Tag Archives: Ugh

Disqus the Frustration

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Sad about it but my Disqus is still not working properly.  Only maybe a hundred or so of the comments actually imported.  As you can see in the screenshot below, the “latest” fourteen comments came in over the last two years.  Now, I know my blog isn’t BoingBoing.net or LifeHacker but I’ve gotten more than fourteen comments over the last two years.

Disqus Comment Moderation Panel

So, where do we go from here? How do we get the missing 1,500 comments imported?  How do I active posting a comment on an older post?  Yeah, another problem I just came across.

While I’m sure this is just a setting issue, I sure can’t find it.  That option is unchecked in WordPress and I don’t even see it as an option in Disqus.  Help?  I don’t want to poke and poke Disqus but I’d really like this to work.  I’m pay for Disqus, I like the platform that much.  But if this is how it’s going to work for, maybe I’ll look again for another option. JS-Kit Echo?  Any other suggestions of where I should send my comments should Disqus never work properly?

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Why Blurb is on My Last Nerve

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For my final project in my photography class our professor assigned us to get a book published with a collection of our work.  This is something we will do at the end of each semester of the advanced photography courses.  It was something I was excited about doing.

There is a great quote by Ansel Adams that has always been important to me.

The negative is comparable to the composer’s score and the print to its performance. Each performance differs in subtle ways.

If a print is the performance, a published book is its international tour debut.

Walking into interviews with clients as well as potential graduate schools with a book of your prints is far more impressive than a CD or website.  I know, we all pretty much shoot only digital these days and creating a beautiful website is easier and easier every day.  However, sometimes there is something about holding a print in your hand, putting your nose up against the texture of the paper, that is so etherial… so different to what pops out of the computer screen.

I was ready to get my book together and published and I was ready to throw out the cash to get it done right.  I went to Blurb as per my professor’s suggestion and from all the great reviews I’d read over the last few years.  I had actually had a few pictures printed into a Blurb book earlier in the semester with fantastic results.

After putting the book together, forking over the extra cash for image wrap, a hardcover and premium paper the book was ready to be mine.

The book arrived and got great reviews from Twitter friends, my professor and my peers.  In fact, everyone that saw it seemed to love it.  So did I!

Well until I compared it to what I had created on Blurb’s Booksmart software, and what you see on their webpage… Continue reading →

Epson Matte Paper Hates Me

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Trying to print some pics that people have purchased.

On the left is how it looks on the screen, and on luster paper on any of the printers I’ve tried it on. Epson Stylus Pro 3800, 4000 Professional Edition, 4880 Pro. On the right of that picture are what happens when I do matte and choose either the Epson color profile for the paper, or the Adobe color profile.

All done is Adobe RGB 1998.

Lemme know what you think is going on, I’m stumped. All pictures I print looks like ass when on this matte paper. Click the pic to open up the larger in lightbox.  These were scanned on an Epson Perfection V750 Pro.

If you want to download the full resolution version, click here.

Here is what the full image looks like, the scans above are only partials since I don’t have a large format scanner.

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I Almost Got Arrested

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Well… I did get pulled over tonight, from within a parking lot because I was taking pictures.

Apparently, it is against the law to take pictures of anything, but especially what I was taking pictures of, at night.

Total bullshit. Wanna know what got me pulled over and my plates/license ran through the system?

I took this picture.

Yup. A picture of a bank at night. I wasn’t even zooming in on anything. Just a picture.

They told me to not take anymore pics, it was a warning that you cannot take pictures of buildings, especially banks, at night. Only, that isn’t a law and I have every right to take these pictures.

He was nice enough but this whole, “photography is a crime” thing is really getting old.


Reluctantly Home

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I finally got home from the Kansas City airport.  It took four hours but I made it!

And of course I had to take a picture.  Note, this is not my home, just an apartment near me.

Now time to get back to reality and revise a paper that is due tomorrow during the final for the same class.

Oh, but don’t forget to check out my photoblog for quite a few new pics from San Francisco and even one new one from tonight!

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Somewhat Shattered

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My photo professor had a guest lecturer in today.  His name is Justin and he is a graduate student at Yale University studying photography.  He’s a really great guy, awesome photographer and just super nice.

He told us about his journey from a trade school graduate hopping from job to job and with no desire to be college graduate much less a graduate student to a teaching assistant at Yale.  It was sort of a pictorial display of time but non-documentary.

