[url=/image.php?image=/images/2004/0326/IMG_0479.jpg&title=bart+sign][/url]

it seems that i’m beginning to fall quite behind with updating the blog this week. this is sign at the bart station that i went to earlier this week to go to the city. the oakland city center is actually a pretty nice area. when i saw this sign, i thought it was quite a contrast from the rest of the bart area because it’s usually a drab gray…but the tiled walls and this bright blue sign caught my eye for some reason. some other people were looking at me a little oddly when i was taking this picture because…come on now, let’s face it, why would anyone take a picture of this sign?

[url=/image.php?image=/images/2004/0326/IMG_0480.jpg&title=vignette][/url]

one market. that’s where i went. it’s a glorious building and my meeting was with vignette. their offices are pretty posh and there are parts of it that have strong tones of lavishness back from the dot com days. this is where i lived earlier this week. in a conference room at this building. this building also houses microsoft and the del monte headquarters, i believe. pretty neat.

—–

[url=/image.php?image=/images/2004/0308/IMG_4143.jpg&title=strike a pose?][/url]

i do not enjoy being in pictures. well, it isn’t that i don’t enjoy being in pictures, but i get rather self-conscious if i’m asked to pose for pictures. which is sort of odd because i ask other people to pose for me ALL THE TIME. not that anyone does pose for me, but still, i do ask all the time without thinking twice about the hypocrisy of it all.

i do enjoy taking pictures, being in them…well, not so much. odd, isn’t it?

this is the second time that i’ve tried to write this entry. i forgot the save the progress the first time around. ugh.

[url=/image.php?image=/images/2004/0228/IMG_0373.jpg&title=][/url]as i was flying out of san jose to north carolina by way of houston, i was stuck in the middle seat. my poor crippled self had a lot of difficulty sandwiched between these two people, but it was ok, the only comfort i had was that the inflight movie was solaris. solaris? ugh. it’s awful. i was so bored that i fell asleep. the guy next to me got up to go to the bathroom and so i was able to snap this picture while he was gone. when i got to the houston airport, i had asked for help to get to the next gate which was very far away. this nice little woman had a wheelchair ready for me and she pushed me across the length of the airport terminal to my next gate. the service was nice, but i felt bad for the poor girl who pushed me all the way.

while i was in houston, my flight was delayed because there was rain in houston. i think everyone in houston didn’t know what to do because it was raining and so all flights were delayed because of the mass panic…due to the rain. sheesh.

[url=/image.php?image=/images/2004/0228/IMG_0377.jpg&title=][/url]when i got to the hotel, the first thing i saw when i got into the elevator was this sticker. ahhh…welcome to north carolina. i thought it was pretty funny. i stayed in an extended stay america hotel. it’s a suite hotel, not to be confused with a sweet hotel. but there was a refrigerator, stovetop, and some dishes in the room which was nice. the hotel room was ok, no free high speed internet, but that’s ok, i guess.

[url=/image.php?image=/images/2004/0228/IMG_0386.jpg&title=north+carolina][/url]this is the tile floor to the break room. rather bright and reminiscent of chuck e. cheese, if you ask me. the break room is HUGE. bigger than my apartment. it’s crazy. i look at it and i am amazed at how much space there is at this office. when i got there and saw the two refrigerators, the vending machines, and the crazy three burner coffee maker, i knew that this office was unlike others i’ve seen. yes, indeed, this office had it all. i was pretty overwhelmed when i got the tour of the office. crazy is all i can say.

[url=/image.php?image=/images/2004/0228/IMG_0394.jpg&title=north+carolina][/url] [url=/image.php?image=/images/2004/0228/IMG_0414.jpg&title=north+carolina][/url] [url=/image.php?image=/images/2004/0228/IMG_0404.jpg&title=north+carolina][/url]

what trip to north carolina would be complete without a trip to krispy kreme. that’s probably north carolina’s biggest claim to fame for me. and the krispy kreme i went to was HUGE. there was a huge parking lot of krispy kreme trucks and there was a large loading dock for these trucks. it was one of the distribution centers for krispy kreme. mmmmm. such delicious donuts. who could ever complain about that? i thought that the donuts were a little smaller than the ones here in california, but i didn’t care, it was ALL GOOD.

[url=/image.php?image=/images/2004/0228/IMG_0416.jpg&title=north+carolina][/url] [url=/image.php?image=/images/2004/0228/IMG_0421.jpg&title=north+carolina][/url] [url=/image.php?image=/images/2004/0228/IMG_0438.jpg&title=north+carolina][/url]

it snowed in north carolina while i was there. i felt like i had the full experience. a little snow, a little cold, a little sunshine, and some krispy kreme. what else could i ask for? the folks in raleigh are a little scared of the snow, though, and whenever it snows everyone freaks out and is afraid to drive anywhere…even if the snow doesn’t stick. yeah, a bunch of wimps, if you ask me. but it does seem like folks in north carolina will get a few snow days in the year. that’s pretty cool, i guess.

[url=/image.php?image=/images/2004/0228/IMG_0455.jpg&title=north+carolina][/url] a high tech solution to the age-old problems of security. this office makes use of key fobs. no, not Fresh Off the Boat, fobs, but these uhh…thing-a-ma-jigs. it’s this little plastic thingy that you put up to a sensor and it opens the door. not a security card, but a tiny little widget thing. yeah. neat. what’s kind of cool is that you can restrict what doors this will open, when you are allowed to open the doors and you can even deactivate the key whenever you want. pretty neat, if you ask me.

[url=/image.php?image=/images/2004/0228/IMG_0459.jpg&title=north+carolina][/url]

ummm, yeah, i don’t know what to say about this.

