My latest experiment is Notational Velocity, and I am really liking it. NV isn’t a todo list manager per se, but its fast filtering and brain-dead ease of use makes this a wonderful, powerful free-form notetaker. One tip, if you name your daily notes with a standard naming convention, it makes getting to these daily logs an utter breeze.

Check it out!

Via Flickr:

Event: Patrons Of The Hearts 2011

There is a lot of talk about having some sort of “vision” in photography. For example, David duChemin of Pixelated writes, “Vision matters because it determines our path and the choice of tools we use to get there.” — Vision Driven Workflow.

I have to confess, I am a bit suspicious of what that all means.

When I photograph people, I tend to gravitate towards a documentary or photojournalist style; usually with available light or with one light, a prime lens and emphasis on mobility. I almost never ask my subjects to face the camera. But, people’s instincts are to pose. You come up with a camera and they stop whatever they are doing, turn to face you with their collective, practiced smiles.

This is particularly horrible in high-end events. We’ve been training generations of people to wear masks; the more conscious we are about our public image, the more instinctive our put-on-the-mask reactions appear to be.

I suppose this is a question of “vision.” If there is one thing at the heart of my photography it is about trying to capture something “real” about life; some sliver or Truth in enshrined in a moment in time. But beyond that initial premise, much of what happens is purely instinctive, unconscious.

It’s hard to disagree with duChemin’s basic premise, but I wonder whether beyond the rudimentary first-order decisions one makes on the outset, whether we can we really be that deterministic about how and what we photograph.

For me, photography is, at the core, a manifestation of one’s life experiences, intellectually and spiritually. We shoot what we are. Which is to say, we shoot first, and rationalize its meaning from what has already been captured, not the other way around.

I do think we can get ‘technically’ better, but not spiritually so. We can’t change how we see the world, at least not through our lens. Is it hopeless then? How does one become a better photographer?

I suppose, for me, it comes down to leading a fuller life.

I don’t even like cupcakes, but these were crazy good. Sweet! By Holly’s mini cupcakes rule.

Our friends Paul and Kristin taught us a new trick. Apparently, holding him facing forward makes all the difference in the world! Yay, sleep!

Lt. Tyrion Draegor stands watch in his Harbinger assault class mech outside the firebase walls; his trusty Firoxi giant firehound stays by its side and keeps a watchful nose out for creepers and the Others. It has been three Standard days since the last onslaught. Draegor’s Dragoons are low on autocannon ammo, water and, most importantly, Irish Whiskey. But today is just another day in the life of a merc; and for now, Green Betsy’s autocannon is still bristling with a full chain of 20mm smart-incendiary rounds, and for a few more hours before the relief dropship hits this godforsaken dustbowl of a planet, it is the same old story of a man and his dog, longing for home.

I haven’t build anything with Legos since Junior High. When I watch Beckett play with his trains and Duplos, I am reminded of the hours I’d spend making things, designing, redesigning, imagining new worlds and creating them; driven by nothing else but an internal desire to realize some internal joy. Intrinsic motivation, if there is a such a thing, feels like the very thing I have been trying to get back to in my adulthood.

Sketching the past and the future.

I remember going downstairs and on to Pleasant Street, Northampton to watch the news from the store TV. CNN was being slow, and I had a bad feeling.

I remember thinking about rushing into NYC, but I chickened out.

I remember cycling through the names and faces of my friends in the city; the vivid sense of anger, fear, the anxiety of the unknown.

On that day, we were all Americans. That has to count for something. We have lost friends, families;  we have spent blood and treasure.

Perhaps, now, the healing can finally begin. I hope, that if the last ten years were fiercely about “them,” that the next ten can be fiercely about “us”.

All of us.

I remember.

nikonrumors.com posted specs on the rumored Nikon V1 and J1, compact mirrorless camera system recently.

The following thoughts are an expansion of a comment I posted to that blog earlier today.

I am kind of excited that this is pissing off as many Nikon fanboys as it is, as evidenced by the comments section on nikonrumors. It seems to me that it this is a pretty good indication Nikon is doing something right–that Nikon is leading with Design and not with technical specs first.

I don’t know how good this little camera is going to be, we will all have to wait and see. But what it does tell me is that Nikon is designing for a potentially new market and anticipating one that doesn’t really exist as the moment.

This is a good thing for Nikon, and a pretty radical thing for a traditional Japanese camera company.

If the lenses retract and are fully portable, it would be a very credible replacement for all point and shoots. Point and shoots are dead anyway, thanks to the iPhone. The only reason anyone will carry a better device than a smart phone with a built-in camera in the near future is if they want to get more serious with their creative energies. Right now, even the smallest big-sensor mirrorless cameras like the Olympus E-PL3(micro four-thirds) and Sony NEX-5 (APS-C) are still physically limited by lenses that aren’t really portable. The pancake lenses on the µ4/3 systems come close, but if you want fast zooms, forget it.

Additionally, if this is what I think it is, a pocket-sized Red SCARLET or close to one as the new rumored EXPEED 3 image processing engine suggests, this is going to be potentially revolutionary for the serious video and digital “film” market, which is a segment that is underserved and badly understood.

Think of the Apple iPod entering the crowded USB music player market; could be a similar thing happening here.

This isn’t as sexy as the Fujifilm X100/X10. But, I think the form factor is important,; the clean lines are important. They could be part of a larger design strategy. If this is all retro, it’d be more difficult for third-party players to build add-ons, viewers, finders, mounts, grips and other accessories to complement this camera.

The 1″ (give or take) sensor size means this can probably take a C-mount, cine-type lenses  with really nice follow-focus pulls. That’s cool. Already, it looks like it will take accept existing Nikon F-mount lenses with an adapter. Your silky smooth 28mm f/2 AI-S just became a sweet normal-ish video lens. Come to think of it, we’ll probably see adapters for all kinds of lenses in the future. Again, cool.

The key will be storage and how fast this thing can write to card. But with XC cards coming, this may make total sense, (http://www.sdxcs.com/).

Wedding photographers ditching Nikon to get 5DMkIIs may finally have something to grin about. Wedding photographers buying 5DMkIIs and IIIs in the future for its video may have a better option now. Imagine a really portable, creative instrument optimized for movies that can complement cameras and lenses optimized for stills.

As I said, let’s see how this thing does when it gets released. But, from this vantage point, I don’t look at this and say Nikon flopped. I look at this and say they are really thinking about what people want and need.

QR codes, as a marketing tool, are stupid.

It is an anti-pattern of good design.

I am not convinced users want to interact with an over-glorified barcode; I don’t look at a QR code and think, “Wow! I feel so moved to take out my phone, turn on the camera, snap a picture and see what happens.”

QR codes can be wonderful. They don’t have to be evil.

They should be used as tokens, issued to users so they can be redeemed for stuff. The reading of such tokens should be done by the issuer, not the receiver (aka your customers).

Starbucks Mobile Card

Starbuck’s Mobile Card is a winning example of the right way to use barcodes as tokens.

Delta Airlines's Mobile Boarding Pass

Delta’s Mobile Boarding pass is such a joy to use that it is better marketing than any silly QR code driven marketing piece.