The Online Photographer

10/17/14 The Morning Comment: Suck Up and Schlepp

Good morning!

Welcome to the Morning Comment—the replacement for the Morning Coffee. Every morning I'll talk about a reader comment from the last day or three. My responses are just my opinion. Even if I argue, I'm not necessarily claiming that I'm right and the commenter is wrong.

This morning's comment, from David Zivic: "I've heard it several times and I think right here in TOP. 'The best camera is the one you have with you.'"

This is an Internet truism, and I wouldn't bet the house that I've never repeated it. David's probably right—I probably have.

But I'm really not sure I buy it. Instead, I think I'd say something like "It's best to have with you whatever camera you need to get the shot you want." Of course that doesn't roll off the tongue.

But really, far more often in the history of photography, great photographers went to great trouble and toil to have the right cameras with them for the work they envisioned in their mind's eye. For some, this might indeed have been any camera at all; but for many, having the right camera was integral to the way they saw and to the results they got. Even photographers who did great work with toy cameras wouldn't have been well served if they'd had a 35mm SLR with them. Many of the great view camera photographers, at the very least, could not have done the work they did without the cameras they toiled to carry. No professional would ever say, "Well, it was the wrong camera for the job, but it was the one I happened to have with me." No bird photographer would not have a long lens because it was too difficult to carry.

Granted, one thing the truism emphasizes is that it doesn't matter how nice a camera you have if you leave it at home all the time, and that's true enough. But maybe that just means you're too lazy to schlepp what you really ought to be schlepping. Better to suck it up and lug along what you need than excuse yourself with some weak-coffee cliché. (I could be talking to myself here.)

We have to be prepared for what we want to do. That's just part of the game we play. It has always been so. The Internet truism seems to implicitly encourage people to be satisfied with any camera that happens to be undemandingly portable. That's really the wrong encouragement, I'd say. Better to carry the camera you need, whatever it happens to be. People will only judge the result. Nobody cares if your camera fit in your pocket or not.

Mike

Original contents copyright 2014 by Michael C. Johnston and/or the bylined author. All Rights Reserved. Links in this post may be to our affiliates; sales through affiliate links may benefit this site.

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Featured Comments from:

M. Guarini: "J.P. Caponigro has done great work with the iPhone."

Mike replies: Yes he has.

fiberstrobe: "I've just checked back my favorite photos from 2013 (you can see here) and none of them was a snapshot happened only because by chance I had a camera with me. All of them was somehow planned and the proper lens (and lighting) was selected. Of course I have many snapshots and typical tourist photos, but none of them reached to the selection."

Edie Howe: "Nope. Nope, nope, nope. You're wrong, Mike. The image is always more important than the camera that captured it. Carry whatever camera you will, but here's the kicker: know how to use it, and know its limitations."

Mark Steigelman: "How 'bout 'For grab shots, the best camera is the one you have with you.'"

David Zivic: "Well put Mike and a good example of your professed 'my responses are just my opinion.' I look forward to the times when I can choose one of my cameras with lens or two and go on a shooting walk, or to a particular spot for a shot I think I saw. I also go to a local wild bird sanctuary with a long lens. What my phone camera has done for me is to allow me to always have an image taking device with me. I need my phone with me for work so it's always there.

"I sell yachts for a living and drove two hours to get photos of a new listing. Halfway through the shoot my Leica decided to stop working. I finished the project with my iPhone and got acceptable shots, especially for thumbnails on the internet. 

"(By the way I also learned yesterday that I don't need to unlock my phone to use the camera feature so I am finding these morning posts valuable.)"

John D.: "I have a job that puts me in the public eye from time to time, and I get photographed a lot. Frequently I have to wait several minutes as the various photographers fumble with their cameras, and then use their iPhones (or the iPhones of their subjects) to give them their own version to take home. I have to say, the only photos that ever get used are the iPhone ones. They don't need complicated resizing, they can be shared or uploaded to the web right away, and they often have better color balance and tonality that the DSLR out-of-camera JPEGs. By the time the pro photographer has finished playing with his RAW files, life, and we, have moved on."

10/16/14 The Morning Comment: iPhoneCam

Good morning!

Welcome to the Morning Comment—the replacement for the Morning Coffee. Every morning I'll talk about one reader comment from the last day or three. My responses are just my opinion. Even if I argue, I'm not necessarily claiming that I'm right and the commenter is wrong.

This morning's comment, from Frank Petronio: "The iPhone is the best small camera yet."

This isn't the first time Frank and I have to agree to disagree. He's a longtime reader and an excellent photographer but we don't always see eye to eye.

Or in this case, i to i.

The statement that the iPhone is a good camera has achieved the level of truism, but it mystifies me. Mine isn't, to me. I have an iPhone 4s, which I've been forced to carry far more often recently because it's temporarily the only phone I own. When I was young—to you younger people, that would be when Teddy Roosevelt was President and they hadn't invented the Victrola yet—cases for MMM (metal, manual, mechanical) SLRs were sold that were called "ever-ready cases." The standard joke was that they were really "never-ready cases." Because by the time you had wrangled your camera out of its case, your picture had retired and moved to Florida.

The iPhone is worse than those.

Granted, this is partially because I use a beautiful little leather iPhone case that interferes with the camera. So when I want to take a picture I have to: fish the phone out of my pocket. Flip open the case. Flick to unlock. Enter the number code. Hit the camera app. Unfold the case to get it out of the way of the lens. Squint at the poor viewfinder. Try to hold the phone still even though it's not meant to be held that way. Taking a picture with it is a bit like the famous walking dog: It is not done well; but you are surprised to find it done at all.

My picture by that time had better be static; a fast-moving picture has long since escaped by the time I'm ready to "capture" it with an iPhone.

Of course if I do manage to take the picture, I'd better hope it's a bad picture, not a good one, because if it's something I want I'll have to suffer from having gotten the right picture with the wrong camera! Always a miserable fate.

I guess an iPhone is good enough for some people. David Hume Kennerly, who I met once in a line at a deli in Washington D.C., used one for a project to improve his photography. He's a better photographer than I am, by quite some.

But to me, the iPhone is a wretched, paltry little camera, one that's only "good" insofar as something is better than nothing. I hate using it and I can't understand why anyone feels otherwise.

But then, I don't understand everything.

Mike

Original contents copyright 2014 by Michael C. Johnston and/or the bylined author. All Rights Reserved. Links in this post may be to our affiliates; sales through affiliate links may benefit this site.

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(To see all the comments, click on the "Comments" link below.)
Featured Comments from:

Adam Weaver: "Press the home button, then swipe up from the bottom of the screen, and you'll see about a dozen icons, including one for the camera. Unlocking the phone isn't necessary—this shortcut allows you to take a photo with up to three stops of dynamic range in just a moments."

Svein-Frode: "Nicely put. I thought I was the only one unable to take any usable photo with an iPhone. Like you said, the action is all over once you have gotten the camera app up and running, and the photos look terrible unless you had a scene in front of you that was bright, lacked contrast and you were able to hold the darn thing still while pressing the button."

Marco (partial comment): "You seem to have the odd idea that an iPhone is primarily for making phone calls...how quaint! Beyond snapshots of my grandson and daughter, at which the iPhone is perfectly adequate, I think of the iPhone as a scratch pad, a way to remember things I've seen and want to see again. Sort of what I imagine a painter would use pencil and paper for. There is that 'truism' that the best camera is the one you have with you but I think that's not completely accurate—especially if you are someone who is passionate about capturing light. These devices that can also take pictures are fine but they aren't cameras in the true sense."

Stas (partial comment): "I am not going to claim to enjoy iPhone's image quality (I have a 5), but I actually like the extremely simple shooting workflow. Point, touch to focus/exposure lock, shoot. I partly purchased E-M1 to replace my NEX-7 because it replicated this workflow in an ILC, and even expanded on it by allowing me to do it from hip level (should have got the silver version for extra hip). So, I agree with Frank—smartphone cameras are the most interesting cameras. They enable an exceptionally pleasing simple workflow, and are 'always with you.' But I wish I could have at least 1" IBIS sensor there, because when I open the image for clean up in Lightroom, I certainly wish I used something else to take it...."

Ben Rothfeld: "Respectfully, your age is showing. I've noticed that a lot of people in their teens, 20s and even 30s NEVER LET GO OF THEIR PHONES. As a result, it's the equivalent of carrying your MMM camera with the never-ready case unsnapped."

Frank Petronio: "Thanks for the acknowledgement Mike. I agree that the iPhone can be clumsy, especially in the supposedly indestructible Lifeproof case I use. But...I still find many aspects of the modern phone cameras superior to other digital cameras I've used (and that goes back to the Canon Xap Shot!) They do require a little practice but you can make rewarding images with them.

