Category: gadgety goodness

Rebel, Rebel

Baby did a bad, bad thing (with the assistance of butterfingers and gravity).




Apparently in a battle to the death, asphalt beats Gorilla Glass.

Good to know.

I suppose it could be said the timing is right since the new iPhone is due out soon. This is the perfect excuse to buy a new one.

Except.

Upon viewing my scarred device in a meeting, the IT team felt bad for me. One apps development guy said “Hey, I have an idea. You could do some testing for me.”

And he put a new phone in my hand.

The timing couldn’t have been more odd.



I guess in the wake of a $1 billion dollar verdict, going from an iPhone to a Samsung is about the most subversive thing I can do here in the Silicon Valley.

“Rebel, rebel, you’ve torn your dress….”




Photos Copyright 2012, Karen Fayeth, and subject to the Creative Commons license in the right column of this page. Photo of iPhone taken with a Samsung GalaxySIII and the onboard camera app. Photo of the Samsung taken with a busted iPhone4s and the Camera+ app.



Abstract, Alcohol and Baseball

During one of the most painful first innings of baseball I’ve seen in some time, where Tim Lincecum threw 44 pitches and allowed three runs, I had to find a way to distract myself from the pain.

Herewith, Lincecum photographed on my TV through a glass of Sauvignon Blanc. The real cheap stuff from Trader Joe’s. Watching this game through cheap wine eases my pain.





Image Copyright 2012, Karen Fayeth, and subject to the Creative Commons found on the right column of this page. Taken with an iPhone4s, Camera+ app and run through a Instagram filter.



Everything Old is New Again

Take a look at this photo. It’s not my photo. I came across it yesterday and I kind of liked it.




It’s got that color saturation and green tinge that you see in a lot of these new square format apps for the iPhone and Android (my personal favorite is Hipstamatic).

Actually, I like this photo a lot. But I didn’t heart it on Instagram. I didn’t like it on Facebook. I didn’t re-Tweet it either.

Because this photo was found inside a frame and mounted to a wall at the Cantor Arts Center at Stanford University.

This photo is part of their Walker Evans show.

This weekend, my photography group took a field trip to check out the exhibit. Going in, I knew very little about Walker Evans other than he had captured a lot of powerful black and white images from the Depression. I purposefully didn’t study up before my trip because I wanted to learn about the photographer through his photos.

Well. Knock me over. I was really, seriously and deeply educated by the time all was said and done.

First of all, Walker was a writer, and then moved into photography. He did both for most of his life. So take that you scallywags who say an artist should pick a medium and not dabble. Feh! Also, I really came to appreciate Walker’s sense of irony. You have to get up close and look around the frame of his photos to find it, but it’s always in there.

That said, the part of the exhibit that gave me the “holy crap!” moment of connection was at the very end when I saw the photos tucked away on the back wall.

It seems that in his early seventies, Walker Evans was left tired and uninspired and found himself unwilling or perhaps unable to create.

And then he got himself a Polaroid SX-70 camera and an unlimited supply of film.

“I bought that thing as a toy, and I took it as a kind of challenge,” Evans explained. “It was this gadget and I decided that I might be able to do something serious with it. So I got to work to try to prove that. I think I’ve done something with it.”


As I stood there looking at the photos, I was at first jealous. Jealous of that “unlimited supply” of Polaroid film. I am completely devoted to the Polaroid camera and used several different versions growing up and well into adulthood. I shot Polaroid until the film was no longer available.

Thanks to the Impossible Project, it’s still possible to buy Polaroid film, but at almost $24 a pack, that easy carefree snap-whatever-you-feel-like and just buy another pack mentality has to be reined in.

So I stood there feeling jealous about having all that free film on hand.

And then…my hands came up and framed either side of my whaaaat? face as I realized…

I have access to an instant camera and unlimited film. But in a different format. Sames tools, different age.

I have Hipstamatic on my iPhone. And Instagram. And a bunch of other toy camera apps.

