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From: "Larry N. Bolch" 
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Subject: Re: Non chatty group/Carl
Date: Thu, 20 Mar 2003 13:28:47 -0700
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Barbara Lee Spinnenweber at BSpinnenweber{at}toromontprocess.com wrote:


> Carl, (and anybody else)
> It's not just the Photogallery yahoo group that is getting less and
> less
> post. I've gained moderator/ownership of a rather large Olympus
> E-10/E-20
> group. There's not many post going on there either. And I'm still a
> member
> of other groups and they are slow too. I think people just got fed up
> with
> the ads. Or maybe they got there answer to their question and there
> just
> wasn't much else to talk about. I had started an offshoot of that large
> E-10/E-20 group before I became owner of that group. In the smaller
> group I
> wrote that people could talk about anything not just technical
> questions.
> You can hear the crickets now.

Over the past month, it seems all the forums have gone quiet. Someone on a
totally unrelated forum was mentioning that even UseNet is quiet at the
moment. It may be pre-war blues.

> I have my own reason for not posting as much as I used to. The weather
> is finally lovely here and I've been out shooting. I've got to before it
> feels like 100°.

There is that too. In the past week, it has been above 0°C every day, after
months of minus double-digits. While spring is not necessarily here, there
is at least an indication that it might eventually arrive. Still massive
amounts of deep snow.

> I've started a portfolio - a depressing one. We were told to go out and
> shoot something that we wouldn't normally shoot. So, I've skipped (not
> really) the flowers and now I'm shooting road kill. I've shot two so
> far and
> both are still with me in my mind. Each very different and yet similar.
> One
> cat and one very crushed almost unrecognizable dog. I'm shooting those
> with
> color slides. I don't know why I'm not shooting digital with those. I
> plan
> on scanning them and possibly messing about with desaturating the
> dead...but
> I'm not sure. I think it might lose it's impact. I'll probably just
> leave
> 'em the way they are.

Watch out, you are pretty close to Cajun country. They claim that as their
right! (Or at least my Cajun friend claims...)

>
> Oh yeah, I picked up a digital camcorder...then I had to add an 80 gig
> hard
> drive. I made my first movie of the karate instructor demonstrating
> four
> katas (karate dances). Oh, and my son giving his news report...and a
> two
> hour taped baby shower (not mine!). I'm using Pinnacle Studio 8 to make
> the
> movies.

I have been shooting long sequences of 640 x 480 images at 1.5 frames a
second with the Nikon CP5000. I am using Vegas Video to either turn then
into very fast slide shows or very slow movies. Each frame is on the screen
for either one or two seconds, but it is in crossfade with the previous
frame for half the time and the next frame for half the time. So, it is a
constant crossfade from beginning to end.

These are of friends talking - being - and shot unobtrusively. All my
friends have been tamed to the camera now. Since I always have it in hand,
they have reached the point of not noticing it. The result is a very intense
portrait, a couple of minutes long.

I have a wonderful music program called Band-in-a-Box. I can write a chord
sequence and melody, and it will score it in almost any style imaginable.
Quick and easy, with a high degree of control. When I am ready to record, I
run SoundForge at the same time. BiaB plays out of my computer to an
external synthesizer. The audio out on the synth is hooked up to the audio
in on my sound card. SoundForge acts as a recorder.

Once the music is recorded into SoundForge, I can do things like add
environment, compression to bring out detail and so on. I can even run it
through a lovely ribbon mic simulator for the warm sound the mic would
produce. I save it as a WAV or MP3 file which Vegas Video will embed into
the movie once rendered.

The resulting clip somehow has a lot more emotional impact than a simple
video clip would have, and far more than any still portrait I have ever
shot. "Wow!" seems to be the comment I get most.

> I've got a "for sure" wedding (one couple had broken up before tying
> the knot) in June.

Ah well, when starting out, I did a few weddings. On one of the biggest, I
failed to extract a deposit. These were well to do people with scads of
relatives who wanted prints. A few days after the wedding, the mother of one
came by and picked up the proofs. I called a few weeks later when I had not
heard anything and was told they had made their selections, as had the bride
and groom, but the proofs had been sent to relatives at the other end of the
country. A few months passed and I followed up again, but the proofs were
now in the US with other relatives. Loads of prints were being ordered. More
months, and another follow up. The mother told me curtly the couple had
recently separated - and that was it. Zip, zero, nada.

larry!
ICQ 76620504
http://www.larry-bolch.com/

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