Your wait staff for the evening.
11/09/2005
POS PC
I've finished all the conversions from RGB -> Output Sharpener -> CMYK -> Adjustment Levels -> 8-bit so it can be saved as JPG for the calendar. And the biggest pain in the you-know-where is my POS computer which wasn't always a POS. But for what I'm doing now is. And I just can't afford a new one this year.
It was fine when my Photoshop needs were simple, but with lots of layers - it is slow as you-know-what.
Really freakin' annoying since now the most time-consuming part of what I'm doing is waiting for the POS PC to do its' thing.
I still need to upload all the new images, and then order another calendar. God only knows how long it will take for the new calendar to arrive (still don't see the previous one as shipped).
At this point - I'm sort of leaning towards dealing with a printer in the States who can do a short run, say 500. I have one printer in mind - who was helpful with the specs for Lulu and when this is over I may contact him for a quote.
It is really wonderful to actually speak with the actual printer who will do your work as opposed to the monolithic (sp?) Lulu. How about actually being able to choose the paper you want to use? Good God. What a concept. I don't think the time with Lulu is wasted as I've learned a fair amount about offset printing and workflow for same, but egads - I wish their turn-around time was quicker.
Maybe I shouldn't talk because my own turnaround time for prints is getting worse and worse - but if someone says, hey - I need this fast - then I do it fast.
* * *
Terrible day with the calendar. I went through the conversion to CMYK and uploaded all the jpgs - which took about 45 minutes to upload with no progress bar, just the infernal blinking of the hard drive light - and then the thing is converted by Lulu to PDF and guess what - looks like pure cyan tint.
So I'm figuring that at least for the calendar, where you don't have control over the PDF conversion settings - you'd better just give 'em RGB like they say. Books may be different since you can do your own conversion to PDF.
Anyway - I need to use the original RGBs again, though this time with what is hopefully proper sharpening settings (this is taking the whole day so far).
May be time to pick up a bottle of Vodka.
* * *
6:30 pm.
Okay. Everything looks fine now, at least in the PDF. Now I'm going to wait for the first copy of the calendar (basically the same as what I did today but without output specific sharpening). So if all works out I'll have one slightly soft version and one sharp version (or if they apply sharpening after all: one sharp one, and one over-sharp one).
* * *
Tomorrow back to the real world: developing film and printing.
It was fine when my Photoshop needs were simple, but with lots of layers - it is slow as you-know-what.
Really freakin' annoying since now the most time-consuming part of what I'm doing is waiting for the POS PC to do its' thing.
I still need to upload all the new images, and then order another calendar. God only knows how long it will take for the new calendar to arrive (still don't see the previous one as shipped).
At this point - I'm sort of leaning towards dealing with a printer in the States who can do a short run, say 500. I have one printer in mind - who was helpful with the specs for Lulu and when this is over I may contact him for a quote.
It is really wonderful to actually speak with the actual printer who will do your work as opposed to the monolithic (sp?) Lulu. How about actually being able to choose the paper you want to use? Good God. What a concept. I don't think the time with Lulu is wasted as I've learned a fair amount about offset printing and workflow for same, but egads - I wish their turn-around time was quicker.
Maybe I shouldn't talk because my own turnaround time for prints is getting worse and worse - but if someone says, hey - I need this fast - then I do it fast.
* * *
Terrible day with the calendar. I went through the conversion to CMYK and uploaded all the jpgs - which took about 45 minutes to upload with no progress bar, just the infernal blinking of the hard drive light - and then the thing is converted by Lulu to PDF and guess what - looks like pure cyan tint.
So I'm figuring that at least for the calendar, where you don't have control over the PDF conversion settings - you'd better just give 'em RGB like they say. Books may be different since you can do your own conversion to PDF.
Anyway - I need to use the original RGBs again, though this time with what is hopefully proper sharpening settings (this is taking the whole day so far).
May be time to pick up a bottle of Vodka.
* * *
6:30 pm.
Okay. Everything looks fine now, at least in the PDF. Now I'm going to wait for the first copy of the calendar (basically the same as what I did today but without output specific sharpening). So if all works out I'll have one slightly soft version and one sharp version (or if they apply sharpening after all: one sharp one, and one over-sharp one).
* * *
Tomorrow back to the real world: developing film and printing.
11/08/2005
New York Marathon, 1st Avenue
Actually had an hour or so to walk over and do some shooting of the marathon. I still had tri-x rated @ 1600 in the M3 - so - what the heck. I shot the first roll with it. I have to say, I like the look. (p.s. it was very foggy early on).
I have a few more rolls (@ 400)- mostly of things going on in the crowd (but I tell you - I remembered taking this shot and it may be the only shot on three rolls that actually contains a marathon runner).
11/07/2005
Part I The New York Calendar
Calendar Preview
Well - this is the stuff I've been working on for the last few days. It was harder than I thought in terms of selections. I wanted a picture that suggested the season. Had to be night. Had to feel like New York. And about half people and half scenic.
