Mysql database got corrupted so for a while there, the entire blog was out of operation.  Fixed it and we’re back.

The more I’ve been learning about Lightroom 2 (technically now at 2.3), the more I’ve been liking it!  First of all, I learned that - thanks to new camera profiles (also available in the latest camera raw software) - I can get my photos to start from where Canon’s own RAW software would have started.  I never realized it was a better choice than photoshop because I liked the photoshop workflow so much.  But now that I’ve played with the camera profiles in Lightroom, I realize that I’ve been selling my images short.

I first wrote about Knoppix in my original blog in Oct of 2004.  I mentioned how awesome it was to be able to test out a live version of a Linux distro.  It’s been a really long time since I last checked out Knoppix.  Since it was bloated with KDE 3.x and slow to boot I used Damn Small Linux whenever I needed a LiveCD environment.  Now that Knoppix 6 is the distro in this month’s Linux Format Magazine, I’m checking it out.  It boots into Adriane.  This is some strange speech synthesis program that launches different command line programs.  (It also reads out loud what all the options are)  Turns out if you want to go to a graphical desktop you ened to type “Knoppix” at the boot menu.  So I scroll down to “graphical programs” then “start lxde”.  Wow!  LXDE is truly a lightweight desktop environment.  It loads up a LOT faster than Knoppix and KDE used to.  The menu loads up very quickly and the programs also load up quickly despite running off of the DVD.  The default browser is Iceweasel (Debian’s rebranding of Firefox).  The internet works perfectly fine.

There’s something about this little, brown, cube monster that people love.  I first came across Domo when chatting on AIM with my high school friend, Lawrence Kwan.  He had it as his buddy icon.  I asked him what the brown square with the mouth was and he directed me to a website with an animation.  I didn’t really get it.  But there was something neat about the little guy.  Then, all of a sudden, I see him all over the place for Target’s Halloween in-store decorations.  (I wish I’d taken a photo)  There’s something people love about the little guy.  On flickr there are, as of this writing, nine groups featuring Domo.

I just wanted to really elaborate on why I think Adobe Lightroom is a program any enthusiast to pro user should own.  Although, as I related here, LR has grown on me, going through the photos I shot at my cousin’s wedding has really cemented my love for Adobe’s product.  Here are my two favorite features.  You may want to open up the images in a new tab at full size so you can follow along.

Once again I’ve had one of my photos published by an outside source.  I always had an image used by WNYC, which you may remember.    This time it was the above photo in a blog post about Social Enterprenuership in Minnesota.  As I said before, if the most important thing to you is getting your artwork out there, use the Creative Commons.  At any rate, most artists (Van Gogh, etc) die poor.  So why not at least know others are seeing your photographs - the more eyeballs the better.  Plus, it might get you famous enough to get paid commissions.

Recently I’ve been going through my old analog photos and scanning them in.  This is the oldest picture I have that I took.  I took some pictures earlier in our first vacation to the Smokey Mountains.  But those prints and negatives were lost by the time I started putting together photo albums.  I’ve been remembering so much about my childhood and it’s been so much fun.  I’m still deciding which photos to upload to flickr, but keep up on my Analog Set which covers up until the middle of my Freshman year in college.