"When I use the panorama feature I really wish the same technology  was implemented into a pro camera...it is the closest thing to a digital Noblex yet. These run over 8000 pixels wide so you can get a pleasing screen image.

"Continuing the impending frigid Winter theme, this picture proved quite disconcerting to my fellow passengers as we flew over the tundra (i.e. Lake Erie).

"The iPhone doesn't replace my other cameras but now I don't waste time making 'throwaways' with the big guns. Also the iPhone has completely replaced any need for me to have a consumer video camera for family events—birthday cake candles, dance recitals and the like. I can easily upload videos of the event to my family-only YouTube channel—which is far easier than burning discs. Cheers, Frank."

Reid Parkinson: "Well hell Mike, your iPhone is three generations old! Your comments might be more persuasive if you were packing an iPhone 6."

Shadzee: "I agree with you 100%. It takes me more than five seconds to get my phone out and take an image. And almost every time the first image is blurry. Then again, my 13-year-old daughter can take a sharp image within a second or so with her iPhone !!  ;-)  A couple of things: she carries her phone in her hand (I put it in my pocket). Her phone is always on (mine is mostly asleep)...most importantly...she is not bothered by blurry images.  ;-)  Every image is awesome.  ;-) "

Mike replies: That last point is key. Don't worry, be happy! Made me laugh.

10/11/14 The Morning Coffee: Vacation Snaps

Poet and editor Jim Schley is a "FOLD" (friend of long duration)—as of this month, he and I have known each other for fifty years, since we were seven. This is the solar house designed by his wife Rebecca Bailey that he and Becky built themselves with the help of a number of friends on the back side of a ridge in central Vermont. A spectacularly beautiful spot.

As with many small publications, TOP has to watch pennies, and, as you know, color reproduction is expensive, so we'll switch to black-and-white now.

...There, that's better. TOP readers Rob Strong and Eli Burakian, both accomplished pros, both friends of Jim's and/or Becky's, and both really friendly guys. We had lunch at an excellent Nepalese restaurant in Hanover that came with excellent conversation. I wrote about them a few days ago.

This picture of Jim at the Vermont store where he and Becky get their mail (Becky had to work the days I was there) actually looks a bit better in color, but you know how it is—black-and-white is so much more popular, and we have to bow to mass taste.

This is a cool thing. The students at a local architecture school built a trailerable caravan for Jim to use as a miniature mobile office. It's where he writes poetry (his book is called As When, in Season).

These few shots represent only part of my trip—I saw family members and another old friend too—but as I've mentioned I hardly photographed at all. Only a few dozen exposures in all. The "Southern Tier" in New York State (where I did hit peak color as they call it) was particularly enchanted, but I'm relying on my memory for that (and yes, you can actually do that. Well, I hope you can).

On the last day of my trip I got to stay with my old friend Steve Rosenblum and his family (he's an eminent cardiologist, but more importantly a photography enthusiast, and a regular reader and commenter here), and Steve knows David Turnley, my friend Peter Turnley's twin brother. It was really nice to meet David at long last, after hearing so much about him over the years and being so familiar with his work. He's quite different than Peter in some ways but the brothers also have a lot in common, including some spookily similar mannerisms. Our conversation with David was intense and wide-ranging, and centered not so much on photography but on policy, people, and politics. David, like Peter, is primarily concerned with the human condition and the state of the world. He's now teaching at the University of Michigan.

Steve is laughing here because the restaurant we were in was very dark and I couldn't find any light for a portrait. David said, "maybe I can help with that," and wandered around looking at his hand at face level to see the light. We tried a few places when David said, "let's try the kitchen!" and walked right in. I'd hesitate before going into a restaurant kitchen without permission, but of course it's nothing to a guy who's shot everything, everywhere. Meeting David with Steve was a nice cap to the trip.

Mike

"Morning Coffee" is a blip about nothing in particular auto-published weekdays at 3:30 a.m. Central Time to be in time for morning coffee breaks in the UK and Europe.

Original contents copyright 2014 by Michael C. Johnston and/or the bylined author. All Rights Reserved. Links in this post may be to our affiliates; sales through affiliate links may benefit this site.

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10/10/14 The Morning Coffee: Home Again

I'm finally back home in Waukesha, having driven 2,759 miles (4,440 kilometers) since Friday September 26th. I saw five sets of friends, one twice, and had a grand and meaningful vacation. It's done me a world of good.

I must say it's good to be back to my dogs and my regular keyboard, in that order, but otherwise I'd much prefer to still be where I was last weekend!

Right now I need to go to sleep in the worst sort of way, but I'll post a few snapshots from the trip in tomorrow's Morning Coffee.

Mike

"Morning Coffee" is a blip about nothing in particular auto-published weekdays at 3:30 a.m. Central Time to be in time for morning coffee breaks in the UK and Europe.

Original contents copyright 2014 by Michael C. Johnston and/or the bylined author. All Rights Reserved. Links in this post may be to our affiliates; sales through affiliate links may benefit this site.

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9/23/14 The Morning Coffee: Travel Plans

Obligatory Butters shot—in the same place as the last shot, but through the window from outside.

Good morning to you—

Later this week I'll be traveling: starting with a destination of Corning, New York, moving on to Providence, Rhode Island, then a stop in Cambridge (near Boston), Massachussetts, then on to South Strafford, Vermont. Back to Corning, and then home.

As of this moment I haven't worked out how I'll be posting from the road, but I might actually be using my iPad. I have to work out the system today and start practicing while I'm still at home.

I really should just get a laptop, but I can't afford it right now. Anyway, if you notice shorter posts next week, now you know the reason why! The discipline could be good for me, actually. I've been writing too long lately.

I hardly ever travel, so this will be an interesting experiment.

The entire frame

Have a good Tuesday—

Mike

"Morning Coffee" is a daily bit of blog news, auto-published weekdays at 3:30 a.m. Central Time to be in time for morning coffee breaks in the UK and Europe.

ADDENDUM: Outtake with Lulu, who hasn't made an appearance on TOP in a while....

BTW neither of these pictures are real pictures, because they won't last for me. I already know it.

Original contents copyright 2014 by Michael C. Johnston and/or the bylined author. All Rights Reserved. Links in this post may be to our affiliates; sales through affiliate links may benefit this site.

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9/22/14 The Morning Coffee: Cathedral Window

And a Good Morning to you. Hope you had a nice weekend.

So there's an interesting thing that happens with the light in my yard, at this time of year:

There's an opening in the trees that leads back to the soybean field. When the sun gets low in the sky, the light comes through the opening.

From the house it looks like a narrow strip of light falling across the yard...

...But when I went out there it's a wider wedge of light that comes to a point like a cathedral window. It's pretty.

I haven't gotten a good picture in my back yard yet, but I feel like I will. I missed a couple the other day.

The neighbors on the far side store their wheelbarrows out by the bean field through my gap, by local custom. They asked me if I minded them going through my yard to get them and I said of course not.

Hope you get through your Monday! Stay calm....

Mike

Original contents copyright 2014 by Michael C. Johnston and/or the bylined author. All Rights Reserved. Links in this post may be to our affiliates; sales through affiliate links may benefit this site.

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9/19/14 The Morning Coffee: The Fate of an Awkwardly Large Chicago Bear

This post really should have a picture, but doesn't.

When Zander was a baby we lived in the Chicago suburb of Oak Park, Illinois, and I'd take him in his carseat basket into Oak Park Camera on Lake Street, which in those days was an independent shop owned by Gene Fara. When Gene died his son Lance took over, and as Zander grew he became very familiar with the camera store—he loved to race around behind the counters and shoot rubberbands at his buddy Brian.

One week an awkwardly large four-foot teddy bear appeared at the store. Zander was entranced, but as much as he begged, he couldn't have it, because I couldn't buy it—it was a raffle prize. We put our ticket in, though, and lo and behold, Zander won! How that happened is anybody's guess—and anybody isn't telling. Shhh.

Zander loved his bear from Chicago, which, with logic if not originality, he named "Bear." Bear was too large to sleep with, but a place was found for him where he could stretch out and relax. Then, when they were both about the same height, came the high point of Bear's life—day after day, Zander and Bear would have epic boxing matches together, with Daddy animating Bear from behind. Zander loved it. Bear was tough but Zander was the man for the fight. (To give his limbs weight, Bear had sandbags in his paws, so he could pack a punch. Once, Zander fought furiously, stopped, dropped his hands, gave a big sigh, thought about it for a couple of beats, and broke into tears. Bear went a little easier the next time.)

