Digital protfolio the beginning..

So today has not been what one would call a stellar day so I dcided to take a break from the stuff I should really be working on and work a little on my digital portfolio. I started with on of my favorite things... Flowers. Here are some of my favorites... Let me know what you think. I am sure as time goes on I will be adding more to my digital portfolio in various categories like weddings, kids, portraits, etc...

I hope you are all having a great day!!! Now I should get back to the stuff I really have to be doing...

Scanning in old negatives....

Most people have boxes, envelopes bags, etc… full of old pictures, negatives and slides. Now there are a few out there that do not dread tackling the task of organizing this mess, I am not one of those. I have all of my pictures sorted and categorized and some are even labeled but I have 3 boxes of negatives that I had no idea what to do with. I looked into getting a negative scanner but the cost was high and then there is the time it would take to scan everything in. So the next thing I did was start looking for services that scan them for you and put them on CD/DVD. At first I was not able to find one that was reasonably priced enough to want to use for the volume of negatives I have to get scanned.

Then I came across www.scancafe.com and not only was their price the lowest but they offer a few things I did not find on other sites. The most important being you only have to pay for the ones you choose to keep after they scanned (You have to keep at least 50% but that is very reasonable for what you get) So that made it even easier to use since I would not have to sort though all the negatives trying to find the ones I wanted to have scanned. I just grabbed a pile of about 900 and sent it in and got to sort through them online after they were all scanned. I kept 80% of what was scanned. I just got my DVD’s of photos today in the mail and decided to post some of them online since they are pretty funny. See if anyone looks familiar to you in the pictures…



Now I am packing up my second order which will be between 2000 -2500 negatives and includes all of my medium format negatives since they just started offering the service to scan those. It takes about 6-7 weeks from when you send your items off till you have the DVD with your scans and your originals back in hand so I figure it will take me about 1 year to get all the negatives scanned that I want to have scanned. Then I will move onto old pictures that I didn’t have the negatives for. Once I get all that done I will see if my grandmother (Yes the same one who said “shut-up fatty” to me on my mom’s birthday) wants to have her slides/pictures/negatives scanned and work with her to get that done. She has large boxes filled with pictures and slides. It would be great to get them scanned so that the rest of the family could have copies of everything. Especially the stuff from when my grandfather was still alive and racing cars.

So if you have been looking for a way to preserve your memories digitally you should definitely look into scancafe and see if it meets your needs. I am really happy with it so far. Now I have to start organizing all my scans but that is going to be fun since I will get to look through some fun old pictures.

Not much new here this week....

Ahh time for another blog. This one will probably be on the shorter side since there is not much new to report here. I am busy with my second semester at school, and all the reading is kicking my butt. So I will not be reading the new Harry Potter book as soon as it comes out. I will have to wait till August when I am back do only having class once a week….

So I have gotten a couple of questions about the digital back I am thinking about buying for my camera, It is not available in the US yet but here is a link to what it is.
http://www.mamiya.com/cameras.asp?id=1&id2=2127


Also for those of you trying to guess which other friend of mine I think would like the school I mentioned wanting to go to it is Paul…. He is currently in Iraq working but still gets a chance to take some pictures from time to time… Check out the website he has been building.. It is still a work in progress so check back from time to time…. http://www.cprambo.com/ He has some real talent and enjoys photography….

Well that’s all for now. If you haven't done so already don't forget to Vote on my poll....

My Dream

What is your dream? What would you be doing right now if you could do anything? For me I would be doing photography full time, and instead of going to school part time for business I would be going here full time http://hallmark.edu/ I have wanted to go to this school for over a decade now and not a year goes by that I do not still think about it. It is a 10 month program in which you are doing something photography related all the time. It is an intense program but you are immersed in photography and the business of photography. Yep sounds like a perfect 10 months to me. I have one friend looking into going there and another I really think should give it some serious consideration.

But alas the dream remains on hold a little longer for me, and that is okay. Maybe one day I will throw caution to the wind and just go for it.

So I would love to hear what your dreams are, what would you be doing right now if you could be doing anything? Or are you lucky enough to be doing exactly what you want to? If so what is it????

Random thoughts and pictures

So I just got back from a short bike ride, about 15 miles. I had to go retrieve my phone from my friend's house where i left it Thursday evening. It was a great night for a ride. perfect weather and the trail was virtually empty. I think I passed 6 other bikers, 2 people roller blading and about 6 or so walkers. There was a family of geese and about 1 million gnats......

I thought a bike ride would clear my mind and leave me feeling more motivated to come home and finish my homework for the weekend but that was not the case. I did however get a chance to do some thinking. It really is a beautiful trail, maybe next time I head out I will grab and take a long my point and shoot camera and post some pictures on here. Anyway I realized a few things while I was out riding. The first is the most obvious, I am out of shape... The other things I thought about were more about what is important to me and the things that make me smile. It helps keep things in perspective. So I decided to post a few pictures of those things. This is just a small representation..

Oh take a look at my survey on the side. I am trying to decide which big purchase I should make next year. Laser Eye surgery so I can ditch my glasses, or a digital back for my medium format camera so I can do more professional level photography work. Let me know what you think....

Missing the family already!!

So everyone left town today to head home and it is already lonely without them. I might just miss Willy the most. He is such a sweet dog. Maybe Grover will be that sweet once he is 14. I felt bad that Grover kept beating up on poor Willy.