I think I've managed to get together all the info I need for the final printing (no, I haven't gotten the first proof yet). One of the good things about putting all this mental energy into the calendar is that if it works in the calendar = it will work in the book(s).
If it doesn't work - then no point preparing book through Lulu. (I have my fingers-crossed that the first proof will look halfway decent._
Well - this is the stuff I've been working on for the last few days. It was harder than I thought in terms of selections. I wanted a picture that suggested the season. Had to be night. Had to feel like New York. And about half people and half scenic.
I think I've managed to get together all the info I need for the final printing (no, I haven't gotten the first proof yet). One of the good things about putting all this mental energy into the calendar is that if it works in the calendar = it will work in the book(s).
If it doesn't work - then no point preparing book through Lulu. (I have my fingers-crossed that the first proof will look halfway decent._
11-6-05
Finally figured out which images will go in the New York Night calendar. Was having trouble coming up with something seasonal and nocturnal for January and realized that Midnight Grand Central was perfect (New Year's Eve). I'll be putting up a preview page showing all the images included soon.
I also managed somehow to tear myself away from the PC and do some shooting at the Marathon yesterday. I think I got some good stuff - mostly of activity in the crowd; but also one shot of a lone female runner coming up first avenue with a little girl watching her pass (the type of p.c. shot that should insprire a generation of little girls to be marathoners). Though it had some artistic merit as well since it was foggy on 1st avenue early on. Still had 1600 Tri-X in the camera when I started so that'll be going into Microphen.
Between the calendar and the marathon and the ads I was so out-of-touch with "the real world" that I forgot that I was supposed to be at Tony's Italian Restaurant (not the one by Billy Joel) last night for my sister's birthday and got call at 6 p.m. asking when I was planning to be there.
Be where?
Tony's. We're all here waiting for you.
Oh, my God. Sorry. I'll be right over.
Tony's is the super mega family Italian restaurant which was so noisy that you couldn't hear the person next to you even if they were yelling in your ear with a megaphone (which no one had).
The reason it's so crowded is that the food is good and served family style. But they've stuffed customers into every possible square inch of floor space, and their must have been some echo system in the ceiling because it felt like having dinner at a rock concert where ordinary conversation was all that was on the program.
And there were a lot of old people at the table and no one could hear what anyone was saying. When someone wanted to tell a story, we assigned relayers at each end of the table to amplify what the story-teller was saying. They did this sort of thing in Central Park when the Dahli (I don't feel like looking up how to spell the man's name, though I can assure you that Dahli can't be right) Lama spoke, though they didn't use human relays as we did.
For some reason, I had taken care of the ordering for the ten or so people who were at the table and naturally when the bill came, the waitress put it down in front of me. Without looking inside the leather case containing the bill I immediately passed it, behind my back to my other sister (behind my father's back); and she looked at it and passed it back to me. No way I'm paying for this thing.
I pretended that I had to talk to her about something and dropped the bill in her lap and then moved to another side of the table to chat or pretend to chat with my aunt.
Eventually dear old dad looked at the bill - pretended to faint - but paid and we went on our merry way. I had paid my share when I had money. These days - I don't even offer anymore.
So the check was paid. But one awkward problem remained: no gift for her. Fortunately, my father had returned from somewhere - Amsterdam? And had a present of a small Van Gogh poster (Vincent's Room) for me. I managed to arrange things so that dad got into a cab first, and then I gave the poster to my sister wishing her happy birthday and making up a story about how I had asked dad to bring me the poster for her birthday. A lie so blatent that she laughed - and she said at least that she loved the poster. But what if dad came over and saw it in her house, she wondered?
Oh - I wouldn't worry about that, I said. He doesn't remember these things anymore. And, obviously - neither do I.
I also managed somehow to tear myself away from the PC and do some shooting at the Marathon yesterday. I think I got some good stuff - mostly of activity in the crowd; but also one shot of a lone female runner coming up first avenue with a little girl watching her pass (the type of p.c. shot that should insprire a generation of little girls to be marathoners). Though it had some artistic merit as well since it was foggy on 1st avenue early on. Still had 1600 Tri-X in the camera when I started so that'll be going into Microphen.
Between the calendar and the marathon and the ads I was so out-of-touch with "the real world" that I forgot that I was supposed to be at Tony's Italian Restaurant (not the one by Billy Joel) last night for my sister's birthday and got call at 6 p.m. asking when I was planning to be there.
Be where?
Tony's. We're all here waiting for you.
Oh, my God. Sorry. I'll be right over.
Tony's is the super mega family Italian restaurant which was so noisy that you couldn't hear the person next to you even if they were yelling in your ear with a megaphone (which no one had).
The reason it's so crowded is that the food is good and served family style. But they've stuffed customers into every possible square inch of floor space, and their must have been some echo system in the ceiling because it felt like having dinner at a rock concert where ordinary conversation was all that was on the program.
