Life is a fast song

It sure is. This summer I’ve had a couple weeks free to do whatever, weeks of lots of farming (these past two weeks) and very little free time, a free day (tomorrow)–except not really, and coming up from Friday until July 5th is…fireworks tent!

I get to live at a fireworks tent in Camp Hill 10 days!  It’s gunna be a pretty crazy job, but I’m actually kinda excited about it.  It’s probably going to be really boring, but I’ve been just thinking of the positive aspects of it.  I’ll have to be at the tent or have someone else there at all times.  For all 240 hours.  Most people work the tent with two people so that you have someone to keep you company, someone to stay at the tent while you take a break, etc.  But then they also split the money you get from working, so it’s a tradeoff.  But as for me…I’m following the money.

It will be an experience, that’s for sure.  Today I was practicing not going to the bathroom for extended periods of time, and I fou…well, maybe I won’t go into that.  ;-)

So I’ll be roughing it the next two weeks.  I don’t know if there will be wifi at my location or not, but I’m not expecting anything.  I might just have to watch lots of movies, read a couple books, think of/do photography experiments, go crazy, and/or mess with people.  I’ll keep you updated.  Maybe.

Will it be a great camping experience?  Nope.  Will it be neat sleeping at a gas station at an intersection with the lights always on?  Negative.  Will I get filthy rich and come out with some interesting life stories?  Sure thing!

And of course something for all you visualites:

A bit abstract. I like pictures like this with a bunch of different layers per-se.

Also, I heard a song yesterday that was a blast from the past…Traveling Light.

~ Jon

Happy padres day!

I’m very thankful for my pops!  I drug Mom and Dad out the other day for a photoshoot.  Not really anything too elaborate, but I just wanted some good pictures of them.  They both don’t like pictures of themselves taken (we have to convince mom not to put a picture of a tree for her facebook profile) and think they aren’t good looking, but I think they’re super cute.  :)  And wise!   Be sure to show thanks to the fathers for the last few minutes of fathers day.  :-)

Typical expressions of my parental units.

I really like this one. :) Shey is a good dog model--with her super cute floppy ear. After this picture, she wanted to be in all the pictures.

~ Jon

Some things

Nothing too special here, just… some things.

For all the cool world cup videos that I’ve been putting up, here’s some more:

• Introduction To World Cup Soccer (the Onion)
• South African Vuvuzela Philharmonic Angered By Soccer Games Breaking Out During Concerts (via the Onion, but I mainly just like the title. ;))

I think the Onion has been pretty good recently.  ;)  Also, there’s this:

My lovely mother, whom I love very much. :)

A flower, ehh no affection for this.

~ Jon

My life be like

This is an epiphany post for me. Not really about anything too specific, but I’ve been a little unsettled about myself lately. This post will be all about the bullet lists. [Also, if you want a picture, here are a few.]

Things that I’ve been up to, in no particular order:

• The past two days I’ve been working on the farm.  It’s a summer job that I can’t seem to get away from, not that I mind.  It’s a lot of time of reflection (or annoying songs popping into your head) in a super noisy tractor.
• The past two weekends I’ve assisted/shot with a photographer that I’ve recently gotten in touch with.  Doing weddings isn’t easy.  It was good just being there without the massive expectations of coming up with great pictures.  Currently wedding photography as a profession is what I’m planning on (hint hint ;))–it’s a challenging job that I enjoy.  But anyways, real life experience is great–and so much different than just reading stuff online.  And I think I’ve seen enough beer games to last a long time.
• Today I visited a video production studio (a few minutes from my house!  How surprising).  I’m debating trying to get that job, as it would be kinda cool doing after effects stuff and video editing.  I like video work, but there’s something to dirty farm work that is really appealing to me.  We’ll see what happens with that.
• I bought a lens.  It’s my 2nd lens that I bought, after the 50mm prime that I got a long time ago.  It was recommended by one of my favorite photographers, Matthew Saville, a super guy.  I’ll have some pictures soon enough.
• I’m still doing internship work with Andy Gaskin here and there.  I’m not doing stuff all day like when I started off, more so smaller projects spread out more.  He’s a great guy to work with, and has a sweet family.  Also, he calls me Dark.  ;-)

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A day in the life: Grandma’s house; HDR

The other day my brother, Dad, and aunt went to my grandma’s house to help out and do some cleanup work. It was a good time to

Pictures.

(that’s how my attention span works most of the time. ;) )

My dad pouring over paperwork.

My Grandmama. She's an amazing woman. (sorry for making you nervous grandma! :))

My dad doing his chain saw thang.

Grandma wanted a tree limb down. My dad's first method was to (try to) use the force to bring it down.

Unfortunately, that didn't work, so he resorted to the lesser method, chainsaw, which promptly got stuck in the tree due to unforeseen evil, gravity.

So, this picture...

[non-related, photo talk] So the above picture is an HDR (high dynamic range).  My first one, actually.  HDR is where you take multiple pictures of different exposures to get a really dark picture, a normal picture, and a really light picture.  Then, on the computer, you combine them to include more detail (since it’s multiple pictures in one).

Many people love HDR pictures.  If you search google, you’ll soon find pictures like these, which tend to be way too overprocessed in my book.  A TON of people (even decent photographers) love the overprocessed, details popping out everywhere look, but I’m not one of them.  It makes me gag sometimes.  I’m not saying I don’t like the pictures that I linked above, but I just don’t like the fake plastic non-real look that the term HDR is affiliated with.  You can make HDR pictures that look realistic, and I like those, but the mobs seem to like the overprocessed HDR pictures more.

Pardon the mini rant.  All in all, HDR is kinda cool.  I might use it once in a while, but it isn’t something you’ll be seeing here very often.

Moderation is a fatal thing. Nothing succeeds like excess. ~ Oscar Wilde

Peace and love,
~ Jon