Ryan flew out early this morning, it was a quiet ride to the airport since neither of us are morning people. Then I headed back home took a short nap before getting ready for work. I hung around the house till the rest of the crew stopped by to pick up Willy. I wanted to get to say goodbye to them, I also wanted Jamie to see I was carrying my new Coach bag. I actually put some thought into what I was wearing today so that I could carry it. I also had to find something to wear that I would not die in since it is supposed to be 99 today with the heat index feeling like over 100. I REALLY hope the AC is working at school tonight.

Now if I have to look for the bright side of the family leaving already I guess it would be I will eat less, well once the leftovers are gone that is. Our fridge has more food in it than I have seen in a long time. (Not to mention Chees cake and Nugget's Ice cream cake left overs!!!) I guess it is also good Jamie and I can't go shopping anymore, I would be broke in no time. I did get some really cute things while she was here though, most of which I can wear into the fall which will be good.

But I still wish they could have stayed longer. I was really depressing driving into work today, plus starting back to class this week makes it tough too. I am glad I got to do something fun last week while I was not in class 3 times a week. I hope the end of august works out the same way so that I can spend some time with Tim either here or in Las Vegas.

Well back to the normal routine, with hopes of more exciting things to come before long. Luckily we know we will get to see the family in January when Brad gets married. Mom and I hope to have a guest room put together by then. It is good to have a deadline to get it done.

Happy Birthday Nugget

Ryan is 26 today so of course that means yet another celebration for the week. The beginning of July is a crazy month as far as birthdays and stuff are concerned... The day started out a little slow. Jamie and Jeff got back from New York this morning and Jamie and Aunt Lois came over to finish getting Ryan's gifts ready while Jeff and Ryan went to the store to get the stuff Jeff needed to make his baked Mac and cheese. Jamie took this time to hand out our purses she got in NY. I love mine....

Once they all arrived everyone but Ryan headed to the mall for shopping. Yes we went shopping on Nugget's B-Day. Now anyone that knows Ryan knows Shopping is a swear word to the guy which is why he opted to stay home while we went over to check out what was happening at the Macy's that is going out of business and has everything 30% off. I got a couple of shirts and pairs of pants. Jamie and Jeff both got a shirt.

When we got back to the house MomMom and Ryan were deep in a game of Skipbo and they took a break long enough for Ryan to open his gifts,which consisted of a lot of shirts and a sweater he doesn't like but I think he looks really good in. MomMom got her presents from Jamie and Jeff since they were not here yesterday, and then Jamie and Jeff got a gag gift of paper products for their first anniversary.

After the presents there was a brief game of Wiffle ball where second base was a pile of poo left behind by the neighbors dog. Then it was time for Dinner. We grilled burgers and hot dogs. We also finally managed to get a family picture taken by using the tripod. Not an easy task with this group to get everyone to cooperate for the picture.

After Dinner Jamie, Jeff, Ryan, Aunt Lois and MomMom went to see the world war II memorial where poppy's plaque is. Mom and I stayed behind so we didn't have to take 2 cars. Once they got back we had Ryan's Birthday cake which was a dairy queen cake that he wanted.

Then we set off our own fireworks finally. That was fun. Sadly the end of the day meant saying goodbye to everyone since thy all head home tomorrow. I will get to say goodbye to Nugget though tomorrow when I drop him off at the airport at like 5:30am.

Another Birthday celebration

MomMom turned 82 on Saturday July 7th 2007. Jamie and Jeff were in New York but we still had a litle celebration for MomMom and of course there was more presents. The day was pretty low key which was fine for me. I was feeling pretty run down and tired. After presents there was another trip to the mall, to get Ryan's glasses fixed, but luckily Ryan was spared from more shopping and we stayed home with the dogs. Poor Ryan might have gone into convulsions if there was more shopping that had to be done.
MomMom got some nice gifts and seemed to enjoy her birthday. Both Mom and Ryan payed Skipbo with her, which seems to be her favortite card game.

Mom's Birthday celebration July 4th 2007

So mom turned 60 this year so that is why the family came in to visit. It is a lot of fun to have them here. For mom's birthday we made special custom shirts for us all to wear. Yep me, a computer, a scanner and some iron on transfers can do some real damage, and yes I actually used an iron.

Of course there was gag gifts and we thought she had figured out our good gift for her so we bought a really tacky purse and wallet and put them in the coach boxes and she pretended she really liked them. We were all laughing so hard that some of us had tears rolling down our faces. But she loved the real purse we got her which made us all happy to see.

It rained so there was no fireworks for us this year, it amounted to a few sparklers in the rain. But all in all we had a good day.

Time with the family

Tuesday might July 3rd,2007 I went to the airport to pick up my cousin Ryan, also known as nugget head. My cousin Jamie and her husband Jeff came with me. The rest of the family went out to eat and hung out at the house. After we retrieved Ryan we went to Geno's in south Philly for dinner. Jeff had seen something on the food network about Pat's and Geno's and wanted to go. All I can say is thank goodness for the TOM TOM which got us there. We used the voice called Tim that spoke to us in a british accent, it made me miss my Tim, *sigh*. After dinner and some pictures we drove around philly then headed towards home. We used the TOM TOM once again to find the schools Jamie and Ryan went to in Chestnut Hill before moving to Wisconsin.
It is great to have them visiting and I am sure over the next few days there will be more stories to tell. Poor Jeff only just found out that Jamie was one of those kids that bit, she used to bite me all the time. We fought just like sisters would......

A New Blog Location

Well I have a myspace page and I have a Yahoo 360 Blog but Nugget head's girlfriend complained about my use of yahoo all because of her intership this summer and told nugget head I needed to be using BLOGGER so here I am starting yet another Blog. If my readers follow me here I will keep this one, if they don't I will need to go back to Yahoo..... So nugget and GF of nugget here is your chance to convince me to stay here....