Monthly Archives: April 2004

general ramblings

daylight savings

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six months ago i wrote very specific code in one of my applications to account for the daylight savings time shift. but i only wrote it for when time shifts backwards, not forwards. today, i get into work and something’s broken because i forgot that daylight savings happens twice in a year, once moving forward and once moving backwards. oops.

oh well, it was a simple enough fix anyway, but it got my morning off to a quick start.

i thought that i would have a lot more trouble today waking up and getting into work. i actually did have a little bit of trouble waking up today, but i just got ready more quickly and left the apartment about 10 minutes late. traffic was light, but it was still dark when i left the apartment.

it was very weird leaving the apartment and it being all dark. i don’t think that i’ve done that in a long, long time. it actually reminded me of when i would leave that early to go to school. man, that was back in middle school or early high school over ten years ago.

man, leaving home while it’s dark…who would have thought that that would be me?

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photographic

tiring weekend

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this was a tiring weekend for me. i spent saturday afternoon with maureen taking pictures. the two of us ventured out to [url=http://www.villamontalvo.org/]villa montalvo[/url] where we took some pictures. there’s a sign in the courtyard that says “Professional photography or wedding photography prohibited without permit.” Heh, good thing i’m not a pro!

i think i ended up shooting around 500 images or so, of them, about 90 of them were usable, i thought. i was pretty nervous when i was taking pictures. i guess i felt that there was pressure on my part to make sure that i got good pictures. the last thing i’d want to do is waste all that time and end up with bad pictures to show for it.

so part of the shoot was spent on location and the other part was spent in my apartment in a more controlled environment. i got to use my newly made gels for my flashes and experimented with lighting. man, there’s a lot i have to learn about lighting. the one thing that i realized today was that i also need a small stool. just a simple prop, but i think it’ll go a long way. maybe i’ll head over to IKEA during lunch today.

i learned a lot this weekend about lighting, and i think that i need another light source…or perhaps i need to better allocate the ones i have now. either way, i think i need to buy another flash. i guess it’s time to do some research into what one would use for cheap slave flashes. i’ve heard that some flashes detect that a flash has gone off and use that. i guess i need to see what that means.

maureen has graciously allowed me to post up thumbnails of the shoot.

general ramblings

group hug

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i really enjoy [url=http://www.grouphug.us]the group hug website[/url]. today, i happened to stumble across [url=http://grouphug.us/confessions/843900145]this confessional[/url] and though this is a serious thing, i think it’s hilarious how it was ended.

“I’m about to cheat on my boyfriend who lives 3000 away. I don’t even know if I can call him my boyfriend, but I kind of feel guilty about sleeping with my best friend. Not that guilty though.”

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general ramblings

throbbing headache

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after last night’s xbox adventures, i ended up staying up later than i should have and i woke up earlier than i should have today. as a result, i currently have a headache that i’m trying to fight off. go away headache, go away!

i was still determined to leave the apartment early instead of getting more sleep because the idea of leaving the office at 7 today was completely undesirable. i’m not sure what else i would do in the afternoon, but it is nice to be able to have that choice to not do anything.

i actually wanted to go to blockbuster and sign up for the game freedom pass and start playing xbox games. maybe i’ll do just that.

for lunch today, i had soup and a sandwich…and i also decided to get an italian soda which i added some cream to. mmmmm. so good. i think that i might have to pick up some club soda to make some of this stuff at home.

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photographic

nikon d70

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[url=/image.php?image=/images/2004/0402/IMG_4375.jpg&title=nikon+d70][/url]

nelson bought the [url=http://www.dpreview.com/articles/nikond70/]nikon d70[/url] and brought it over last night to poker night. it definitely is of a higher build quality compared to the canon digital rebel, but it was hard for me to use the camera because i’ve only been exposed to canon cameras all my life. but the basics were pretty easy to pick up.

nelson was telling me about one of the problems with the camera out-of-the-box was that the color tone from the factory are uneven. apparently, there is some kind of color tone fix that people have been using, but the images from his camera that i looked at were fine.

the lens that came as part of the kit is impressively wide and reasonably fast. i wonder how good the optics are, the images that came out of the camera felt a little soft, but i’m not totally convinced that i was taking pictures in complete focus.

if i wasn’t so heavily invested in canon gear, i think that the nikon d70 is currently the best digital SLR in the sub-$1000 range. the shutter is definitely softer sounding than my 10D. it sort of reminds me of a 1D shutter.

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techie

xbox

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last night my xbox received a little boost. it now boasts a 200GB hard drive and a little new hardware. the install process is actually drastically more complex than i thought it would be. the actual hardware install is a pretty delicate process which requires hands far more steady than my own. but even after the hardware is installed, the software setup is actually quite a bear as well.

it turns out that the only way to get certain things for a modchip’d xbox is via IRC. you have to go to a specific IRC server, look for a specific IRC channel, type a specific thing in that channel to get the ftp information that will then give you access to the bios for the modchip that you need to flash into memory.

once that is done, you then have to find another utility that will install the dashboard for the xbox and prepares your new hard drive for the new applications on your xbox. that utility was a little bit easier to find as there was a bittorrent file for it.

then you have to construct your own BIOS for the xbox.

then you have to create a dummy filler file because the xbox dvd drive has trouble reading small files burned onto media, so you make a 100MB dummy file, add that to your image and then you can burn your bootable bios flashing CD.

then you flash this new bios into the xbox.

are we done yet? no.

then you have to burn the CD that contains the other software that preps your newly chip’d xbox for its new life. insert that CD, format your hard drive with their utilities, and then finally, you are able to do something meaningful.

sheesh.

anyway, the process started at 7:30pm. there was a small mishap during the hardware install which required pulling the header pins out of the circuit board we just put in and finally resorting to using wires to get the thing working. we took a long break and then finally around 1AM the whole process was completed.

crazy…but cool.

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general ramblings

no april fool’s day jokes…

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yesterday was april fool’s day, but i did not have an elaborate gag set up for the day, nor did i really play any pratical jokes on anyone. the joy that i used to get playing jokes on others is just not there anymore. i’m not sure what happened. there were a few april fool’s day jokes that may have gone a little too far in the past so i’ve decided to tone it down and just let the day pass by.

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