Zander continued to grow, of course, and Bear's last childhood duty was to be wedged in between his bed and the wall so eight-year-old Zander wouldn't wake up in the middle of the night trapped in that narrow space himself.

Eventually Bear's head began to come off and his stuffing started to come out. So our friends Sally Schley, her daughter Gina Jozef, and Sally's mother Imy (a.k.a. "Grimmy," for Grandma Imy) Schley came to the rescue—they made a restoration project of Bear. They removed his stuffing, washed him, restuffed him, and sewed him up. We donated Bear to the Schley family cabin, where he lived for a couple of years.

But Bear is large, and eventually Grimmy gently suggested he should go home again.

When you move, one of the big headaches is figuring out where things should go. Some things you have to throw away even though you know someone somewhere would want them. I apologize , for instance, to collectors of Olympus OM Zuiko lenses for throwing out a number of pristine empty lens boxes, several for the rarest of the lenses—but getting them into the right hands was more than I had time for. I've donated 30 boxes of books to a local bookshop and café; filled a dumpster; and made numerous trips to Goodwill. Goodwill is particularly useful because if you can't bring yourself to throw something worthless away, they'll do it for you.

Unfortunately, Goodwill won't take stuffed animals because they can harbor germs. At least, the ones that have not recently been laundered.

What to do? Things looked grim for Bear. Had he reached the end of life and love? He was in splendid shape, soft, gleaming and clean. And teddy bears his size can cost anywhere from $60 to $200. It seemed a shame to throw him in the trash like he was junk after his long life of silent service. I racked my brain, but I couldn't think of any friends nearby with small children.

In an effort to save Bear from his ignominious fate, I loaded him in the car and drove to a older neighborhood in downtown Waukesha...and just drove around, looking. Finally I spied a little red-headed girl about three years old riding a bike on the sidewalk, with several adults watching her from a porch.

I approached the porch, and after a bit of initial awkwardness, explained my mission. The little girl's father came out and introduced himself, and we shook hands, and, once the parents were persuaded that I hadn't lost a bit of stuffing myself, the proceedings warmed up considerably, and the little girl took possession of good old Bear, who, it turns out, is a foot taller than she—while her father told me that she has a special fondness for stuffed animals and a room full of them. She said "thank you" very politely and did seem very pleased. After farewells and God-bless-you's all around, off I went.

You can't find a good home for everything you have to get rid of when you move. But maybe I've made a successful adoption placement for Bear. I hope they have enough room—he is, after all, awkwardly large.

Mike

"Morning Coffee" is auto-published weekdays at 3:30 a.m. Central Time to be in time for morning coffee breaks in the UK and Europe.

Original contents copyright 2014 by Michael C. Johnston and/or the bylined author. All Rights Reserved. Links in this post may be to our affiliates; sales through affiliate links may benefit this site.

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(To see all the comments, click on the "Comments" link below.)
Featured Comments from:

Nige: "Nice story, good to hear Bear ended up with a new career. Here's a roughly thrown together couple of pics of my son and his boxing gorilla. I used to operate the gorilla, who I think was called Monkey, just like you did the bear. My son has grown substantially in the intervening 15 years."

Mike replies: He still has the same smile though.

FK: "This post has nice warm fuzzy feeling."

Mark: "Good for you Mike, I would not have been able to part with so significant a memento. At our house Bear would have wound up hanging out in a corner somewhere waiting for the possibly someday grandchild to take over the 'Care of Bear' duties. Hopefully Bear has many more years of hugs left in him with his new little girl."

adamct: "One day I was at Costco buying groceries when I saw one of those giant bears you're describing. My twin daughters were about four years old at the time, and somehow I felt like I just had to buy it for them. I took it home and set it up in our large, long living room so the bear was 'sitting' upright in the free space in the middle of the room. Then I called my daughters.

"One of my daughters is a fearless, wild free spirit. She took one look at the bear and her face lit up. She ran at it full-tilt, tackled the bear, knocked it over, and hugged it in a death grip. My other daughter is much more cautious, but not wanting to be left out, she insisted that I set up the bear again, so that she, too, could tackle it. I obliged. She gathered herself, then started running at full speed. About a foot or two from the bear, she suddenly slammed on the brakes, turned around and sidled back to me. She motioned for me to bend down, then whispered in my ear, 'Daddy, is there a man in there?' I love that story because it perfectly captures my daughters' different characters. (Of course, once I reassured her, my second daughter promptly clothes-lined the bear as well.)

"The first daughter mentioned above still snuggles up in the bear's 'lap' whenever she is looking for comfort (usually after being scolded for acting up)."

9/18/14 The Morning Coffee: Photosexual Politics

A good morning to you—

I'm probably the last person to comment on this, as I've never shot a single nude photo of anyone. (I don't know how ordinary or unusual that makes me among lifelong photographers—I don't have any reading on that metric.) And I don't need to see Jennifer Lawrence naked so much as I need to her cast in better-written movies. Hunger games, bah humbug.

But "This Idea Could Stop People From Posting Women’s Naked Photos Without Permission," written by Tara Culp-Ressler on ThinkProgress, is one of the most interesting photographic articles I've read in a long time. To me it doesn't seem reasonable to blame the people who shared their photos privately in the first place—romance is full of hope and excitement and trials of intimacy, and to expect people to remain guarded and legalistic in their thinking while in that state isn't very generous to human nature. But then, is the act of disseminating those private photos later, without permission, properly thought of as an act of sexual violation or aggression?

I lean toward sympathy with the latter position. Personally I'm very big on the idea of consent as a general principle. "Revenge porn," so called, goes against the grain of the way I tend to think human relations are best conducted. But as I say, maybe I'm not close enough to the issue to comment.

Have a good Thursday, and be considerate to others.

Mike

"Morning Coffee" is auto-published weekdays at 3:30 a.m. Central Time to be in time for morning coffee breaks in the UK and Europe.

Want to suggest a topic or ask a question? Leave it as a comment.

Original contents copyright 2014 by Michael C. Johnston and/or the bylined author. All Rights Reserved. Links in this post may be to our affiliates; sales through affiliate links may benefit this site.

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Featured Comments from:

Tim McGowan: "You have something in common with Ansel, he too did not shoot nudes."

Edie Howe: "Mike, Thank you for speaking up on this subject: as a survivor of sexual assault, the thought of having intimate images of myself distributed without my permission does indeed cause the same level of fear and anxiety that remembering my rape trauma does. Yes, it is a form of sexual assault. Nice to have an ally in you."

Jerome: "This not a technical problem, and it won't be resolved with technical cleverness. It is a problem of what behaviour we reward, and what behaviour we punish.

"The hacker: Let's start with that weird hacker apotheosis. Hackers are criminals. They break in, steal, extort, blackmail, intimidate. It is beyond me that hackers are celebrated and elevated to being heroes, some sort of robin hoods of the digital era. They are not. Just a bunch of thugs, that found a substitute for physical strength to commit crimes.

"Let's try an analogy. Imagine a burglar break into your house, steal your belongings—and then see him nut running off into the darkness, but all giddy and bursting with pride, showing off, surrounded by a cheering crowd that can't get enough of your stuff, and resells it with huge profit? And they point fingers at you, how stupid you are for having belongings, or being victim to a burglar. And don't even dare to speak up, or that crowd will turn into a raging mob, defending their burglar hero. But that wouldn't happen, the perpetrators would end up in jail in no time. Because we all agree that these are criminals, and their behaviour is not to be encouraged.

"You see? That's the difference. The burglar is labelled a criminal. People who resell stolen goods are also labelled criminals. Nobody cheers.

"Not so our hacker. He has no reason to fear any persecution, and he can monetise whatever he stole without a problem. This needs to change.

"Security: It is amazing that users are blamed  for not being experts in securing their computers. Life is not long enough to become an expert in everything. IT security is a moving target, today's security fad is obsolete and ridiculed tomorrow. You just can't keep up with all the vulnerabilities, leaks, vendor's policy changes if you have a life to live.

"You will be hacked. No smug comment on how clever a password you have will change that. No user can constantly double check on the iClouds, Dropboxes, OneDrives of this world to see if there isn't any loophole waiting to be exploited, a new default setting that might backfire in combination with a new convenient (but potentially risky) feature and a bug in whatever device you used any given day.

"Hackers are experts in that, and they will find their way. Just like the burglar, who will pick a bigger crowbar, or just smash a window to get in. Security measures are just a hope to inconvenience the criminal enough to make him go to the next house.

"Pick a vendor you trust, set your passwords, and hope for the best. As a user, there's nothing more you can do, and nothing to feel guilty about.