—–

i’m just about ready to order my lighting equipment for my camera. a couple of light stands and a couple of umbrellas should do the trick. i’m actually looking forward to playing with the new equipment. the question is…who will be my models? i’m going to have to push pretty hard for a few people to come and help me out. i’m also thinking about getting a cheap cloth background for a few solid backgrounds. maybe i should get a solid white sheet and a few gels too. hmmmm.

now i just have to wait for it to get a little warmer and we’ll be all set for some outdoor shooting. i’m very tempted to also get a reflector and a handy reflector holder. hmmmm.

[url=http://www.tow.com/photogallery/20040130_iso/]adam[/url] posted the results of the comparisons of the Canon 1D vs 10D high ISO shooting in low light conditions. a few days before the comparison, adam and I were debating the performance of high ISO shooting with these two cameras. I had felt that the 1D’s high ISO performance was still better than that of the 10D, particularly at ISO 3200, but adam thought that 10D should have been a better performer.

apparently there is a lot of talk about the stellar performance of the 10D and its high ISO performance. and i would agree that its performance is particularly amazing when compared to that of the D30 or D60. the d30’s ISO800 noise is the same as that of the 10D’s ISO1600. So you do get a full stop more at the same level of noise due to the DiGiC processor on the 10D.

but i feel the noise exhibited on the 10D is more splotchy than that of the 1D, especially in low light. in bright light conditions, the noise is less noticeable.

am i disappointed? no way! this is still a whole lot better than what i was getting with my old D30. besides, the 1D is a professional camera, you’d expect it to yield professional results. any less and i’d be pretty disappointed. i’ll be the first to admit that the 10D is not a professional camera but instead of prosumer camera. and it’s true, it’s cheap. compared to the 1D, it’s half the cost!

still a great camera, though.

—–

today i received my order for the wireless router and the controller. there is a sales pitch that says that you can get this router configured and running in less than 3 minutes. i decided to time the install process and it ended up taking me 30 minutes…a far cry from the 3 minutes that they suggested that it would take.

but it finally was set up and it is working now. i guess it’s nice to have it all set up though. the web interface for the belkin 802.11g wireless router isn’t nearly as nice as the linksys router, but after a little while, one gets used to it. i had a lot of trouble trying to lock down the security for the wireless network. one of the things that really disappoints me is that there is no one around in my apartment complex nearby who has a wireless network. not that that really bothers me so much…but it would have been nice to see it. i sort of feel like an island.

now the next thing to do is to upgrade my notebook’s wireless card so that i have an all G network. i’ve heard talk about A+G routers and all, but i don’t know if i really would really make the switch to A. oh well, at least i can type my entries from bed again.

i guess i have to figure out how to get jen’s imac in the other room to work as well. what concerns me a little bit is all of this talk about how WEP is not as secure as it is billed to be. that is definitely a frightening prospect. i’m going to try and break into my own network and see how hard it is to break into the network.

—–

[url=/image.php?image=/images/2004/0115/IMG_0249.jpg&title=tasty+brown+sauce][/url]

i went to safeway tonight to pick up some food for dinner. i originally had grand plans of making stew with this special “tasty brown sauce mix” that my mom gave me on one of my visits home, but alas, there were problems at the grocery store.

what could go wrong at the grocery store, one might ask? what could go wrong, indeed!

well, i got all of my food and as it was being rung up, everything seemed fine. but then on the very last item (potatoes) the scale wouldn’t weigh out the item. the cashier kept trying over and over to scan it and weigh it to no avail. she kept cleaning the sensor, wiping it down, brushing it aside, but the same telling beeps came from the cash register.

finally a manager came to see what was up after a long line of customers were waiting. i was beginning to grow a little impatient, myself. the manager proceeded to repeat what the cashier had already done numerous times only to confirm that, yes, indeed! the scale is not measuring the weight of the potatoes.

finally, she rings up the potatoes on another register to find out how much it costs and that item is added to my tally. but as the total is being added up, the register freezes. i don’t know what happened to it, but it seemed to have died. and so, again, the manager comes to observe what has happened and she pushes some buttons on the machine which seems to anger it as it beeps louder and longer with each keypress.

finally, i tell them that i don’t need a receipt, i’m ok and i’ll just go now.

so i’m not sure if i really got charged for all the food i got, but i think i did.

anyway, i got home and it was pretty late and i was pretty tired so instead of making the stew with the “tasty brown sauce mix”, i made ramen instead.

—–

[url=/image.php?image=/images/2004/0110/IMG_3507.jpg&title=cake”][/url][url=/image.php?image=/images/2004/0110/IMG_3508.jpg&title=cake][/url][url=/image.php?image=/images/2004/0110/IMG_3519.jpg&title=cake][/url][url=/image.php?image=/images/2004/0110/IMG_3517.jpg&title=cake][/url]

i have a sweet tooth. it probably gets me into more trouble than not, but there’s just something about the sweets that i cannot resist. i try to take it all in moderation, but it’s hard sometimes because dessert is so good!

as much as i love the sweets, i probably don’t have cake as much as i would like. it’s a pity because, well…cake is good!

[url=/image.php?image=/images/2004/0110/IMG_3492.jpg&title=hpnotiq!][/url]

before the new year’s party kicked off, john suggested that we try and set up a shot with the bottle of hpnotiq. this drink is wickedly blue and we both thought it would be cool to backlight it and have the blue really come out. we weren’t able to get the shot that we really wanted, but i didn’t want to spend too much time trying to get the effect we wanted, but this is the best shot of the bunch.

it definitely renewed my interest in studio photography. i don’t think that this is something that i would pursue because part of the problem is that i just don’t have the patience to set up the shot and figure out how to make it work. trying to overly control the environment is so hard and so much work! i prefer to work with what i’ve got and make the best of it…but still, it was fun to do.

—–