Light Leaks Magazine

Light Leaks magazine is all about the low-fi. Our readers love unusual cameras—plastic toy cameras, crappy cameras, pinhole cameras, “technologically challenged” cameras. Light Leaks showcases these cameras, the photographers behind them and the photos created with them.

Light Leaks Magazine.

Posted by Mark Wallace Posted in: Photography No Comments » February 2008

Leaderboard Widget

Now you can keep an eye on who’s winning where.  This is a nifty widget that I find mostly useless.  I thought I’d share.

Posted by Mark Wallace Posted in: Humor, Politics No Comments » February 2008

Mexican Food! Yum!

Yesterday Craig and I ran up to Photomark to buy a few things.  While we were there I was able to play around with the Leica M8.  Wow, what a sweet little camera.  I’m just $8,000 away from owning my own.

After hanging out at Photomark we decided to drive in to Phoenix for some good Mexican food.  We found a place on the NE corner of 16^th Street and McDowell called Hacienda Mexican Food.  We knew it was going to be great when we realized nobody spoke any English.

Craig excited about our Mexican food find.

While we were in the restaurant I decided to play around with my wide angle lens.  We shot a few pics while we ate.

Craig waiting for his food.

A view inside the restaurant.

The food finally arrived and it was tasty!  The salsa was great and they gave us little bowls of alphabet soup as an appetizer.  The soup had been “souped up” a bit and was also pretty good.  We had 2 bowls each.

I loved the fact that our drinks came in glass bottles.  They were cold and delicious.  I can’t wait to go back!

Delicious alphabet soup.

Big Head Mark eating some soup.  I love the distortion of the wide angle lens.

 

Posted by Mark Wallace Posted in: Photography, Random Stuff No Comments » February 2008

Teleprompter?

Yesterday Diane and I were at the studio recording a new episode of Digital Photography 1 on 1.  This episode is heavy on math and technical data and I knew it was going to be rough trying to get through the script.  But then I remembered a little video I saw on YouTube about a low cost teleprompter solution.  Here’s the video:

We didn’t have a mirror so I came up with a different solution.  We hooked up our laptop to our video projector and then set up a softbox just under the video camera.  The softbox acted like a video screen and the setup worked pretty well.  Diane controlled the teleprompter while I read from the script.

Unfortunately I set up the video camera incorrectly so the footage is no good.  We’ll have to re-shoot the video soon.  I think I’m going to build a better teleprompter though because this rough setup really helped out.  I’ll post images and plans when I create my new system.

Posted by Mark Wallace Posted in: Photography, Random Stuff No Comments » February 2008

Scattered, Smothered, Covered, Chunked, Topped, Diced & Peppered

Oh yeah, it’s Waffle House!  You haven’t lived until you’ve eaten at a Waffle House at 2:00am.  No matter when you go it’s always an adventure.

Yesterday Diane and I decided to have a late breakfast at one of my favorite Waffle Houses.  Although every Waffle House is fun to visit, some are just a little more fun than others.  There is a Waffle House in Tempe not far from our Studio.  It is next to the freeway (that’s almost a requirement for a Waffle House) and it’s next door neighbor is a huge strip club.  Let’s just say the guests are always interesting.

Whenever possible I like to sit at the bar so I can watch all the activity on the grill.  The waiters call out orders and the short order cooks throw eggs, hash browns, sausages, and other food on the grill at a frenetic pace.  It’s amazing they can keep everything straight.

The customers are always fun to watch as well.  Road weary truckers, families, homeless people, college students, rich, poor; they all come to Waffle House.  I love the mix of ethnicities, ages, and economic background.  The Waffle House is truly America’s melting pot.

So what are you waiting for?  Get in your car and grab some Waffle House goodness.

 

Posted by Mark Wallace Posted in: Humor 2 Comments » February 2008

Common Errors in English Usage

Another great resource on the web.  Read it, learn it, use it.

http://wsu.edu/~brians/errors/errors.html

Posted by Mark Wallace Posted in: Books, Useful Info No Comments » February 2008

History of Photography Podcasts

I discovered an amazing resource for photographers today.  Jeff Curto from College of DuPage is making his class lectures available via a podcast.  Here’s more info from his site.

The Podcast
This podcast is recorded during class lectures for History of Photography, Photo 1105 at College of DuPage. The podcasts are intended as review for students in the class, but thousands of people around the world have found them useful to their education as photographers. Please be aware that there are many links to relevant class information on the class’ main web page, as well as a course syllabus - use the links to the right to find that information.

Listening, Watching & Subscribing
You can  listen to and watch the podcasts from these pages or you can subscribe to them using a podcast reader. The most popular podcast reader is Apple’s iTunes. If you subscribe using this link, each time there is a new class session posted on the internet, the software will automatically download it to your computer.

Enhanced Podcasts
The podcasts are presented in what’s called the “enhanced” podcast format. This means that they are embedded with still images that change along with the audio, sort of like an old filmstrip or synchronized slide show, but better because they have random access to the entire class. They can be viewed on a computer (using QuickTime or Apple’s iTunes software, both free to download and use) or they can be viewed on any video-capable iPod. The files are .m4a files, so they need QuickTime to view them, or an iPod that can show video.

Posted by Mark Wallace Posted in: Photography No Comments » February 2008