Friday, December 30, 2011

No Rose Parade For Me In 2012


Did a bit of research and I'm glad for it. There is no MetroLink Monday for Orange County. As for Amtrack their first train From Irvine, CA to LA doesn't get in early enough. the parade will be over or almost over by the time I would have reached Pasadena.

So it's TV or something else. The problem is the no MetroLink business. Anything I would like to do involves the train.

Have to do more research. I don't know about that. I'm already getting a headache from all this what if's.

Happy New Year everyone!

Original contents copyright 2011 by John S. Krill and/or the bylined author. All Rights Reserved.

Thursday, December 29, 2011

The New Year Is Upon Us

Beats me what they're looking at. Can't see a thing myself because of the Sun. Maybe someone is drowning? Well all I can say to that is good luck folks.

I talk about celebrating the New Year at LagunaBeat and I'll save you the trip. Here's what I said, kinda'.

Beacuse New Years Eve is Saturday and nobady counts Saturday as a real day means Friday IS the real News Years Eve.

Taking that a step further that makes Sunday a non-New Years Day. There is no Rose Parade on Sunday. Isn't  that proof enough that Sunday is a non-day? So that makes Monday the REAL first day of the year.

To sum up: Friday is the last day of the year and Monday is the first day of the new year.

Three days of celebrating the new year - Friday, Saturday, and Sunday.

And I'm still going to the Rose Parade. Taking the train all the way. That would be Monday the first day of the year.

Original contents copyright 2011 by John S. Krill and/or the bylined author. All Rights Reserved.

Saturday, December 24, 2011

Merry Christmas


Original contents copyright 2011 by John S. Krill and/or the bylined author. All Rights Reserved.

Thursday, December 22, 2011

MOEN I Love You!

We had our kitchen sink faucet break. The lever that controls the amount of water and the temperature broke. It's just a small piece of metal that keeps the lever in place.

You could still turn on the water but if you weren't careful the lever would fall off.

I took some photos of the faucet and went online to MOEN and there in plain site on the front page was Customer Support. After a couple of clicks I had a page where I could leave a message about the faucet and up to three photos. Even though it wanted the part number of the faucet they said you could put in a dummy number if you couldn't find the number or it it wasn't where they said it should be.

In the comment section I explained the problem with the faucet and also told them the part number wasn't where they said it should be. I also explained I couldn't remember when we bought the faucet.

That was at 7:30AM PST. By 9:41AM they had e-mailed me that they were sending replacement parts but because of the holidays they couldn't get them to us by the first Tuesday of January 2012.

I'm still in disbelief by MOEN's prompt response.

All I can say is: I LOVE YOU MOEN

Original contents copyright 2011 by John S. Krill and/or the by lined author. All Rights Reserved.

Wednesday, December 21, 2011

I Really Want To Take The Camera Everywhere

I carry the camera everywhere. That camera is currently a Nikon D5100. I love it.

But when I'm with friends I would really like a smaller camera to carry around. Something I can put in a small camera bag when we're inside or eating, etc.

I'm not going to give up the camera just because I'm out with friends. They know me and they know I'm a photographer and they seem to like the idea there is someone in the group that actually knows how to take photos.

They also know that when we're out walking about somewhere that much of my attention is on the place and not them. Sometimes I think they assign someone to watch out for John. He just may walk off and get lost. I'm not lost I just can't find anyone.

So if I could carry a smaller camera that would make me look less the official photographer and more a part of the group that would be great. Everyone knows I'm not going to leave the camera at home or hide the camera in a bag. So it needs to be kinda' small like a point-and-shoot but have the characteristics of a larger DSLR. Recently there have been a whole new group of small, high quality cameras come on the market.

They all have interchange lenses, good quality sensors, eye-level viewfinders, and no reflex mirrors to direct the image to the viewfinder. What you now see in the viewfinder is a very small LCD screen. Just getting rid of the reflex viewfinder system reduces the size, weight, and cost of the camera. It also brings the camera into the 21st century.

For a round-up of the current crop of mirror-less cameras check out this link to DPReview. Remember that some of these mirror-less cameras have no eye-level viewfinder. I require an eye-level viewfinder so this narrows the field quite a bit. In 2012 I expect to see many more eye-level viewfinder mirrorless cameras come on the market.

So what camera has caught the attention of this photographer? That would be the Nikon 1 V1. Not an inexpensive camera. $900.00 list. Discounted price $850.00. I payed less than that for my Nikon D5100. If I want one I'm going to have to start saving right now. Well really in January 2012. Who saves in any December?

