Check out these productive work-at-home hacks from Lifehack to get started.
If you need help implementing successful work-from-home tactics, or are searching for a career with flexible hours and telecommuting options, contact the recruiting experts at The Armada Group today.