"Shaming: Now this is the most troubling aspect. Who is shamed? Not the criminal who stole the pictures is shamed, not the media that publishes the stolen pictures. No, the victim is the one who gets public shame.

"Shaming means that you did something wrong. Something to be ashamed of. You stepped out of line, and now the crowd scoffs, points fingers and puts you in your place. Who do you think you are? How dare you do this, and expect to be treated respectfully afterwards, to still be one of us?

"Let's not fool ourselves here. It's women who are publicly shamed. The thinking is: they stepped out of line. Now they deserve to be punished. And this line of thinking needs to be stopped.

"There's nothing shameful about human bodies. There's nothing wrong or shameful in owning / taking nude pictures. This is a part of our human nature, and deserves the respect and privacy that we owe the person, regardless what gender, whether naked, clothed, crying, laughing...you get the idea.

"The one who needs to be scoffed, shamed and prosecuted is the one who steals or exploits stolen photos. The victims need and deserve our empathy and support.

"Please, give this a thought. If you agree, be vocal about it. Don't be a silent bystander when you see friends, colleagues ogling stolen nude photos and shame a (probably a female) neighbour, friend, colleague. This is the only way to stop this madness: to stop encouraging such behaviour."

9/17/14 The Morning Coffee: Zander's Ex

I'm on notice. A number of people were not happy with me yesterday for missing Morning Coffee. Sorry again.

I'm planning a trip soon, and today dear Butters the dog "interviewed" at Camp Bow-Wow, a doggie daycare where he can board while I'm gone. The dogs are campers, the kennels are cabins, the attendants are counselors.

It's a really neat place. Lots of dogs milling about in a number of separate indoor and outdoor play areas, with attendants always on duty...and, er, cleaning up duty. They all carry spray bottles—a spritz of water is apparently enough to distract dogs from a momentary altercation.

And lo and behold, one of the attendants was Kirsten R., who was my son's girlfriend his senior year in high school. Kirsten was over at our house a great deal that year, and by the end of the time I felt almost like she was a surrogate daughter (she's how I learned that parents can miss their childrens' significant others when those relationships end). I like Zander's current girlfriend a lot (and obviously he does too, since they've been together for going on three years now), but they've never spent much time at our house so I don't know Jenna as well. I hadn't seen Kirsten in over a year, although I figured I'd run in to her again around town sooner or later. It was great to see her again after so long.

Zander's first serious girlfriend, when he was fourteen, was a girl his age I'll call Ingrid. They met in Middle School and spent a lot of time together one summer and for a few months afterwards. She was always talking about her "ex-boyfriends," and one day in the car I asked her how many ex-boyfriends she could possibly have at the age of fourteen. Turns out not all of her exes were boys she'd even kissed, and some of them she "went out with" for less than two weeks. I said something to the effect that maybe that didn't quite rise to the standard of a boyfriend and girlfriend, and her funny answer made me laugh: "Oh, Mister Johnston, kids our age don't latch up."

Meaning, get married. Which is the way adults think, as patiently explained by Ingrid at 14.

After Zander joined the ranks of her many exes I only saw Ingrid one more time. She came over looking for Zander when they were both about seventeen. He wasn't home, so she waited for him for about forty-five minutes, and we talked, on the back deck. She was trying to be her old cheerful, breezy self, but I could tell she was troubled, and she related some troubling things: for instance, that her mother had kicked her out of the house. That shocked me, because her mother, a divorced woman who lived in a nice house and had a good job, had always seemed to me to be very attentive and involved in her daughter's life, quietly proud of her and appropriately protective.

To our shock, we learned earlier this year that Ingrid had died. I was distressed when I heard it and curious as to what had happened, but it was not obvious—there was no mention of an illness or accident or cause of death in the obituary. I asked Zander if he'd ask around, and a few weeks later he learned that Ingrid had died of a heroin overdose. Her mother kicking her out of the house suddenly made sense as a desperate parent's attempt at an ultimatum that might change her behavior.

I've thought about poor Ingrid many times in the past several months. It is such an acutely tragic waste of a fine young life; I cannot imagine the anguish of her poor family, especially her mother who doted on her, and my heart goes out to them. I remember Ingrid as a smart, articulate, pretty, perfectly normal girl with a sense of humor that was both wise and lively. She was a person of superior social skills—even at fourteen she loved to keep track of all her friends, and she was polite but confident with adults. She was always quick with an update about what people were doing—who was dating whom, whose family had moved where—always sharing details about people she knew. But always generous, not gossipy. She always struck me as a young woman who really cared about people.

And now she never gets to latch up.

Mike

"Morning Coffee," auto-published weekdays very early to be in time for morning coffee breaks in the UK and Europe. They're just little blips about things that are on my mind.

Original contents copyright 2014 by Michael C. Johnston and/or the bylined author. All Rights Reserved. Links in this post may be to our affiliates; sales through affiliate links may benefit this site.

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Paul De Zan: "Damn. I had to work extremely hard to extract my kid from a drug-infested scene in both junior and senior high school...and we live in one of the richest cities in the country, so don't ever believe that community affluence will keep your own kids safe, folks. This absolutely could have been my kid if the breaks had fallen just a little differently. I grieve with you."

Paul: "I work as an ER nurse, most often in Massachusetts. Opiate addiction is an epidemic. Massachusetts has it pretty bad, perhaps worse than other places. In the ER, I would very roughly estimate that 50% or more of our work is connected to drugs or alcohol. In one hospital I worked it would not be terribly uncommon for me to have four patients and three of them would be people who had overdosed on opiates (or worse, a combination of opiates and benzodiazipines (like Ativan) a particularly deadly combination).

"It's all very sad. I was reading an article in the New York Times where someone described 'sad life syndrome' as why a lot of people end up addicted to something or other. That's how I see a lot of it. People who have not been dealt a full set of cards by life and have limited oppotunities in life. In my experience, coming from an area with a high degree of alcohol abuse doesn't help anything either.

"Perhaps sadder are the kind of case you mention. People from stable homes who appeared to be on a good track and then for no apparent reason find themselves going down the wrong road. Oftentimes I think that starts with abusing prescription pain medication (like oxycontin or oxycodone) and when that becomes too expensive, turning to heroin (because it's easily available and cheaper). That's a relatively common story.  I've seen that too from patients who were put on large doses of prescription opiates after surgery and ended up addicted to them. Their doctors would not rewrite prescriptions for them and ultimately they ended up on heroin.

"I have no real idea what a solution would be. Definitely much stricter prescribing of narcotics would help some. I used to be in favor of legalizing all drugs but I have very mixed feelings now. I'm not entirely sure that human beings have the cognition to be able to handle opiates in any form. But I'm saddened to by what the drug war has done to people, both in this country and around the world."

GRJ: Man—Morning Coffee is getting kind of bleak, Mike. Hiroshima, drug overdoses.... But I suppose in life as with coffee, one takes the bitter with the sweet. Nonetheless, thank you for your thoughtful treatment of bitter themes. I visit your site because 'The Online Photographer' seems to envision a holistic photographer, one who is engaged not merely with photography, but with living and reflection."

9/15/14 The Morning Coffee: Resonance

A Good Morning to you—

Recently a reader named Chris Hunt offered a nice contribution to the library at TOP Underground HQ—a copy of Charles Harbutt: Departures and Arrivals, a retrospective book that came out two years ago. I only have one book of Charles Harbutt's—a signed copy of Travelog from way back—but his work is right down my alley.

Chris was trying to find a good home for the book because, as he explained, "sometimes a given photographer's work just doesn't resonate."

So true. I've always likened it to taste in music, or physical attraction between people, or the "voice" of a favorite poet—there's sort of a rough consensus as to what's good, but it's perfectly normal for individual people not to agree with it, and there's a sort of magic, a mystery, to what really clicks with each of us. So it is with photographers.

Charles Harbutt, Le Mistral, en route Arles–Paris, 1975

It's often actually difficult to isolate exactly what it is about a photographer's work we're responding to. It might be personal associations, interest in some aspect of the subject matter, a technique we love the look of, similarity (or dissimilarity) to our own work, any of a hundred things. 

My friend Geoff Wittig has a great passion for pure landscape. It always helps me to meet people who have passions for various kinds of photography different than what I like—it reminds me that there are many rooms in the mansion.

I'm sure I'm going to enjoy Departures and Arrivals—but I can completely understand why it might not resonate for Chris. I get rid of a lot of books too, ones I know I'm not going to get much nourishment from. It's not that there's anything wrong with the work, necessarily. It's just that it doesn't resonate.

Hope you discover something that resonates for you, in your Monday.