Justin uses a 4×5 film camera for most of his shots, well he did originally.  Now he uses a Hasselblad type medium format film camera.  These 4×5 cameras allow for tilt/rise/fall/slide etc etc.  If you don’t know what these things are, you’re probably normal.  But for us photo geeks, it means capturing pictures with great, GREAT accessibility… Not the word I’m looking for.

Think of it this way.  When you take a picture of a building, looking up, it gets smaller at the top.  By tilting/shifting/raising the lens you can keep the building perfectly square.  It’s what Ansel Adams used.  It’s what architectural and fashion photographers use quite often, if not exclusively.  They are the old looking, accordian style cameras you probably thought were pieces of crap.  Not so!  I really want one and am trying to figure out how I can find the money for the camera and the film and the lenses… All in time.

After the great lecture, I got to talking to Justin (weird to type that name and not be in third person) and my professor as well as another professor about going to graduate school for a masters in fine art.

All three of these guys studied at Yale University.  It is arguably the best MFA program in the country, as far as photography goes.  And the price isn’t too terrible at around $25,000 a year.

My professor seems to think I could get in to Yale, Stanford or UCSF with my current portfolio as well as some new and better things.  Wow, I sure didn’t think so.  I still have a long way to go, both in time to apply and time to take more and better pics but still…  Stanford and UCSF, according to the two professors, are or can be free.  No tuition for MFA students.  Weird right?  Apparently a little known true story, or widely known and not talked about haha.

So.  I get excited at this prospect.  While I’d kill to go to Yale where my idols teach, Sally Mann, Gregory Crewdson… etc etc.  UCSF and Stanford are in the very area that Ryan and I want to move.  And possibly free.  Awesome right?

I call my parents to share this news and get their opinions.

They don’t seem too excited, positive or supportive of the idea.  My dad says, “Well it’s something to think about”.  I guess I was expecting, “Wow Justin, what an awesome opportunitiy, tell us more!”

Not so.  So now I’m bummed.  It seems only my friends are optimistic about my photography.  I don’t get much encouragement anymore from family and even Ryan doesn’t seem very excited about this passion of mine.  I understand people can’t be 100% into everything I am in, but this is just about my greatest creative love.

Hmph.  I’m pretty down about the whole thing now.  A few hours ago I was all-a-glow and now I’m in the dumps.

I’ll leave you with a few old pictures I took but never put on the internets.  They were all taken before I ever had a photography class, not sure the importance of that but… whatev.

Yeah.  Feel free to comment on what you think I should do.  I’m torn now.  Graduate and get to work taking over my grandmother’s advertising company, go to graduate school, work for a photo studio or start my own studio and teach photography on the side.

Hmph.

Feast of Fools

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Feast of Fools logoImage via Wikipedia

So, my friend Nick Starr had the chance to be the guest of honor on the Feast of Fools Podcast last week.

In the episode, they took a question from me which was, “Hey Nick, what would we be doing had I been able to go with you?”

Well they quoted me differently making it sound like I was going to sleep with Nick, maybe they read it wrong.  They also took out words that made me sound like I couldn’t write proper English.  Hmmm.  It’s ok, I figure they just got it wrong since it was live.

But what actually bothers me is the part where Nick says I’m hot.  Well that didn’t bother me haha, it was when they went to my site and right off the bat said I didn’t have any pictures.  (The second post is a picture of me…)

When they found the picture Fausto or Marc stated that yes, I was hot but also that my picture was heavily airbrushed.

Listen to it here
[audio:http://itsjustjustin.com/wp-content/wordpress/podcast/Feast%20of%20Fools.mp3]

And now, here’s the picture. Click it to go to the larger sized version at PiczarPhoto.com

Not Airbrushed

Argh!  Why does that bother me so much?  I didn’t airbrush myself.  Oh well. Mostly it was all compliments and I absolutely adore Marc and Fausto’s show, it’s been on my podcast playlist since Day 1.

Still, I wouldn’t argue with some of you guys letting ’em know that the reason I don’t have lines and wrinkles in that picture is because I don’t have lines and wrinkles!  I’m barely 24 years old! You can find the post specific to this episode here.

In the end though, it’s great to be heard on a podcast you love so much. I’m not on Dawn and Drew at all anymore, need to catch up with them… And anything with Keith and the Girl has been on the forms or email but never on the actual cast.

It’s a great feeling to have people talk about you, even with some of the bad parts (misquote/airbrush). But to be called sexy and hot for the whole world to hear, that’s empowering haha.

I want to thank Nick for being so nice and saying such wonderful things about me on the show, and for keeping it down to about two minutes, any more and who knows what might have been said tee hee.

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