All of these beautiful color saturated photos. They can still be made! I can still snap with reckless abandon! Oh dear god I have this gadget and I might actually be able to do something serious with it.

Oh my goodness. Oh. My. Goodness!

This realization left me dazed and confused and happy. So happy.

And inspired.







Top photo, “Untitled, 1974 Unique Polaroid” by Walker Evans and used here under Fair Use.

Quote from The Ongoing Moment by Geoff Dyer.

Bottom photo, “Power” Copyright 2012 Karen Fayeth, and subject to the Creative Commons license found in the far right column of this page. Taken with Hipstamatic app for iPhone.



Well I’ll Be Darned

Over the many years of our association, The Good Man and I have run into quite a few “well I’ll be darned” moments. New York boy and New Mexico girl are sometimes worlds apart in our life experiences.

The latest came around when we moved into our new apartment home. I’ve lived in huge apartment complexes, six unit buildings, and the last place I lived was a duplex.

And at each of those places, they way you got rid of your trash was to schlep it downstairs to the big metal trash bins in the parking lot.

But our new place has a curiosity….a trash chute! This blows my tiny little mind. I’ve never even seen one much less lived somewhere with one.

This is the coolest thing EVER.



So beautifully unobtrusive





Ok, that hole is a little scary, but rather effective


It’s a pretty, shiny bit of steel. Open the convenient door, drop in my trash, close the door, dust off my hands and whistle a happy tune.

It’s just down the hall and around a corner from my place. I can even slip out there in the morning in my nightgown and bare feet. Fabulous!

The other day, The Good Man put some boxes down the chute and said he was pretty sure they were stuck. I suggested he send a bowling ball down after it. He wasn’t amused.

See, he’s used to the Super getting really mad when the trash chute gets blocked. Me, I don’t know from a Super or a trash chute, so I have the luxury of just being a wise ass.

So The Good Man is all “yeah, whatever” and I’m all “whooooooo!” about this feature of our home.
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Next time, on Intercontinental relations, we’ll discuss “Why are the traffic lights in New Mexico horizontal, that’s just weird” (him) counterbalanced against “Why doesn’t California use mile markers? No wonder you people drive like crap.” (me)



Shazam!

I was so impressed by a Hipstaphoto I saw in December where a photographer had used an Olloclip to capture a snowflake, that I just had to go out and purchase one of my very own.

After the Christmas holidays, they were on major backorder, so I wasn’t expecting my new iPhoneography device until February.

I did a little hop click of my heels when it arrived this week.

Super!

Between moving and the deluge of new projects at work, I haven’t had a bunch of time to play with the glass lenses and ingenious clip for my iPhone.

Yesterday, I sat in the work cafeteria slumped in my chair trying to get in some nutrition, and my eyes landed on this tableau:




Well, the light was nice and the shakers were interesting. So I decided no time like the present.

I dug the Olloclip out of my pocket, slid it on the iPhone, and took some quick snaps.

These aren’t well composed and in some cases, focus is a little wonky.

And yet, I’m deeply impressed.

These three shots were all using the macro lens:



Red pepper flakes. They almost look like jerky. The light streaks are from the sun bouncing off the ridges in the shaker




Pepper that looks like grains of sand.




Take this photo with a grain of salt


So far, I’m digging the Olloclip. I still have to try out the fish eye (though I’m not really a fan of fish eye lenses) and the wide angle. Honestly, I bought the Olloclip for the macro lens, so I expect the other lenses won’t see as much use.

I think the quality of the Olloclip is a bit better than the Macro Cell Lens Band (reviewed here) mainly because it’s made of actual glass and not plastic, but I find the lens band more portable.

Either way, they make delicious looking macro photos. Time to explore!

Happy Friday ya’ll.



It should be noted that I paid for the Olloclip myself and that this review was not solicited, nor was I compensated. I’m just a giddy fangirl and proud of it.

All photos Copyright 2011, Karen Fayeth and subject to the Creative Commons license found on the far right column of this page.