Mike

"Morning Coffee" is auto-published weekdays at 3:30 a.m. Central Time to be in time for morning coffee breaks in the UK and Europe. It'll also be there for Americans who might get up very early in the morning, say at 4:50 Eastern Time.

Original contents copyright 2014 by Michael C. Johnston and/or the bylined author. All Rights Reserved. Links in this post may be to our affiliates; sales through affiliate links may benefit this site.

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John: "I bought Ray Metzker's Landscapes through TOP almost two years ago after reading about him here. I looked at the photos and skimmed the information, and I decided his style was not for me.

"Recently I came back to the book, looking and reading more deliberately. I now enjoy the photos, the way he approaches tone, composition, and subject matter.

"I also find interesting Metzker's remarks about tone in an exhibition of Sebastiao Salgado's, comparing this printing to how he (Metzker) printed tones for one of his exhibitions. I know some TOP readers were recently asking about books for learning black and white photography. The photos and comments on tone in Metzker's Landscapes are a great B&W education. So, Mike, this is a photo book that now resonates with me."

[A different] John: "Few photographers' work resonates with me like Harbutt's. I attended his show in Tucson, was deeply moved, and have since bought two of his books. Like you say, it's hard to explain what draws one to certain work. But one thing I like about Harbutt is his pictures are those anyone could make. No exotic locations or events required. Mostly just ordinary life, but very well seen and rendered. Plus, he usually includes some insightful writing. I find both inspiring and motivating."

9/12/14 The Morning Coffee: City of Peace

Oleander is the official flower of the City of Peace, reputedly because it was the first flower to bloom there after the bomb.

I was moved by something my friend Peter wrote in his piece about 9/11 last night: he said his heart goes out to people who "find themselves so unfairly in the middle of conflict."

It's in incisive thought. It's easiest to process thoughts of a monolithic "they" when thinking of the people who find themselves trapped in bad situations. The Syrians are fighting. Black people in the inner cities murder each other. They do this, another they do that.

But of course there's no "they." There are only people, in their infinite variety. I've thought often over the years of the people of Hiroshima who were the first victims of an atomic weapon. (Despite having never read John Hersey's famous Hiroshima, originally published to a frenzy of acclaim in The New Yorker, entirely filling a single issue.) It's widely acknowledged now, by both Americans and Japanese, that the victims of the Hiroshima bomb sacrificed their lives to save more lives, but that might not console the dead. The bomb killed between 90,000 and 140,000 people in what is now called the City of Peace. Among them were certainly people of every imaginable sort, including many who in no way deserved to die: teachers, gentle people of religion, young boys thinking of girls and young girls thinking of boys, demented old men, loving grandmothers, babies who had not had a chance to be anything but innocent, people whose passion was a craft or gardening or music. Certainly there were those among the dead who were pacifists, and those who didn't agree with their government's policies at all; people who had already suffered loss in the war, people who expected to survive it who didn't; the list, you perceive, goes on and on. All the dead perished. No matter who or what they were.

Why them? The photographer Diane Arbus told Newsweek in 1967, "it's irrational to be born in a certain place and time and of a certain sex. It's irrational how much you can change circumstance and how much you can't. The whole idea of me being born rich and Jewish is part of that irrationality. But if you're born one thing, you can dare—venture—to be ten thousand other things." (The quote is from William Todd Schultz's "psychobiography" of Diane Arbus, An Emergency in Slow Motion: The Inner Life of Diane Arbus.) Of course, you can't dare or venture to not be under the invisible bomb that's falling from the sky, unbeknownst to you and through no fault of your own. Nor can you help it if a stray bullet can come through your window or your wall and strike your child, of if factions are warring in the places you used to peaceably conduct your life.

Only a few people who die in conflict deserve to. It's irrational, but for most people caught in the middle of it, as Peter says, it's merely, profoundly, unfair.

Mike

"Morning Coffee" is a little blip from Yr. Hmbl. Ed. auto-published weekdays at 3:30 a.m. Central Time today to be in time for morning coffee breaks in the UK and Europe. For those west of that, it'll be there when they wake up.

Original contents copyright 2014 by Michael C. Johnston and/or the bylined author. All Rights Reserved. Links in this post may be to our affiliates; sales through affiliate links may benefit this site.

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9/11/14 The Morning Coffee: Only Leicas

There is no such thing as too much orange.

A Good Morning to you—

So far it's been only Leicas on the Orange Couch. Juan Buhler shoots with an M9 (traded for prints) and an M8; and yesterday my buddy Jack MacDonough (you probably remember his print sale back in June) came by loaded for orange! Orange shirt, orange camera bag for the Leica S2, and orange snap-on case for the Leica T.

The orange bag is actually his real bag for the S2. Why? "So when someone tries to take it, I can see where they are going. So I don't have a bag that looks like a camera bag filled with gear. So I don't take myself seriously."

Jack's picture of me taking the picture of him.

I really like the Leica T. It's a beautiful little piece of metal sculpture, with an outstanding feel in the hand and a shutter sound that might well be the best of any camera ever. It's surprisingly similar to the Sony NEX / A6000 cameras in shape and general layout, but it feels much better simply because it's such a little work of art.

I'm going to go out on a limb here and say that I generally really like the Kaufmann Leicas. I'd never diss an M camera or anyone who uses one, of course, but it's a legacy design and has never quite felt entirely native to digital to me. Jay Leno, in talking about car design, distinguishes between cars that are the product of one person's vision and those that are made by committees. Andreas Kaufmann's Leicas (I'm primarily talking about the S and the T I guess) seem to have that single-visionary quality to me. He deserves more credit, if you ask me. He's the Steve Jobs of Leica. His cameras are particular, striking successes.

All that said, I'll still take my NEX-6, because of the built-in EVF and the flip-up viewing screen, both features that I like. The NEX-6 is quite a bit cheaper, but I can't say the Leica T isn't worth its price. I think it is.

Obligatory Butters shot

We got the kitchen moved today, and the only part of the task I liked was this:

Pictures on the fridge is definitely one of those details that make a house a home. (Scott Hill gets the palm as best family-card photographer on our fridge. You out there, Scott?)

Later on I cooked for myself for the first time in the new house. I semi-successfully fixed boiled green beans and baked quartered red potatoes. It took every ounce of intelligence I possess and every scrap of attentiveness. Do you think it would be piggish of me to write a “Morning Coffee” about how grateful I can be when someone cooks for me? I know it’s a stereotype, but I really like being cooked for. It doesn't happen very often and I'm genuinely appreciative whenever it does. I have just the smallest shred of aptitude myself. If you're lucky enough to get cooked for today, remember to let the cook know you care.

Hope you have a good one.

Mike

"Morning Coffee" is auto-published weekdays at 3:30 a.m. Central Time today to be in time for morning coffee breaks in the UK and Europe.

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Original contents copyright 2014 by Michael C. Johnston and/or the bylined author. All Rights Reserved. Links in this post may be to our affiliates; sales through affiliate links may benefit this site.

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Featured Comments from:

Steve Jacob: "I do the cooking around here. My lovely partner may be able to do magic in InDesign and Photoshop, paint masterly portraits and do my bookkeeping, but she runs out of puff when required to do much more than heat up a ready made flan. Not that I mind. I have a degree in Chemistry and there is not all that much difference when you come down to it. It's also fun to experiment, even if the odd weirdness results. I do however get plenty of appreciation. That's actually part of the reward, along with eating nice food of course. And she does the washing up."

Scott Hill: "So this is what 'Internet famous' feels like! Very proud that our kids occupy such prime real estate—thanks, Mike!"

Mike replies: Hi Scott. Now you're under pressure for this year, y'know.  :-)

UPDATE from Jack about the bag: "Regarding the questions about the Orange Bag. It is a Tumi Alpha Bravo Knox Backpack . You can get it from Amazon and TOP will make money. It is not waterproof and has no padding, but it works for me. I can carry any S equipment and accessories. I like that it has a nice carrying handle, but also shoulder straps if I'm going a distance. Normally I just have the camera in my hand, which is why I have a wrist step. Perhaps I should update the wrist strap with orange rather than red? Here is the Leica S2 in the bag. By the way that was not a 70mm on the body at Mike's, it was the 30mm–90mm S zoom [about a 24–75mm-e  —Ed.]."

[A different] Scott Hill: "I guess I'm not the Scott Hill. (OK, just not the one referred to here  ;-)  It's oddly startling to see your name in the middle of something like that."

9/10/14 The Morning Coffee: High-Maintenance Puppy (OT)

A very Good Morning to you (I had an amazing day yesterday—hope you did too. I've been hearing from an old friend).

