i don’t like interacting with vendors.

ive been at sans 2006 since friday. summary: wow

i am on a security track given by the technical editor of sysadmin magazine. i just went to a scary presentation on bluetooth security. sans is awesome.

i’ll try to get some pics posted soon, the sites here are [wt]acky. i’ve been meeting cool people.

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it’s almost creepy how buildings look when they’re completely upright in pictures.

i love the coverage of the 8/90 super angulon. this is nearly 3cm is rise. i had the camera bed at a 45 degree angle to get the lens high and comfortable. thank goodness for bag bellows. i need to shoot more like this. everything looks so proper and uniform. and so unlike real human vision.

there’s a large scratch on the polaroid in the 3rd column of windows. :-/

this was shot at embarcadeo center in san francisco. no security guards. :)

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the title is a crack at all the stories i’ve ready regarding photographers being unnecessarily confronted by police and security. i keep a copy of the “photographers bill of rights” in my camera bag. i’ve been confronted by security and police. i think i’ve said before, if i was a terrorist, would i really stick around with a conspicuous camera that takes 20 minutes to compose a shot?

in any case. today i talked ryan into playing photo assistant. he stood by patiently while i framed up a few shots today in san francisco. mainly he told people it was ok to walk in front of the camera.

the outing went: polaroid. film. polariod. film. scratched polaroid. polaroid.. no dice. pack up and head out.

above is a scan of the first polaroid. lots of front rise. difficult to get in the right spot to be able to cover the building. also deciding the tree didn’t detract too much from the image. i have really only shot a few buildings, so this was a fresh crack.

tonight i made one of our favourite dishes: goat cheese salad. arugula, candied pecans, dried sweet cranberries, sliced bacon, home made dijon vinagrette, and soft goat cheese. soooooo good.

ryan made a herb roasted chicken.. though the chicken was the most juicy we’ve ever prepapred, the herbs were a bit overpowering. but now we know a technique for infusing flavour into chicken. we used a junior fryer from whole foods. enough for four.

changes for next time: much less herbs. possible alternative: slices of garlic, kosher salt, cracked pepper

an update on the chinese new year treasure hunt..

219 teams finished and reported. 114 beginner, 83 regular (our designation), 12 master.

we finished #22 out of 83. we got all 17 clues.

not bad!

i need a backdrop for a particular shot i need to do. full body portraits. white on top to black on bottom. there’s no such pre-made backdrop for any reasonable price that i can see. see plan b.

plan b: make one. seamless paper, paint. wouldn’t look very good unless the transition was harsher with deliberate looking strokes. may be too distracting. see plan c.

plan c: use grey paper (and give up on white) and angle the bottom back (away from the camera/light source) to make it darker. i could further darken the bottom by burning the bottom of the print.

i’ll need to clear out an area for this. make sure the paper i have is wide enough. and make sure i can frame the scene to maximize the subjects in 4×5. i could probably get this done at home.

i’m hoping B has a soft box. up above camera, pointed down. dark pants. i think it will work. especially if we had a grid. we could probably macguver a barn door.

i’ve moved my blog to http://schlachet.net/. i’ll setup a redirect for the old url, but bookmarks should be changed. all two of them. :)

i’ve been blogging for over three years now. i figured it’s time for a vanity domain name for it (and easier URL to remember).