I'm also hoping that Nikon fixes some of the more troubling aspects of the camera. For an interesting field test and review go over to Brad Hill's web site and examine his test and review of the Nikon 1 V1. It's an-going test and more will come early next year. What I find interesting is his "MUST" list for a walk-around camera.

I like his idea of calling it a Walk-Around camera. So that's what it will be. My next camera will be my Walk-Around camera. And currently that's the Nikon 1 V1 and I'm hoping that in six months when I get one some of the bugs will be fixed. Again read Brad Hill's review of the Nikon 1 V1.

About the photo: It was taken at the Mission Inn in Riverside, CA. Take the kids there. It's an interesting hotel and it's all decked out for Christmas.

Original contents copyright 2011 by John S. Krill and/or the by lined author. All Rights Reserved.

Friday, November 25, 2011

Thanksgiving With Family

That's four generations of the Krill family.

For me Thanksgiving is the time in America when Family gatherings occur. It's that simple.

Get them all together and have them completely ignore you when you are trying to take the official photos of the event. Being the (Un)official photographer in the family has become so much easier since the convergence of the computer and digital camera. I've already uploaded the photos from the Thanksgiving Family gathering.

Now I have to get the word out. That's kinda' easy too what with e-mail and Facebook.

I have put all the photos at my Live.com site. This is the link to the folder with the photos.

And here is that folder embeded into this post.



You can click on either the link or image and get to the photos. Enjoy

Original contents copyright 2011 by John S. Krill and/or the by lined author. All Rights Reserved.

Wednesday, November 23, 2011

It's Called Evolution

The form of photography that I would like to practice is called: photojournalism, or photoreportage, or documentary photography, or photo illustration. Though I'm not sure what photo illustration is.

So is photojournalism dead? Not by me. I see it everyday in the Los Angeles Times, my local regional newspaper.

It's not dead it's just evolving using different methods for distribution, mainly the Web. If we as photographers cannot adopt then we die. Yes funding is a big problem but the plus of lack of money is a freedom to do your own work and not what the owners of the large old school newspapers and magazines want. Yes it's difficult but the rewards are great.

Here are three articles on the state of photojournalism and documentary photography. I suggest you read them in the order presented.
Original contents copyright 2011 by John S. Krill and/or the by lined author. All Rights Reserved.

Monday, November 21, 2011

It's My Camera I'll Party If I Want

Was up real early this morning and saw the moon sitting just over the canyon. Got the camera out, set ISO to 6400, and fired away.

On my first try I was trying to hold the camera steady. That was a joke. But I did notice that the exposure was good. So the next few tries I moved the camera around. The above photo was one of those efforts.

What do you want for 3 in the morning?

Original contents copyright 2011 by John S. Krill and/or the by lined author. All Rights Reserved.

Sunday, November 20, 2011

This Is Powerful Stuff

Sometimes video can be the more powerful source of information. I don't do video but in this case ONLY a video can show the power of silence. See and not hear for yourself.

Wednesday, November 16, 2011

Thru November 19, 2011 Adobe Lightroom 50% discount

Adorama is offering Adobe Lightroom at a 50% discount. Thru November 19, 2001 Adobe Lightroom is $149.99. Go to this link at Adorama.

This is probably an Adobe sale price. So it may show up at other dealers such as Amazon and B&H Photo Video.

Saturday, November 12, 2011

Nikon's D5100 and D7000 Get Firmware Updates

I just updated the firmware in my Nikon 5100. And I did it all by myself. So what was the update all about. Answer is: Nothing and everything.

I say nothing and everything because the manufacture will give you reasons for the update and you may read them and decide you haven't got any reason to update the firmware in your camera and you'll pass on the firmware upgrade.

Don't. I'm telling you to do the firmware update no matter what you think. The reason is simple. Manufactures lie. They all lie. Every single one of them.

Their lies are lies of omission. It's what they NEVER tell you that is the big reason for doing the update of the firmware in your camera.

I know they lie because I worked in the computer industry for 30 years and I was one of those nice people that would announce the firmware updates. I REALLY knew what the update was for because I would force the engineers to tell me. If they didn't I wouldn't release the firmware to our customers.

Camera manufactures are no different. No manufacture will ever tell you what really goes on. It's in their DNA.

So when your camera manufacture releases a firmware update get it and update your firmware.

Thursday, November 10, 2011

Does Thousands Of Posts Mean Anything?