So you'd have to be a pretty devoted reader of this site to remember my post about vacuum cleaners. If you don't want to go read it, basically it's a test of a Dyson "Animal" upright vacuum, which really sucked (although remember, with vacuum cleaners that's a good thing).

So right in the middle of the move, what happens? Butters, who likes to chew on little plastic things, chewed the plug off the cord of the Dyson. Rendering it utterly useless just at the point when we needed it most—mainly for the miniature drifts of Butters' own white hairs collecting all over the old house.

Who would have guessed, but it turned out almost no one could fix that. The cord is not a straightforward electrical cord like lamp cord; it's some kind of coaxial arrangement with insulation and so forth. The best I could do was the nearest Dyson Service Center—which is in Schaumberg, Illinois (about an hour and a half from here). And they quoted a six-week turnaround time!

Finally I found a great little old-fashioned-American vacuum-cleaner shop called "The Kleen-It Shoppe" on the edge of downtown Oconomowoc (a very charming little town, too—I'd never been there). The owner, George, made a special effort and turned it around for me in one afternoon. The cost: $65. Plus more than an hour in the car. I was grateful, though, because apparently they're the only place that could perform the service at all.

Goes to show you there's more than one way to be a very high-cost puppy. And now I have a very real reason not to be lazy and leave the vacuum cleaner out.

Our print sale starts later this morning. Hope you have a nice, low-cost Wednesday—

Mike

Original contents copyright 2014 by Michael C. Johnston and/or the bylined author. All Rights Reserved. Links in this post may be to our affiliates; sales through affiliate links may benefit this site.

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toto: "Hmm...it's gonna be a nice, high-cost Wednesday if you order one (or more) of the prints."

Mike replies: Oh, I disagree. Try finding a beautiful custom Pt/Pd print in a gallery for $230. You could do it—possibly—but it wouldn't be easy. I'd say these prints in virtually any art gallery would be somewhere between $650 and $1,200, and I can't imagine a pricetag of less than $450 on them.

9/8/14 The Morning Coffee: Vacant Lot Lost and Found

A Good Morning to you. This is a big day for TOP: We're officially back up and running again. I'll have a nice announcement later today, too.

But first, a joke: What do you call a fish with no eyes?

And a riddle: What is the only word in English that can be used as a noun, a verb, an adverb and an adjective without changing its spelling?

My former Miata with its new plates. Photo by current owner
and TOP reader Larry Gebhardt.

And a strange coincidence. Early on in my search for a new house, I used to zip around in the evenings in my then-new-to-me old Miata (since sold to a TOP reader). It was great in a spiritual sense, to get out from behind the computer and out under the evening skies with the scenery changing. But not great physically, as I was still essentially just sitting on my backside. Anyway, one day I found a lovely corner lot that was still unbuilt in an older neighborhood. I looked it up on the real estate site, and the price was $90,000. Too much for me if I hoped to build a house on it any time soon. But still, it seemed like a great opportunity, full of possibility—a daydream scenario. I looked at it online and on the map for a while, but after a couple of months I sort of lost track of it. A couple of times I looked for it again when I was in the car, but I didn't really recall where it was and I never had any success locating it—never found it again.

So guess what? I didn't recognize it, because there's a house on it now, built between then and now—but that lot is actually two doors away from my new house. Quite a "shock of recognition" when I figured that out.

•     •     •

The move has gone exceptionally smoothly—just about as smoothly as possible, in fact, and yes, I am knocking on wood as I write that. I've taken everything slowly, planned carefully, and gotten as much help as possible.

I even hired help to move the computer—Tom Phelps of Network Consulting Services, Inc. (NCS). That seemed like overkill even to me—how hard can it be just setting up a computer?

Tom Phelps of NCS Inc.

Well, it turned out it was some of the best money I've spent in the move. Tom is going to set up a professional network behind a firewall for me, with file sharing and a laptop that I can use for an part-time temp and also for traveling—and battery backups on everything. Plus a phone system that allows phones in Europe to be "extensions." I know a lot of you are very computer savvy and even this would seem easy for you, but I barely understood the explanation. It's all stuff I could never do myself.

Very happy I hired Tom. Nice guy and really knows his stuff.

So that word is "fast":

A forty day fast—noun
To fast for Lent—verb
A fast reader—adjective
Running fast—adverb

And the joke: you call it a fsh, of course.

Hope your Monday goes by fast, if you're working today.

Mike
(Thanks to Dave Reichert and Larry Gebhardt)

Original contents copyright 2014 by Michael C. Johnston and/or the bylined author. All Rights Reserved. Links in this post may be to our affiliates; sales through affiliate links may benefit this site.

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DC Wells: "One of my high school English teachers (way back in the '60s) told me that she had found almost 100 English words that could properly function as a noun, adjective, adverb, and verb. I recall only 'best' and 'down.'"

Murray Davidson: "It's, like (adverb), you are like (adjective) to like (verb) an answer like (preposition/conjunctive) the like (noun) of this...."

9/5/14 The Morning Coffee: Another One Bites the Dust

A Good Morning to you—

Looks like another favorite camera is about to go the way of all things, replaced by an as-yet unannounced update—the Panasonic GX7 (which Carl Weese uses and loves) is currently almost 1/3 off at B&H Photo. Amazon has a few black ones left for only a few dollars more.

It's useless to protest, but I confess I don't like the quick obsolescence of today's cameras. I understand the reasons, but it seems a waste after a while.

Joel Meyerowitz still uses a Deardorff that was made the year he was born, which I believe was 1938. Henry Wessel uses a Leica M3, which was last available new in 1966. Me, I have trouble putting enough exposures on my digital cameras to justify the expense before they're suddenly old news.

Well, the GX7 is a lovely little camera, fun to use. The Mazda Miata of cameras, you might even say. And at least a few people will get a nice bargain on one. Hurry up and use it up, though.

•     •     •

The computer moves this morning. I hired help, which might be stupid. But (speaking of stupid) I don't want to underestimate my talent for messing things up. I should be back online by tomorrow. But if you don't hear from me for a few days, you know where I am—on the phone with Applecare. Wish me luck with that!

This whole moving business is almost over.

•     •     •

And speaking of Carl Weese, he's our September Print Sale—two absolutely gorgeous platinum/palladium prints made from digitally enlarged negatives. You'll be hearing more about that soon.

Hope you have a digitally enlarged day, in your nook of the world.

Mike

"Morning Coffee" is auto-published weekdays at 3:30 a.m. Central Time today to be in time for morning coffee breaks in the UK and Europe. For those who rise later, it will be there. The feature is a month-long experiment to give people something to check in with while I'm busy moving.

Original contents copyright 2014 by Michael C. Johnston and/or the bylined author. All Rights Reserved. Links in this post may be to our affiliates; sales through affiliate links may benefit this site.

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Shaun: "Excellent, looking forward to Carl's print offerings, still really enjoying the platinum/ palladium prints from Carl's print sale four years ago."

Mike replies: Four years ago?! That shocked me...the years do go by quickly. But you're right, it was April 2010.

9/4/14 The Morning Coffee

Good Morning to you—

I'm exhausted, so this will be short.

The move went fine. There is now much more space in the old house and some furniture in the new one.

The movers were quite interesting guys—only one of them talked, but he talked enough for them both. He's a single parent too, like me, except he raised five kids alone, and on a moving guy's salary. I sure hope it wasn't five times as hard as raising one—that thought doesn't bear thinking.

And speaking of things that don't bear thinking, he lost one of his raised-by-dad brood—his engaged, pregnant 24-year-old daughter was killed by gunfire in a grocery store robbery in 2007. She was just shopping. Got caught in the crossfire. The guy who did it will spend a long time in jail, and then a much longer time in hell.

No pictures, unfortunately. I haven't been taking any pictures of this whole process—too much else to do. It brings up an interesting point, though—I like to take pictures when I'm an observer and don't have any responsibility for an event. When I have immediate responsibilities, picture-taking tends to go out the window.

If you've never done a local move, they're great. You hire the truck and the workers by the hour, and if you choose the beginning of the month it's easy to schedule. Today's move was actually just the first of two. I'll get the first load squared away at the new place while we continue to organize the rest of the stuff at the old place, and then hire a truck again. It's nice and relaxed compared to an interstate move. And the total cost will still be quite a bit less.

The computer moves on Friday, if all goes as planned. That's the same day the new orange couch arrives. For some reason I am inexplicably attached to the new orange couch already. I can't wait for it to come.

