Enabler Set in a yummy Couer De Vahine

I fell in love with Cocoapink after spoiling myself with some Soulmate hair rescue. Its like silky spackle for the damaged hair follicle, and it smells great too. Then I tried the enabler gift set, and I was hooked.

But my budget tends to be controlled at time with an iron fist — why buy wonderful shampoos when we can get away with Suave? So on my order I offered to take photos in exchange for products, and they took me up on it by sending me a bottle of Squeaky, their SLS and parabeen free shampoo. They loved the Squeaky photos, sent more products, and they’re happy with those photos too. I can’t wait till they need more photos again

Squeaky - This one was taken without a whitebox though

Yes, I’m willing to do work-trade photos if I’m really in love with your products But if you want to stick with taking your own pics, here are a few tips. The actual tutorials for the individual steps are all over the web; I’ll link you to a few of my favorites.

- Build yourself a whitebox — this gives you control over the lighting, and a consistently white background so color adjustments are fairly simple.

- Make your products as attractive as possible. One complaint I had with the Squeaky photo is that the back label shows through; but I couldn’t get the sticker off cleanly — best bet in that case would be to get one without a back label. Or if you sell clothing (on ebay for example) be sure to iron it if needed! Sure, we can iron out wrinkles in photoshop, but starting with a nicer photo is the way to go whenever possible.

- Pay attention to perspective & product placement. For example, if you’re going to photograph food, shoot it either straight from the top, or on an angle that gives it some grounding so it doesn’t look like its about to crash to the ground.

- Diffuse your lighting! If you can get away with soft natural lighting, that’s always best. But if you have to use flash, soften it.

- Use Photoshop to fix any leftover white balance issues. Actually this tutorial, Web Photos that Pop, will take you through many of the recommendations I’m making here. Some of the styles she uses in the examples are a bit dated, but this is a very old article. This does explain the technical settings though, and once you know how to use the tools, you can use them to create what you’d like

- Crop smart. You don’t have to everything in a tiny thumbnail. Sometimes a detail has more impact.

- Don’t forget to sharpen! After you’ve cleaned up your photo and shrunken it down to thumbnail proportions, you’ll notice the details get lost in the fuzz. A simple sharpen filter will do the trick. Run it twice if needed, and then fade sharpen till you have perfection.

Need more tips? Got a product photo that doesn’t seem to be working out? Drop me an email and I’ll see if I can help you out.

Need it bigger? Drop me a note.

Aren’t those the moodiest clouds you’ve ever seen? We live on the smaller mountain just in front of Timp. The “Green field” in front is just a hill in front of the junior-high track.

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Disclaimer: This is NOT an endorsement for or against Ron Paul — though I have run into a few spam-happy Ron Paul fans who just may be evil mutants. I just couldn’t help myself.

I will bring you hope, old friend. And I ask only one thing in return: don't get in my way. I didn't take this photo, btw - I will probably move it to another category.

For more fun (and more trouble than I want on my innocent little web blog) search for xmen movie + magneto quotes. And for some super fly Ron Paul t-shirts, go here.

American Fork Flag salute for Sgt. Nathan S Barnes

All I will say, is that today, for many people I know, the war in Iraq became infinitely more real. Today, my home town celebrated the life and mourned the loss of our own Sergeant Nathan S. Barnes. Hundreds of scouts and others lined the streets holding flags and saluting as the procession drove by. A bagpipe band played Amazing Grace, and I could hardly decide what was louder: the pounding of our hearts or the sound of them breaking. I tried to take some pictures. My camera died, and at the moment the shady spot we were standing in (especially looking at the cub scout group across the street also gathered under a single tree’s shade) didn’t seem right for a tribute photo. So I borrowed my mom’s camera, leaving her with my kids and their neighborhood friend who’d come along, and walked a few blocks up hill toward the cemetery. Now, aside from getting a chance for a quick chat with a nice REAL photographer (not just a bumbling pseudo-hobbyist like myself), I wish I’d stayed at the bottom of the hill. As it turns out, not only did they get the scout troops in order, but my own children had the opportunity to hold flags too. I wish I were there to see it, and yes, photograph them.

