Hey everybody, just wanted to post my favorite picture of the challenge. I know it’s only day two, but out of every portrait I’ve seen so far this one shown is my favorite.
This is a great portrait, the expression is amazing and the black and white really works well. To all those who have already participated, you guys have put up great shots as well, but this one strikes me as being superb.
Keep on doing what you all are doing! I can’t wait to see more of your guys’ wonderful shots!
Well in a last minute look at my assignment before writing, I figured out that we can’t do quotes. Darn, well I found something that might even be better. I found an excerpt from a speech made by William R. Brody to the graduating class of a University. This speech is somewhat inspiring, but it has a lesson that all of us need to learn, if we haven’t already.
The homework assignment for this weekend…. Yeah over the weekend. Over the Thanksgiving weekend, I have homework. Anyway… I have to find a quote, poem, essay, speech, short story, or non-fiction/fiction book that inspires me. One that has touched me in some way. Hmmmmm. It’s not as easy as it might sound. It is supposed to be a personal letter, not fan mail or describing how we liked what we read. We have to tell the author in a letter, how what they wrote inspired us some how.
I found this site, which has a few good quotes, and one that struck home with me was “Every artist was first an amateur”. This I think applies to us photographers, as well as people involved in other mediums. We all have to start somewhere, and each and every one of us develops and grows in our skills. I have a lot of great contacts over at Zooomr that have inspired me in many ways. I enjoy looking at their photos every day, and appreciate it greatly when they comment on and favorite my pictures. You guys are great, and keep up the good work!
This year holidays just haven’t been the same. It didn’t feel right on Halloween, and even today on Thanksgiving, it didn’t feel right. On Halloween I had a friend over, we watched some scary movies (not that scary, my friend chickened out, and I finished it) but it wasn’t that fun. It just felt strange.
Today on Thanksgiving was a blast when my family was over. We had a huge and early dinner which was fun. My grandparents stayed after dinner. After they left though it was very boring. I surfed the internet a lot afterwards but to no avail. I can never find any interesting sites out there.
Anyway, what do you guys think about the holiday’s this year? Maybe it’s just me.
I am very thankful for my family, my health, my friends, and the ability to be able to participate in any activity I want to, such as photography and sports. What are you guys thankful for? Have a great Thanksgiving, eat way too much food, and have a blast!
I am not a morning person, never have been and never will be. I stay up very late on weekends and in the summer, and sleep in till 7:30-9:00. On school days, I am forced to go to bed at 10:00. This is a good bedtime considering I have to get up in the morning at 6:00 or sooner.
One of my parents will come in and turn on my light, saying it’s time to wake up. I would use an alarm clock, but I hate the perpetual beeping and they never wake me up because I can turn them right off. My parents never really wake me up either. When they open my door and turn my light on I nod my head and say yes but then my head falls straight to the pillow when they leave. On those rare occasions that they let my dog out while I’m in bed, they will let him in and he will come rushing up the stairs and to my room.
If the door is open he will run in, stare at the bed or pace around the room, and whine, and whine, and whine. This goes on until I get up and feed him. One of the reasons I think it is hard for me to get up in the morning is because I have a loft bed. This is a bed on top of a desk with a ladder. It takes too much energy when I’m dead tired to haul a 30 pound dog (that’s supposed to be 12lbs) down the ladder. But that’s just the way it goes.
I will feed my dog and by now I am half awake/dead-zombie and get dressed. Then I am pretty much fully awake and I eat breakfast. Then I get on my computer and check Zooomr. I will check my email which is still littered with 80 emails I haven’t read, and will never get to reading. Then I rush the last couple minutes to get socks, backpack, and shoes to go to school.
I go to school, and come home in the afternoon. I go upstairs throw my backpack somewhere on my floor and turn on the computer. Then I do my homework, half reading Zooomr things, email, and other stuff. This is not the best routine because this prolongs the agony of homework, but I got in the habit and it’s hard to get out of.
I live way in the middle of nowhere so it’s hard to go outside and play with friends because, well, there are no people whatsoever around us that are my age. So my days are filled with boredom unless we watch a movie as a family or something. I usually do have a lot of homework on some nights (I procrastinate a bit so that makes it worse) so I have to do that.
Then I go to bed at 10:00 or a few minutes afterwards and my routine basically repeats itself.
That is my daily routine in a nutshell (sort of).
Do you guys have any suggestions for a good portrait lens. I’m wondering because of Trevor Carpenter’s December Challenge. If nothing good come up, I always have my current lenses, but I would like your guys’ input. I hear the 50mm Nikkor is a good lens. If you had the chance would you get the 1.8 or 1.4 lens? Thanks.
At my recital, the piano at the church felt a lot different to me than the piano at my teacher’s home. That is because modern pianos no longer have ivory keys. This is a shame, because playing the piano, one with ivory keys, is enjoyable. They are smooth, and it just feels right. On the other hand, the new pianos are only made with plastic keys. This lessens the overall experience of playing the piano. My teacher told me that ivory keys are illegal. They can no longer produce pianos with these features. The reason being, is elephant hunting is illegal now-a-days. I can understand this, but still it is a shame.
This is not that exciting, but it is for me. I used to be bad at typing, not listening to my computer teacher at school when she tried to help me. I finally gave in and decided, what the heck, and started to read the pop-up notes the typing program brought up every time I reached a new key. You have no idea how much this helped. I used to type so slowly. I remember when 26wpm was fast, and I was racing to beat my friends. Now, such and such years later, I am typing 105wpm as my top speed record.
This is the same paragraph over and over again, but every time you make a mistake, you have to type the letter over again and then continue. This includes spaces as well. This test is fairly easy, no relatively confusing or complicated words to type. Still, reaching a speed is all in the typer, not the paragraph their typing. Now could I hold up this speed for a long amount of time. I don’t know, I guess it would depend on what I was typing. My eyes might get tired over time anyway staring at a computer screen.
Well today, after about two and a half months of playing the piano, I had my first recital at a small church. This church is small, but still, it could accommodate enough people to make me nervous. I have a really bad case of stage fright. I was third to perform in a lineup of seventeen students.
The first performer was outstanding, understandable since he had been playing for six years. Then, my teachers grandson went up. He played really simple songs, but he’s really young and only been playing for two months. Then it was my turn, and I figured, better now (sooner) than later. The more I put it off, the more nervous I would get.
I messed up pretty badly, although I am the biggest critic of myself (psychology, proven fact). I made around five mistakes in my first piece, March Slav by Tchaikovsky. Obviously the crowd didn’t know so that’s good. My next piece was pretty impossible to mess up. The name of the piece is Indian War Dance and is a pretty fun and simple piece. The only thing I messed up on this one was hold the last note for too long. No big deal!
The entire performance was pretty much two hours long. There was lots of talent here, and it was very enjoyable. I would have liked to do better, but I really wasn’t that bad. My mom left saying she was relaxed. There was a lot of peaceful music, but a lot of the pieces were pretty compelling. I saw people with four sheets of paper for one song, and that one song took five or so minutes. Yeah…that’s me (unfortunately) in a few years! Not good!
It was fun and a good experience. I guess it really is good for me to do these things, but if I had a choice, I probably wouldn’t do something like this.
P.S. My opinion probably would’ve changed if I’d had more experience performing in front of people. The piano is a very complicated thing, with four to six different things going on in the same song at the same time, and your brain has to assimilate all this and put it together into a captivating piece of music. All this and I’ve only been playing for two months! I’d hate to see how much is going on in my head two years from now! Sure, the notes are right in front of you, but that doesn’t really matter. I forgot my song when I got up there to tell the truth! That is how nervous I was.
