next week i am giving a presentation at vmware’s annual conference, vmworld 2009 (breakout session VM1461). it’s a pretty big thing for me. i’ve done presentations for user groups but not like this: audio/video crew, session owner, audio recording, wireless microphones, session feedback surveys. this conference will have about 10,000 attendees. the speaker staff is overseeing 400 speakers. there are hundreds of breakout sessions. ya..  *exhale*

one thing i’ve found that has helped me is going through my presentation out loud by myself in a conference room. the proverbial speak in front of a mirror trick. i did this once, gave my presentation to an internal group at work, revised my speaking notes, then gave the presentation to a group at vmware (which was a great opportunity). i tried to do the solitary/room thing once more, but i wasn’t feeling it. my biggest thing right now is being over my allotted time. i have rough timings for each section of my talk, so maybe if i just put those down in my notes and keep a timer….

anyways, the conference is next week. my breakout session is “full” at 70 attendees. i’m not sure how big the room is yet, i have a feeling it larger but full with walk-ins. luckily, i am attending other sessions before mine, then after mine a few others. it will be over before i know it.

image taken with a canon ae-1 program, 24/2.8 lens. arista premium 400 at iso 400, rodinal 1+50 for 13 minutes.

i’ve shot half of a twenty roll order of arista premium 400. it is said to actually be rebranded kodak tri-x, but sold at nearly half the cost. i’ve been shooting it at iso 3200 in the widelux, and just developed it in rodinal 1+50 for 33 minutes. the rolls have also been deliberately overexposed by at least a stop. so far, i am really liking what i’m seeing, despite some emulsion scratches i need to track down from the camera. i feel each set of rolls is better in quality than the previous, from a technical standpoint. testament that you really do need to get to know your camera.

the widelux is proving to be a great street shooter. the aspect ratio of the format (roughly 2.4:1) really makes the image more cinematic.

i went out on a neighborhood photowalk with armand, who does photography for missionlocal. it’s great to meet other local photographers. we got along really well, and it was fun walking around our neighborhood together talking about our favorite places and about photography.

this bike we can across embodies the colorful nature of the mission.

taken on fuji portra 400vc, with a pentax 6×7 and 90mm/2.8 lens.

i recently dusted off my lomo action sampler camera. i put a roll of fuji 100 speed film i got for free into it. i took it to a party. it’s a pretty awesome camera, even though mine appears to have a light leak now.

it’s yet another camera that reminds you that photography isn’t always about the technical aspects. sometimes it’s just about the pointing and the shooting.

this was my view while i cleaned up a scan of a 6×7 image. it is repetitive work and tiresome. what’s interesting is you spend the entire time looking at one image at this level, working almost on a single pixel basis. it’s so easy to spot flaws at this magnification, and to think about what’s wrong with the image after spending so much time on this mind-numbing part of the process. i usually forget to zoom out and regain the perspective of the entire image, the view that everybody will be seeing it from.

view the resulting image, scaled down to 640×506. the full size image is 8724×6896, or sixty million pixels.