Follow me, don't follow me (on Twitter)

These words from the R.E.M. song Orange Crush actually make sense here. I've been on Twitter for about a year now. My use of Twitter is almost totally focused on photography. With the exception of a few friends, everyone I'm following is a photographer and generally making really useful contributions to Twitter (given the 140 character limit). So you don't need to follow me specifically, but do check out the folks that I'm following.

The blog is official

The blog is now online! And it's connected to the waldo647images.com home page, under the About menu. This has been a long time coming. In the past, I've typically decried the reverse chronological format of blogs, because I was working on things like FAQs. Now it looks like wikis are filling that need more these days. I may look into a wiki some day, too...
Closer to (my) home (page) — my bio page (an outgrowth of the My Bio section on Smugmug) was beginning to get longer and longer with updating paragraphs. As these paragraphs continued to accumulate, they starting looking more and more blog-like.
So, another experiment — waldo647images has a blog! The trick here is to tease the blog apart from the bio page.

Starting this process today, creating posts retroactively going back to December 2007, it's occurs to me that these paragraphs were kept somewhat sparse to avoid their adding excessive length to the bio page. Over time, these entries may get beefed up a little, depending on my memory and cooperation from the creative muse. I may also re-craft the bio page to make it more cohesive, perhaps even shorter; and, well, more like a bio of my photographic efforts.

For the time being, comments are turned off. Frankly, I don't have time to deal with them. Maybe later I'll turn them on. Links may also move here from the Useful Links page. The only issue is that I kind of like how I'm treating them on the Useful Links page now, including a descriptive paragraph for each one. My concluding story about Carl de Cordova would probably make a better blog entry, though.

One thing: this blog is going to be content-driven, not frequency driven. In other words, it may go 10 days or even a month without a post, and then have a whole series of them, as the need arises.

A final note: I haven't figured out how to put this under the roof of my domain yet, so it's staying on blogspot.com, created with Blogger. That may change in the future, and if/when it does, it will hopefully be transparent.

Update 4/12/2011: This blog now has chriswesselmanphotography replacing waldo647images, but I’ve left the blogspot.com — not enough reason yet to change that.

IE6 bug with NavBar

I've become aware of a bug in Internet Explorer 6 (IE6) on Windows, which causes my NavBar (that blue menu bar) to double up with the Purchase menu appearing under the Home menu. There are some comments in Smugmug's forums (Dgrin.com) about what a lousy browser IE6 is, and asking everyone to update to a better browser (IE7 or Firefox, etc). That's all fine, but I know a lot of public computers are on IE6, and there may be no compelling reason to update them. So I've moved the sub-menus from the Home menu to the About menu, and everything should now show up relatively well in IE6. The important thing is the color balance, and it's not bad, even on uncalibrated monitors. This is far more important for me, from the creator/artist side of the fence. Drop me an email, if your experience on IE6 — or any other browser — is not up to your expectations. There's a lot of thought & effort going into all this; so meeting your expectations is actually quite important to me.

soup2nuts — a journal gallery

Something new in mid-March 2009: I've added a journal gallery in Smugmug, allowing me to using extended captions, much like journal entries. I'm actually copying images and moving them from other galleries; so, yes, there is some duplication. Prints can still be ordered from either one*. My goal in this journal, entitled in tech fashion "soup2nuts", is to have some fun talking about the creative process, and what's driving it from behind the viewfinder. Hopefully, there are some comments and ideas, worth checking in on, from time to time — as both text and images are prone to change...

* Update 4/12/2011: I’ve turned off the printing capability here, to make sure prints are ordered from the gallery with the originals. Some images have been updated with the later versions of Lightroom and the new 2010 CameraRAW converter. They may not have been updated here.

Nikon D90 at MacWorld

In January 2009 at MacWorld, I spent a good 20 minutes with a Nikon D90 — quite a compelling camera! I'm also tempted by the Tokina 11-16mm F2.8, a very fast ultrawide lens for event shoots in smaller rooms and limited spaces.

And then, there's the Nikon D700, with it's FX (~35mm) sensor and excellent low-light capabilities. So there's lots of room to grow on the equipment side of the equation, especially as new projects come along. Equally important, of course, is the creative side of equation: being there, recognizing, and capturing outstanding images. It's a lot of fun...

Update 4/12/2011: Last December, I bit the bullet and got the Nikon D7000. It’s a game changer. Please look ahead to 2011 for a post about this...

Tamron Workshop

In October 2008, Sue & I attended a Tamron workshop put on by our local camera shop Keeble & Shuchat: http://www.kspphoto.com/.

I'd been hearing a lot about the Tamron SP 17-50mm lens: pro glass, very sharp lens. We took advantage of the discounts to add this lens to our gear, along with two very nice items which we won in drawings: an ExpoDisc and a Manfrotto traveling tripod.

Update 4/12/2011: This Tamron SP 17-50 F2.8 lens has become the mainstay of my shooting, both with the Nikon D80, and since last December, the Nikon D7000. Along with my Nikon primes: 35mm F1.8 and 50mm F1.8 — I use these for all my event shoots.

I just wish Tamron made an SP 50-105mm F2.8. Sigma makes a 50-150 F2.8. I’m looking into that

New Mexico trip

In early February 2008, Sue and I took a wonderful trip to Albuquerque, Santa Fe, Taos, and Chimayó (New Mexico). It was an extraordinary time with excellent winter light.

Here are some images from our trip:
http://www.chriswesselmanphotography.com/Nature/New-Mexico/
and
http://www.chriswesselmanphotography.com/Travel/NM