Stuck In Customs

Don’t Forget the Free eBook!

If you go over to Flatbooks.com and sign up on the right hand side, you get a free eBook called “10 Principles of Beautiful Photography.” I added a little bit more to the end of this book… as a bit of a bonus.

Share your Austin PhotoWalk Photos!

Be sure to put your favorite shots in the Austin SXSW PhotoWalk group! I’ll post mine as soon as I get a chance to process ’em ! Amazing prizes — will list them out soon. The judges (not me) will be picking out about 20 or so of the most interesting to win prizes.

Daily Photo – The London Eye

I took this on the last PhotoWalk in London, so it’s about time I post it! I won’t be able to process the Austin ones for a bit… this is a busy time for me… you’ll have to forgive me!

Half of the fun of the PhotoWalk is people posting and sharing photos after the event. Even though everyone is taking photos of the same stuff, it is cool to see so many different perspectives. I’m pretty sure we all took photos of the London Eye on that evening, and this is the one that I made.

The Austin PhotoWalk

Get all the PhotoWalk Details on Plancast. See you at the Driskill at 6:30 PM ! 🙂

Join us Live on TWIT

I know most of you don’t live in Austin or are not visiting for SXSW, so you can see part of it live on TWIT. We should be on live there about 7:30 to 7:45PM (CST) or so. Leo is broadcasting from Momo’s, which is down 6th street, and it will be one of the stops along the photowalk. He’s going to pop out of his studio and come into the street to say hello to all of us. It won’t be long, but you’ll get a little hint into the action.

World Record – Single Location PhotoWalk

I really have no idea how many people will show up, but on Saturday at the Diggnation party, I met with a couple of judges and officials that keep track of this sort of thing. We came up with a way to count everyone, and then we’ll submit it all to the official body. So, if you come along, you’ll get on Leo’s live TWIT show and be part of a world-record event – cool!

Submit your PhotoWalk to Flickr

Half of the PhotoWalk is sharing and commenting. So, get your stuff up on our PhotoWalk SXSW Flickr Group! Thank you to Tom Hall for setting up that group!

Daily Photo – Inside the Driskill

Well here it is, the awesome hotel where we are having the event. Many people agree it’s the most beautiful hotel in Austin and is over 100 years old. They’ve always been very kind to me — we had our workshop in there, a book signing, and all other sorts of events. One little thing that most people don’t know — the 4th and 5th floors have beautiful paintings and art hanging on all the walls of the hallway. It’s worth a trip up there just to wander around the halls and see the art!

I did a long-form article for My Modern Met. Do you know this site? It’s pretty cool — run by a friend named Alice Yoo. They feature many different artists from various disciplines, and we decided to do this thing together!

So I wrote an article called, “Nine Things For Your Photo-Brain To Consider“. Jump on over to read all the details.

Also, they are giving away a $1,000 prize in their own photography contest (link), so you may wish to enter!

Selected Photos

My Modern Met also made a selection of some their favorite works to include with the article, and I will put a few of them here for you!

Sorry for Japan

I hope the portion of our community that is in Japan is doing okay. I’ve been watching the live stream on Aljazeera — it looks horrible. So, I’m sure I speak for the rest of the community here when I say we are thinking of you.

SmugMug still going strong

I’m still happy with my move to SmugMug (see my SmugMug Review) for all my photos. I saw that we recently passed 60 million total views, and the SmugMug servers have been real workhorses. I don’t know much about the infrastructure… I was wondering if maybe they used Amazon S3?

Do you all do any printing through SmugMug? I don’t, but I know many people do. I’ve heard that a lot of people take photos of ballet recitals, soccer games, etc etc and then sell the prints to the other parents. Not a bad idea! I even think there is a way to set it up so other parents can come in and order themselves, after they pick out their favorite photos. Anyway, I’ve never done any of this…wondered if you have?

Daily Photo – The Infinite Stairs to the Oubliette

This is one of the areas where the French kept Marie Antoinette in the conciergerie. There were many mysterious parts of these chambers, and this was one of the most interesting.

I one time designed a set of stairs like this back in the day with a Quake level editor. There was a website where you could upload your creations that could be shared by other level designers. I uploaded my stairs, but I don’t know if they were ever used or not. I thought I saw them in E1M4, but then I realized that those stairs were actually 5x better than mine.

Have a camp at Burning Man 2011?

Do ya?  I’m homeless and interested in some camps!  I am also completely useless.  The only thing I can do is take photos.  I can’t cook or build things very well.  Everyone else at Burning Man seems to be extremely handy.  All I can offer is my sardonic wit, my camera, and I come with a full load of gourmet chocolate from Europe that I keep refridgerated in my RV.  So that’s not so bad.

More Burning Man Photos

To see the other photos from the big event, click on the “Burning Man Photos” category.

Early Morning ABC Appearance

I’m going to be on in the morning… have to drive into the studio about 6:30 AM, of all things.  Good god man… I’m a blagger.  I sleep then!  But, I gotta go… I missed the last one because of a scheduling conflict and missed my appearance time.  The producer had to call me… it was too late.  I didn’t mean to rockstar-out on her, and I promised I won’t pull another charlie-sheen.

Daily Photo – Exploring the Playa

Here is another set of photos for you! I’m releasing these in small groups, just because I have so many… and it goes against my one-photo-per-day thing. But that’s just a thing you know. Ain’t nothin’ but a thing.

I usually don’t put captions, but I have been for these Burning Man shots… so see below for more details.

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iPad 2 in Austin?

Are you one of those hardcore stand-in-line-super-early-at-Apple iPad 2 kinda people? Are you here in Austin? Then let’s talk! I need two of those things… email me at wildcard (at) stuckincustoms.com — if you can grab some for me, that would be cool. I’ll pay you back of course, and I’ll even throw in an autographed book.

Beta List Complete

We had a bunch of comments on the announcement for the iPad version of 100 Cameras in 1. Our beta-list is complete, and you should hear soon if you are on the list. We can’t get (and don’t need) everyone in… so it is a very small selection, I’m afraid. Anyway, no worries, full version will be out soon enough!

Daily Photo – Where They Dry the Fish (Ósvör in Bolungarvík)

I ate a lot of fish in Iceland. I even had rotten shark. You’ve heard of this? They bury shark and let it rot until it ferments. And then you eat it. And then you have to drink this Icelandic vodka called Brennavin or something like this. It’s lethal. I remember because I was sitting by a couple of Irish girls that were traveling flamenco dancers and they were laughing at me while I powered through this one-two combination. I don’t drink… but, it was part of the shark experience. And I think of it more as a healing potion than whatever the hell it really was.

While in the northwest fjords, I came across these little huts with intermittent slats. This is where the fisherman hang the fish to dry in the incessant sea-winds that blow up the coast. Pretty cool, eh?