Worse than missing that though, exactly as I was videoing head of the procession driving by, my dear dad, who has an uncanny ability to call at the most inopportune times, decided to find out how much longer we’d be. I couldn’t silence the phone fast enough. I wonder how many people I distracted by neglecting to turn it off first. If you were one of them, I’m very sorry. Not that it’ll help much, but hey, have an amateur photograph.

I’m not used to my mom’s camera. The pictures came out super contrasty and saturated, so I resorted to an old trick of semi-desaturation for a colorized look. Enjoy. And please, no matter how you feel about the war in Iraq, remember our troops and the people they’re trying to help in your thoughts and prayers.

Enjoy this for now.

A few boats on the harbor near Pikes Market

Building we stayed in

View of the neighborhood

Another shot of Elektra with the observation deck where we spent a few wee hours of the morning

Cool family style italian restaurant. They had jazz and a whole lot of food.

A view from Pine, where I was lost trying to find my building - thought I was on Pike ;-p

Seattle has these purple glass tile things you

Another under side view of the skylights

Some cool antique print set we found at the end of the underground tour

Just a boring picture of the airport. I had tortilla soup at the mexican place on the left.

Classic Conor - cowboy hat, laptop, and a cigar. We were waiting for people to arrive at the restaurant at pier 66.

Bill

Seattle has quite a few panhandlers and homeless people; something I’m not used to here in Happy Valley. My faith teaches that we’re ALL beggars in a way, and that just as we want mercy and kindness despite our failures, we need to look for ways to help those who need us however we can. What surprised me is how contemptuous so many people were as they were asking (and even getting) donations. It reminded me that I need to be a bit more grateful myself.

Anyway, I’d just given a slice of delicious cake I was saving for myself to a guy who claimed he was hungry. I turned back just in time to see him throwing it away. And a few minutes later — cakeless and coinless — I met Bill. He didn’t ask for anything, in fact he was just sitting there on his park bench giving directions to whoever needed them. I wished I’d saved the cake for him. But he was grateful to tears just to have someone sit and chat for a while about who he used to be and how many people have been so kind to him in this rough patch. His toes had been amputated during a cold winter, but all he could talk about is the doctor who helped him, and how he was happy that he could still dance. He said he’d be happy to have his picture taken, so here it is. He is worth remembering.

update: they’ve moved or removed the article :-S So here’s the photo I’m talking about:

The old hospital in Lehi. It's been torn down now.

The article was basically saying people in hospitals get sicker for lack of fresh air.

I post maybe one percent of the photos I take, but you can find a few here, as well as a few at sxc.hu. Maybe if you ask nicely, I’ll autograph a print for you ;-p

A pretty purple and orange cone shell I found

Guess I may as well post a few other pics I got at the beaches too. It makes me want to go back there now. This one’s a Jewel Top Snail, from what I was able to gather, and it feeds on the kelp that lives in the bay. Come to find out, its colors are only this vivid when it’s still alive. So I took a couple of pics then tossed it back.

A view from the top of the .. top

Found this guy at that same beach in Montery. He wasn

Flotsam

Jetsam

A little mermaid?

A gull and a piper at Morro Bay

Just the sand piper

Closeup of a snowflake

It was actually somewhat complicated — my camera kept wanting to overexpose the picture, and when you’re talking pictures of things this tiny and this close up with so little contrast, it’s sortof hard to focus. So this isn’t nearly as pretty as the flakes looked to my eyes, and I’m sure if I had a microscope or even a magnifying glass they’d be more beautiful. But here it is anyway.

By the way, years ago someone kicked my CAN in the snowflake arena … Check out the work of Wilson ‘Snowflake’ Bentley. Maybe if I hang this cool snowflake thermometer poster in my office, winter will be a little more bearable. Especially when I look around and realize that most of my snowflakes are the lovely Fernlike Stellar Dendrites — which shows that my weather isn’t so bad as it could be And this poster is super fly too.

Still more information on the coolness of snowflakes can be found at snowcrystals.com. Have fun!