I'm about to head over, with the bedding in the front seat and the dogs in the back. It's a new day. Okay, night. I'm leaving the coffee here at the old house, though, where the computer still is, so I'll be back here first thing.  :-)

Oh, and speaking of first things: the first thing I unpacked and arranged at the new house? The photobook collection. You can see where my priorities are. (Here's an interesting list of photobooks from Abebooks. Nice of them to recommend Changing New York, like anybody mortal can afford that.)

Have a relaxing and slow-paced day wherever you are.

Mike

"Morning Coffee" is auto-published weekdays at 3:30 a.m. Central Time today to be in time for morning coffee breaks in the UK and Europe. For those who rise later, it will be there. The feature is a month-long experiment to give people something to check in with while I'm busy moving.

Want to suggest a topic or ask a question? Leave it as a comment.

Original contents copyright 2014 by Michael C. Johnston and/or the bylined author. All Rights Reserved. Links in this post may be to our affiliates; sales through affiliate links may benefit this site.

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Jayson Merryfield: "What, no pithy thoughts on themes Miata?"

Mike replies: In the fullness of time. It's a 2016 model and we don't know anything about the drivetrain yet. I'm unlikely to be an early adopter. It must have a manual ragtop, a manual stick shift (5-speed is better than six), a naturally aspirated engine and rear-wheel drive to be a roadster to the manner born.

In my humble opinion, –220 lbs. is very very good; it still remains to be seen how well I'll fit in it; and engine options are going to be crucial. The pertaining axiom is that "all Mazdas are underpowered," and that includes all previous Miatas. I'm really hoping for two engine options, one for all the people who like underpowered Mazdas and don't think the Miata needs two engine options, and the other for those of us who are right.

9/3/14 The Morning Coffee: Moving Day / Miata Day

A Good Morning to you—

Later this morning the moving truck comes. Yesterday I had an exhausting day being anxious about it. And yes, doing a lot of work to prepare too.  :-)

I heard once that the realty industry strives to make people think the houses they buy have the promise of being homes, whereas the houses they're moving out of are just houses. No sale here. I'm leaving my home, and the house I'm moving into is still just a house. I'm not necessarily sad to be leaving, but I'm feeling...what's the right way to say this...appropriately reflective and contemplative about it. My son grew up here. My older dog's grown old here. I started TOP here. I've lived here longer than I've ever lived anywhere in my life. I have history here.

Today is also Miata Day. The press and media unveiling of the 2016 Mazda MX-5 Miata will be live streamed on YouTube today at 6:00 p.m. U.S. Pacific time. It's the fourth generation of the world's most popular roadster, internally called the ND. (Mine was a second-gen NB, 1999–2005.)

You remember how I like roadsters. I'm also going to enjoy going over to the ND Rumours, Speculation, and Concept Cars section of Miata.net and watching a lot of guys' heads explode tonight. There are people there whose lives are going to be a howling desert of emptiness after the reveal. Of course there's always the job of picking over exactly who was right about what and when. That will be fun for the holdouts.

Here's the very last unofficial render. I feel like I've seen about 40. Oh, and you'll be force-fed Duran Duran during the event. Like that hasn't happened before. Thought you'd appreciate a warning.

UPDATE:

[I actually rather like it.]

Life will be carnage tonight at TOP Secret Underground HQ, I'm sure. I've packed myself a little survival kit with an alarm clock, a few dishes and glasses and some tableware, and toiletries. I'm sure by Thursday I'll have a long list of other things I need. As to what's crucial...I guess it's my bed, the dog beds, the coffeemaking apparatus, and the computer. I won't have truly moved until the computer changes venues. A comment on modern life, but there it is.

The Ailsa announcement is on hold until she gets a picture to me, and she's working all week so that won't be until the weekend. Oh, and it looks like my trip to the U.K. is on hold until sometime in 2015 now. (Ailsa thinks I'm trying to get out of going to a "football" game with her and her husband Roland.) And as to how you pronounce her name—it's pronounced "ger-trude ter-WILL-i-ger." So now you know. (It's "ALE-sah." What else could it be?)

And can you believe this? In the bureaucratic inferno that is the process of acquiring a passport, the State of Indiana sent me a new Birth Certificate—and it has a typo. They got my birthdate wrong.

You know what I always say—editors needed everywhere.

Hope you have an error-free day today, wherever in the world you are.

Mike

"Morning Coffee" is auto-published weekdays at 3:30 a.m. Central Time today to be in time for morning coffee breaks in the UK and Europe. For those who rise later, it will be there. The feature is a month-long experiment to give people something to check in with while I'm busy moving.

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Original contents copyright 2014 by Michael C. Johnston and/or the bylined author. All Rights Reserved. Links in this post may be to our affiliates; sales through affiliate links may benefit this site.

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9/2/14 The Morning Coffee: Fast Diet (OT)

Good Morning to you—

Several people have asked about the fate of the skinny guy trapped inside me who's trying to get out, a subject I address from time to time. The bottom line is that I lost about 35 lbs. and have kept it off, but I've been stalled in the 230s for the longest time. My progress was greatly slowed by my illness in January, when I lost way too much weight too fast, then inevitably gained it back. Fast weight loss is not good.

Friend and TOP reader Michael McCaskey wisely called the score on my Gruelandgrass diet..."You need more variety," he said, and he was right. It worked while I stayed on it, but it's too hard to eat the same thing day in and day out. For short periods of time it works, but not for longer periods of time. You just get too sick of the same meal if you eat it too often.

Romantic longing helps dieting, I've found. There's a reason for that phrase "pining away."

Walking is good. Poor Lulu has arthritis, and we need to address the problem of pain management for her soon. She's gotten slower and slower. But Butters can go for energetic 1.5 to 2.5 mile walks and not be detectably less ebullient at the end of the walk than he was at the beginning. I'm much more tired by the end, though. Bottom line: he's exercising me.

My current favorite: fast diets. Reader Marek Fogiel sent me the book, and I'm afraid I rejected it out of hand at first, saying I was never going to do "torture diets." Well, I was wrong, and Marek was right. I read the book and took its advice and I actually like fasting. Know why? Because there are no decisions to make. You don't have to decide what to eat. You just eat nothing, so every decision all day is pre-made. That's nice. Decisions are difficult.

Another strange thing about fasting: It makes you feel better. I'm serious. It makes you feel more alert and somehow more clearheaded. From an evolutionary biological standpoint this makes perfect sense: if you have to secure your own food, when you're not getting any food is when you need to be most on your game—you need energy and clearheadedness to help you get out and find something to eat. I have to admit I really rather like the feeling. It's energizing and even a bit addictive.

Fasting for a day here and there isn't terribly difficult, either, because hunger isn't linear. What happens is that you get hungry for a little while, and then it goes away. And then it comes back, but then it goes away again. Once you know this, it's pretty easy to deal with it—you just wait.

Next up in the parade of dietary experiments: Soylent. I've got it on order, but they're way back-ordered following a popular New Yorker article. I'm going to try it, and I'll report back. And yes, I'm aware that it's kinda crazy. But I've been running experiments on myself for two and a half years now, so what's one more?

Absolute best diet: either be someone or marry someone who enjoys cooking and fixes healthy meals. My congenital and irremediable inability to cook impedes proper eating, no question.

Hope you have a great day today—eat healthy (but not too hearty).

Mike

"Morning Coffee" is auto-published weekdays at 3:30 a.m. Central Time today to be in time for morning coffee breaks in the UK and Europe. For those who rise later, it will be there. The feature is a month-long experiment to give people something to check in with while I'm busy moving.

Want to suggest a topic or ask a question? Leave it as a comment.

Original contents copyright 2014 by Michael C. Johnston and/or the bylined author. All Rights Reserved. Links in this post may be to our affiliates; sales through affiliate links may benefit this site.

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Dan Khong: "I can fully agree from experience that fasting even briefly can result in better concentration and clearmindedness."

John Krumm: "I think I mentioned trying and liking the FAST diet back when you started your own. It was easy for me to stop, just like it was easy to start. Alas, it's hard to start again, because while I know the hunger isn't horrible, it's still bad enough to make me not want to experience it. Certainly one of the joys of that diet is eating what you want on the regular days. But it was a great diet for a family guy since I could just eat much less a couple days a week and not worry so much about the regular dinner menu for everyone else."

Cateto Catetez: "Mike, posts like this in a big profile site like yours are of concern to me.

"For someone who has such a reasonable, sensible and enjoyable approach in the world of photography, it feels really weird to read your posts on a very serious issue for many people, such as is diet.

"I respect your wishes to follow fast diets (or slow ones, for that matter). But I have some background knowledge on the topic, and I can tell you one thing:

"The perfect diet exists and has been used by humans for many thousand of years: eat reasonable amounts of just about everything; avoid excess in any category of food; and do physical activity regularly.

