The Mormon Hippie

I bought my domain last night, and server space and have a "Coming Soon" page at (again, there's no hyperlink button...I have no idea what happened to it):

Well, I'm back in Idaho Falls. Finally. There were some extenuating circumstances that pretty much forced me to move back up here for a while. I think it'll actually all work out for the best. In fact, I know it will. Once I get a job that is. I've been up here for about 2 weeks now, and tried to get in touch with my old boss, but wasn't able to and kind of gave up, but I'm going to be a bit more persistent now. The break from work has been nice, but I'm not the kind of person that really likes to sit around and do nothing, which is basically what I've done the last 2 weeks. I've had some fun playing and beating Halo 3, and trying (and failing thus far) to get my printer really calibrated. It seems to print really dark. All the images from Bear Lake that I made were done on my laptop that has the LCD display, and I'm printing from my desktop which has the CRT monitor and the images really do appear a bit darker on it, so what I'm seeing is really what I'm getting, but was too stubborn to change anything the first print (the add hyperlink button is gone or I would put a link to the photographs, and the URLs are too long to paste here, which is a reason I'm considering leaving Vox...more on that later though). I guess this is where digital imaging gets tough, both for the creator and the viewer; atleast for viewing on the Net. Not all monitors are created equal, and the average Joe isn't going to have a properly calibrated monitor. My monitor isn't even calibrated. So each end user's experience is going to be different, i.e., going from my laptop to my desktop. Oh well, just a kink I need to work out.

I've been working on a new website lately, and am getting color schemes worked out, as well as a good design for the home page. Here's just a quick preview of what one of the galleries will likely end up looking like:

websitescreen

I'm too tired right now to post my Why People Photograph quotes, so I'll do it tomorrow. That should give me just that much more time to think about them and be able to put up some kind of coherent thought on the matter.

Last night I went up Little and Big Cottonwood Canyons to photograph. I've always loved backpacking, and rock climbing and such, and lately I've been thinking of ways to incorporate those activities into a photographic project. If there's one thing I've learned from framing homes its: stop thinking about "it" so much and just do "it." So last night I did just that, and instead of sitting and stewing longer about how to approach this "project," I went out to begin making photographs (I actually learned this lesson during my B.F.A. project, but I guess I needed a reminder). I ended up making only three photographs, because I didn't get out the door till later than I had hoped; I ruined 10 sheets of film by dropping them in my bathroom sink with the leaky faucet, and had to open up a new box.
I'm fairly pleased with what I shot so far, although they may or may not have anything to do with rock climbing. Come to think of it, they look pretty similar to these:

One of them had a river in it, and there was more river than rock in it. So right now, they don't really portray anything like "hey, this rock is climbed a lot," but, like I said, things are still in the conception stage.

On an unrelated topic, I keep a few mini blogs that I update a bit more regularly than this one, so if you check here and don't see any new updates, you can check these out:

Pownce
Jaiku

These mini blogs are actually pretty fun. They let me post things that I don't really want to include here, but do want to blog about. If you like em, sign up. Pownce is still in Beta, and you need an invite. If you want one, I still have six left, so email me or leave a comment and I'll get one out to you.

I came across these pic tures and thought I'd share them

How NOT to clean your camera

Professional photographer pills

Just a little lower....

Portable print station

Hank, I can't see anything!

I got another batch of negatives developed today. I'm really excited about these ones. A few weeks ago I mentioned I went photographing for the first time in a while, and said I got a really good photograph that I was excited about. That negative was one that got developed today, and it looks really good. I can't wait to see it in positive..."form." There were a few others that I shot quite recently that look really good as well. I just wish I was able to get at least a low-res scan or something just to post here, but it'll have to wait a little bit longer. I think after just one more round I should be all caught up with all the negatives that need to be developed, and then I can get a bunch of the shipped out to Jon, who has graciously offered to scan them for me. (I just realized he'll be the first to see them as positives....oh well. I'll live)

Just figured I'd make a quick update.
No, I didn't get around to "Round 2" of processing negatives Sunday. It was roasting hot, and the bathroom was even hotter. So it should resume tomorrow. I'm still reading Why People Photograph, but I haven't come across any good quotable quotes lately.
I'm in the middle of learning CSS (Cascading Style Sheets) to redesign my website. I think I mentioned I signed up for MyArtSpace.com, and I have only one complaint: I don't have a simple URL to send people to, such as "www.myartspace.com/andyduncan" or something like that (don't try copying and pasting that URL into your browser, because it won't work). This is the real URL to my profile page there:  
      http://www.myartspace.com/artistInfo.do?populatinglist=home&subscriberid=k5ydptfxv9tc98c1
Not exactly something I can print on a business card or something. Or tell someone "hey go here."
For now it remains my main some-what "professional" web presence until I can get my website up.