‬‬‫‬‭‮‪‫‬‭‮҉Petre erteP

found this while dropping off the rent check:

( Read more... )

i bought a new focusing screen for my digital slr.
for those familiar with 35mm slr's, you might recognize the pattern printed on the little rectangle thingy. that's the magical piece of acrylic or glass that allows you to manually focus a camera lens. digital slr's, for the most part, do not include this option, which sucks because it's an extremely simple change (or "challenge" if you're this dude on youtubes).

i'm really excited to get it because it allows me to better focus manual lenses. let me back up and explain, nikon has used the same lens mount for their slr cameras. that means i can use my lens from the early 60s on my new camera. i've got 4 old lenses that i can use with my camera, including my Nikkor-S (C) Auto 1:1.4 f= 50mm, which is fancy speak for "a lens that can shoot in low light pretty well (and do other stuff too)"

an example of what the old lens can do:



when i focus on the "0" in 400, you can see how everything in front and behind that point of focus is blurry. the focused portion which can be seen wrapping around the telephone pole is known as the depth of field.

yeah.

mj, in my mind, has always been something odd. like an icon, an institution, a(n un)natural occurrence that had just been producing music and spectacles as i grew up.

the first thing on tv to scare me was thriller (my fav version of the dance here). "mom, why are his eyes like that?! how did they do that?!"

i remember being on vacation with my family in the sierra foothills, in sonora, and that night Bad was premiering on tv. we sat around the motel tv and watched it, and i thought that was a view into what gangs… do… in… parking garages

i remember smooth criminal.

and the video for black or white with the morphing, which was pretty hot shit when it came out. WHOA COMPUTERS WERE USED??? (and after watching it again, the video is pretty bizarre, but appropriate for the time. macaully culkin? george wendt? hip-hop/rap break down? guitar by slash from gnr? tyra omg was that youoo?
remember the end of black or white? a (black)panther walks off the set and morphs into mj?
there were copy cats who apparently went out and smashed cars after watching the epilogue to the music video, and i remember tommy davidson's version on in living color, when at the end, he gets arrested and says to the arresting officer "am i black or am i white?" and the cop replies "i don't know, but you're under arrest," and davidson says "well then i guess i'm black"

i also felt a bond with his music through weird al, who satired 2 of mj's songs, eat it and fat.

that video you sent me is something else, he was a great entertainer, i dunno what else to call somebody who dances and lip synchs on stage.

i wasn't really exposed to david bowie when i was young, so mj was the spectacle of androgyny that i saw. the plastic surgery, the supposed vitiligo that made his skin lighter (no, definitely not chemical treatments, no) (insert joke about the american dream, little black boy growing up to be a rich and powerful white woman), the amusement park at his house, i knew he was weird.

the weirdness in the music confused me. the whoos and hee-heee-heees and wratch-ch-ka-monyas and k-moan-ya wasn't like music i had heard, maybe if i had heard jazz scat and funk it would have made sense. the heavy use of synth and overdubbed backing vocals of himself... even when i was little, i figured that it'd be a pretty bland concert that could only be filled in with theatrics. my mom won tickets to see the moonwalker tour in LA. they went and had fun. they told us kids about it, and it all sounded really silly to me.

growing up, i always thought his bizarre behavior and his secrecy and avoidance of media to be really bizarre. yeah, he made attempts to shy away and be reclusive, but he also wore really bizarre outfits and lived a lavish lifestyle.

now, as an adult, i would like to see it, but i'd rather not listen to the music that he would be writing at this point. if it were older songs with an actual band and he wasn't mouthing the words, then yeah, but otherwise, i'd feel cheated.

his music was funky and rockin, but then turned to over synthetic r&b love song fluff. sorry, but i really can't make much sense, relate to, or enjoy love songs sung by an impish nose-free creep like him.

totally bizarre guy. and his death at this point is overshadowed by, as you [kim] put it, his damage.

i like bikes, beef, plants, old cameras

if you add me, please comment so i know you aren't a serial adder



click pics for tagged blog entries

к людям России или Украины или где бы ни: комментарий, котор нужно добавить. я не добавлю вас если вы не будете иметь много чудесных фото с первоначально содержанием.

what're the steps involved, the thoughts that cross your mind, when you abandon a large stuffed animal in a grocery store parking lot on the day after mother's day?

moment of inspiration:
looking on etsy for cycling caps, came across this page, and laughed, lol'd, and forwarded it to a couple people. but then i got to thinking, maybe i should grow a monobrow? maybe that's above ironic facial hair? i mean, zachary quinto's nearly got one...

found where i got the training glasses
( but what is it? )

Found last week while riding my bike to work. I was pedaling along the Santa Rosa Creek and was under the railroad bridge when I saw this notebook and thought "oh hell yeah!" and turned around and grabbed it.
( inside )

i thought it was a roadside memorial ('cuz what says "classy memento mori" better than a red balloon on the departed's b-day where they died [ok, maybe one of those "in loving memory" decals in the back window, and like, who do you give priority to? what's the etiquette for who gets to be placed over the brake light when someone else dies?])

( but )

chillest little vato.
( and other stuff at the dumps )

so, before i go an sign up with seekingarrangement.com and search for donors (for the aids lifecycle ride) in the shape of sugar daddies and sugar mommies, could you guys help me out and post this all over?

<a href="http://www.tofighthiv.org/goto/petre" title="halffly by metalkpirate1day, on Flickr"><img src="http://farm4.static.flickr.com/3581/3396951427_dafbc8498e_o.jpg" width="700" alt="halffly" /></a>

thanks!

here's a picture of the beach last sunday morning while it was super windy and cold and storming:

I messed this picture up. These cooks were all squatting against the building having smokes. They had on those spandex sweat caps and were chatting. I walked past them (mistake#1, I should have stayed back and readied my camera) and set the exposure, then asked if I could take a picture (mistake #2, I didn't have to ask). They said no, so I said I'd take a picture of the moustache tag above their heads, then I didn't point it low enough. Oh well, live and learn.
( san francisco stuff )

polaroid colorpack ii. the focus ring comes off if you pull it, and then if you don't recall where it was when you pulled it off and put it back on willy-nilly, then you end up not being able to focus until you waste a few shots. i just got a piece of ground glass, and after i finish this last pack of film, i'm going to put the glass in and try to figure out where focus is.

more to come later

probably the most photographed tree in the park


shot with my 1965 polaroid land 103