"It really is that simple. And trust me, no magic diet will solve the wieght issues of anybody.

"I know that the simple 'diet' I outlined above (which I certainly did not invent) is not easy to follow in the modern Western world: it's all too easy to spend countless hours working in front of the computer (I know it well, as I do it often).

"But we have to make this clear: a magic diet with no physical activity is not going to work. You will get bored sooner rather than later. And your overweight will come back sooner rather than later.

"So we can keep on playing with magic diets forever, but the fact is that we are using the wrong strategy to solve a simple problem."

Mike replies: I really don't think that it is that simple. Delve a bit into the specifics of the obesity epidemic and see if you still believe there's not a very serious systemic problem.

But to your meta-point: I have a feel for photography. I've studied it and practiced it, thought about it, and I care about it; I have a strong visual aptitude by most means of measuring that (a very good visual memory, for instance). By contrast I don't like food, have little interest in it, no aptitude for preparing it, and know little about it. So that I would have a "a reasonable, sensible and enjoyable approach" to the one and not the other actually makes perfect sense!

8/30/14 The Morning Coffee: The Rembrandt of Chicken Photographers

I have many favorite photographers whose work I try to keep up with. One from Britain, Kate Kirkwood, is, in my soberest judgment, the greatest photographer of chickens ever to have lived. Number 33 from her series “Light, Landscape, Lives” is the “Night Watch” of chicken pictures:

Kirkwood

Rembrandt

When I first said this to her I thought she might take it the wrong way—it's a bit flip, as I am wont to be, and I was not trying to belittle* her work—but she took it in the right spirit. She wrote, "I was immediately flattered and delighted by the Rembrandt comparison because I look for and strive for that sumptuous dark light, the dense colours, those possibilities."

I think she finds them, but see what you think. I love this body of work, from Britain's famous Lake District.

She's not bad at street photography, either, as you'll see if you delve further into her website. But of course there's probably more money in chickens. (Again with the flip....)

•     •     •

I had to spend eight hours in the (still empty) new house today as, tick-tock, I inexorably lost my last working weekday till Tuesday. Ya hate that. The first half waiting for the AT&T UVerse guy (Internet hookup), who was supposed to show up in the 11 a.m. to 1 p.m. window and showed up at 2:30 instead; the second half waiting interminably for him to get his work done. I was required to be present, in case any decisions had to be made. He was a nice guy, don't get me wrong—Ricky, from the city, with daughters nine, eleven, and thirteen. And he was working away at it right along. It just took forever.

A few decisions did have to be made, but they did nothing to fill up all the time. I was bored out of my s k u l l.

On the good side, the painter is all finished (thanks Karl), and the colors I chose for the walls work wonderfully. As the day progresses the subtlety of the colors and the way the shifting light is reinforced by the colors is marvelous, much better than I expected. The house is more beautiful than I thought. The light is wonderful. Based on a big eight hours of observation.

Also we discovered that our bathtub is a whirlpool bath! You know, with massaging jets. Another experience that is still in my future in this life. Kind of a bonus, because that's the kind of thing I would never specifically spend my own money on, not in a million years.

I should have brought a towel and taken a long bath, come to think. I had nothing else to do. Except sit around watch the light change. And think of all the other things I should have been doing.

Mike

*Did you know that Thomas Jefferson coined the word "belittle," and made himself a figure of fun among English pedants at the time because of it? That's according to Mencken.

"Morning Coffee" is auto-published weekdays at 3:30 a.m. Central Time today to be in time for morning coffee breaks in the UK and Europe. For those who rise later, it will be there. The feature is a month-long experiment to give people something to check in with while I'm busy moving. If I can get the rhythm down, I'll try to continue the tradition when TOP gets revved up again in mid-September.

I'll write about anything. Want to suggest a topic or ask a question? Leave it as a comment.

Original contents copyright 2014 by Michael C. Johnston and/or the bylined author. All Rights Reserved. Links in this post may be to our affiliates; sales through affiliate links may benefit this site.

TOP's links!

(To see all the comments, click on the "Comments" link below.)
Featured Comments from:

JacobT: "For me that set of photographs captures the lake district far better than any of the grand vistas for which it's most famous. Those little vignettes cast me straight back to my childhood there, encountering various creatures on late night drives and misty atmospheric walks. Thanks so much for bringing her work to my attention! Thanks again for the wonderful site, from a homesick Cumbrian residing in London."

Dave Stewart: "Thank you for the link to Kate Kirkwood's site. I really enjoyed looking through her work. Also most heartening to see that she has built up a fine body of work with a humble Nikon D60 and kit lens. That's something to bear in mind as Photokina approaches, and many of us find ourselves tempted by all the new and (allegedly) so much better baubles!"

Mike replies: Right, but I somehow keep feeling that her "sumptuous dark light and dense colours" would be better served by a full-frame Canon with an L lens.

Svein-Frode: "What a great photographer. Talk about turning a weakness (digital camera noise) into an advantage! Thanks for sharing, and Kate if you're reading this, keep up the excellent work. I can imagine that your prints must be even more beautiful!"

Steve Pritchard: "The photographs in Kate Kirkwood's 'Light, Landscapes, Lives' section of the linked site are just sumptuous. I've only looked at the first twenty but had to leave so as to save them until I can clear the decks of distractions and give them my undivided attention. I can't think of a better way to spend a Sunday afternoon. Thanks for the link.

"By the way, did there really used to be such a thing as English pedants? Before my time!"

Bob Smith: "Ok, I looked. Here is what I think: WOW. It's wonderful coming across or being pointed to a photographer with a definite look and feel to their work. I have bookmarked Kate's site and will be spending a pleasant afternoon taking it in."

8/29/14 The Morning Coffee: The Paris Meetup (Thanks Franck!)

Ctein at a Parisian café. Photo by Franck D.

Your late Morning Coffee this morning (Ed. apologizes for falling down on the job*): Franck D., who organized a TOP gathering in Paris with Ctein, sent us the following short report.

The Monday evening of the TOP meeting was supposed to be a lovely evening in Paris, and the few Parisians that had not left the city were supposed to enjoy terraces with a drink in hand. A number of TOP readers had planned to meet up with Ctein inside Café Crème…at the exact time when a heavy summer rain hit Paris. As as result, the cafe filled up quickly and we found ourselves cramped on a couple of sofas and chairs in a recessed (and rather noisy) corner.

It was a fun evening though! Ctein, his friend Bayla, and seven of us from Mendocino, Zurich, Paris and a few other places spent the evening talking about how special TOP was, about Mike, about matte, glossy and baryta paper, and about lenses and printers. Ctein told us that printer profiles were overrated and that we should have the courage to ignore them and trust the printer to manage colors. Trying to recover from this shocking news, we looked at a beautiful set of (digital) prints that Ctein had brought with himHe had worked on these over the last year or so. We talked about science fiction, about Steve Jobs, about moderating posts, about how Mike will be able to get some help in the new TOP headquarters. We talked about tea and pu erhs, about Ctein’s soon-to-be released novel with Jon Camp and about the color of the sport car he will buy when the book becomes a best-seller.

An enjoyable night in the (temporary) TOP Parisian office!

Many thanks to Franck for hosting the meetup, to Ctein for making himself available (although I'm sure he did it just to have fun too) and to those who showed up.

Mike

*I haven't yet gotten into a rhythm with the schedule with these Morning Coffees. Of course, my whole life is torn up at the moment as I work toward the moving truck on Wednesday, coordinating things like UVerse hookup and phone service and the preparation of my current house for sale. The transfer of the workstation is coming up too, and that's going to be a big day. I'll get there, I think, but in the meantime, as I've said, your patience is much appreciated.

"Morning Coffee" is usually auto-published weekdays at 3:30 a.m. Central Time to be in time for morning coffee breaks in the UK and Europe. The feature is a month-long experiment that I'm going to try to continue when TOP revs up again for the Fall in mid-September.

I'll write about anything. Want to suggest a topic or ask a question? Leave it as a comment.

Original contents copyright 2014 by Michael C. Johnston and/or the bylined author. All Rights Reserved. Links in this post may be to our affiliates; sales through affiliate links may benefit this site.

TOP's links!

(To see all the comments, click on the "Comments" link below.)
Featured Comments from:

David Paterson: "Re 'Ctein told us that printer profiles were overrated and that we should have the courage to ignore them and trust the printer to manage colors.' OMG—surely they used to burn witches and others at the stake for less heresy than this?"

Mike replies: They did, but they would have long since tried to burn Ctein as a Wizard, and he would have waved his wand and turned them into salamanders.

Ernie Van Veen responds: "He turned me into a newt. No...really...."