This is my third blog. The other two also started at Blogger but one of them, Photoessayist.net, is now a Wordpress blog. The other, LagunaBeat, is still at Blogger. I mention all this because with all the raw-raw up at the Blogger convention, or whatever they're calling it, LagunaBeat has never been highlighted by Blogger. It only has 2869 posts with over 3000 photos and has had a posting everyday since August 15, 2007. Not bad.

Me complain? Not really. I will say that Blogger's attempts at updating it's templates is way late and not much to talk about.

Everyday I get closer to moving LagunaBeat to Wordpress. The only reason I haven't is I'm just too lazy.

Sounds like a good reason to me. Wouldn't you agree Blogger staff?

PS: I still don't understand shy I can't do a 'Preview' before I Publish.

Now I am complaining. If you are in HTML mode then the keyboard command, 'Ctrl I' doesn't itialize but gives you some Bookmarks sidebar. WHY in gods name do you do this Blogger?

PSS: This new Blogger editor interface is just not happening. Very poor. The old editor interface works much better.

PSSS: No spell check for the title. The old editor does this.

PSSS: And don't even get me started on the new Blogger home page.  Reminds me of a Mercedes-Benz dashboard. Nothing on that dashboard makes sense.

Wednesday, November 9, 2011

Lets Try This With A Photo

So here we are posting a photo when I said I wouldn't being do this in the last post. There is a reason for this. Let me explain.

Still can't do a preview. Wonder why? One method is to publish the post then view it. Then you back to edit and you can Revert to Draft.

Now back to why a photo here and not at Photoessayist.

This is a whole new template for me and I think for Blogger. I need to experiment with it and I wanted to discover what is the biggest photo size I could post.

Currently I'm creating an image that is 725 pixels wide. Looks O.K. Though I only viewed the post with one style, magazine, available to the visitor.

I don't expect the look will be very consistent with different browsers and even with the various styles the viewer can use.

This has been instructive. I now think I will post photos here after all. Probably the artsy fartsy stuff.

Anyone out there? Hello? Well if you are taking a gander at this blog could you tell me what you think?

Original contents copyright 2011 by John S. Krill and/or the bylined author. All Rights Reserved.

Friday, November 4, 2011

A New Blog To Experiment With

I'm a Photographer. I love what I do. And no I don't earn any money from it. Yet. Money isn't my primary motive. Photography is. If you want to experience my history as a photographer then go to Photoessayist.com. Everything is there. How I started. My experience in the Marines and Vietnam. And life after the Marines.

I did a lot of freelance work in the 70s but never enough to pay the bills. Not even close. So from the middle 70s on I made a living doing other work. Primarily in computer hardware.

I'm not going into my personal life with this blog. What I hope to do is talk about photography in general. We'll see.

This isn't my first blog. I have two others. The first is Photoessayist.net. This blog is for my photography outside of Laguna Beach.

My second blog deals with Laguna Beach. It's called LagunaBeat.com. This blog gets most of my attention. I have over 2800 posts and many thousands of photos there. All of Laguna Beach. Because I come from the news side a lot of the photos here are no different that what you would see in your local paper. Other photos are pure candy of the beaches and coastline of Laguna Beach. And the remainder are of  Laguna Beach that isn't remotely of the beach. Old homes, cottages, interesting cityscapes and Laguna Canyon. I'll do nature, landscape, and architecture, and people. In general a visual document of Laguna Beach at this moment.

I have also posted photos at 500px.com. But that site isn't nearly ready for prime time. I will write about this very soon. The short version is don't use it. If you need a place to display your photography don't do it at 500px.com. Take a look at SmugMug.com. It's more expensive than 500px.com but appears to have many features that are lacking at 500px.com. Take a look for yourself.

So what is this blog for? Writing. I've never been a good writer and I hope to develop some decent writing skills with this blog.

I may post photos here from time to time but I really want to leave that to Photoessayist and LagunaBeat.

What really motivated me to start this blog was Blogger's constant hype about how it's been improved and updated. If you go to Photoessayist.net you will discover that it's not on Blogger but at WordPress. I got tired of waiting for Blogger to get their act together and in 2009 I moved over to WordPress.

So we will see. If I determine after a few months of using this new version of Blogger that it is not any better than the old one then we're out-of-here. I will probably take LagunaBeat.com with me even though with all the posts I currently have there it would be a major effort.

That's it for now.

Next I have to get the header and sidebar organized. That will take a while but I hope to write about those experiences as well.

PS: Already I've seen weirdness here. I can't do a preview for whatever reason. I rely on preview to help me spot really bad spelling, grammer, syntax, etc. I don't get it.