And there were a lot of old people at the table and no one could hear what anyone was saying. When someone wanted to tell a story, we assigned relayers at each end of the table to amplify what the story-teller was saying. They did this sort of thing in Central Park when the Dahli (I don't feel like looking up how to spell the man's name, though I can assure you that Dahli can't be right) Lama spoke, though they didn't use human relays as we did.
For some reason, I had taken care of the ordering for the ten or so people who were at the table and naturally when the bill came, the waitress put it down in front of me. Without looking inside the leather case containing the bill I immediately passed it, behind my back to my other sister (behind my father's back); and she looked at it and passed it back to me. No way I'm paying for this thing.
I pretended that I had to talk to her about something and dropped the bill in her lap and then moved to another side of the table to chat or pretend to chat with my aunt.
Eventually dear old dad looked at the bill - pretended to faint - but paid and we went on our merry way. I had paid my share when I had money. These days - I don't even offer anymore.
So the check was paid. But one awkward problem remained: no gift for her. Fortunately, my father had returned from somewhere - Amsterdam? And had a present of a small Van Gogh poster (Vincent's Room) for me. I managed to arrange things so that dad got into a cab first, and then I gave the poster to my sister wishing her happy birthday and making up a story about how I had asked dad to bring me the poster for her birthday. A lie so blatent that she laughed - and she said at least that she loved the poster. But what if dad came over and saw it in her house, she wondered?
Oh - I wouldn't worry about that, I said. He doesn't remember these things anymore. And, obviously - neither do I.
11/06/2005
Boom in the Night
Speaking of things that go boom in the night - last night the windows were really rockin' and rollin' and at first I just said - oh - must be some fireworks somewhere - but couldn't figure out what sort of holiday November 5th was. Strained my poor head (given my recent calendar output experience I'm an expert on holidays) but couldn't figure it out.
BOOM. BOOM. BOOM went the sky. Not thunder. Can't be a terrorist thing, it sounds like it's on timers.
Look out my back window into the alley (only window I have) and see others with their heads out craning towards the tiny corner of the sky - but can't see anything exploding.
Cat jumps down in terror and runs to a neutral corner.
I shut the window and figure someone will wake me if this is the big one.
Looked this morning in google for New York fireworks news and found the answer:
"ING announces: Dinner followed by fireworks in Central Park and live entertainment."
Ah - it was a pre-marathon fireworks blast. I wish they'd make some public announcement before they set this stuff off.
ANNOUNCER: Friends, Romans, residents: We come not to scare the freakin' hell out of you, but just to give a bit more promotion to an overly promoted event.
I've seen the orange ING - banners all over the neighborhood for the last week now. Should have put two and two together.
Look - I know the marathon is a great triumph to the human spirit and all that but why do they need to run through the whole city to prove how motivated they are? One thing I'll tell you - they don't stay in the Bronx very long. Just a quick touch and back down to Manhattan.
I know, I know - how inspiring it is. The pubs on the upper east side are happily filled. The sponsors are happily filled. Everybody's happy. It's a great achievement. A monument to the human spirit.
Reminds me more of those dance marathons they used to have to raise money (They Shoot Horses Don't They). There's just something excessive and possibly freakish about the whole marathon around the city thing - and I sort of wish they'd just nip it in the bud. Too late now I guess.
Don't they know that in a couple of years they'll all be sitting around with plastic bands on their knees tottlin' around the town.
The whole thing is just - well - un-American. How are we supposed to compete with our lungs filled with urban soot - against kids who grew up running from one village to another to go to school in the purified air of - oh - Kenya maybe?
Not to mention that our whole country is about 800% overweight according to the last fat poll.
Business sponsors this thing because it symbolizes the purity of purpose of the human spirit. Not exactly what the big banks are all about.
Speaking of big banks, did you notice the last Citibank campaign: there's more to life than money? Live well?
Sorry boys - but I don't buy it. Not from you. You spend every waking minute trying to figure out how to get the last dime out of my pocket and tell me there's more to life than money: that from a bank? You can only Orwell me so much.
Citibank telling me that there's more to life than money? Who do they think they're foolin' with that one.
Anyway - that's my take on the whole marathon thing. Wake me when it's over.
[The views expressed in this post are solely those of Mr. Beckerman, and do not represent the philosophy of DaveBeckerman.com Inc. DaveBeckerman.com is a proud sponsor of the New York City Marathon. We don't actually contribute anything financially to it, but we sponsor it in our own way which must remain classified because of national security. Editor]
BOOM. BOOM. BOOM went the sky. Not thunder. Can't be a terrorist thing, it sounds like it's on timers.
Look out my back window into the alley (only window I have) and see others with their heads out craning towards the tiny corner of the sky - but can't see anything exploding.
Cat jumps down in terror and runs to a neutral corner.
I shut the window and figure someone will wake me if this is the big one.
Looked this morning in google for New York fireworks news and found the answer:
"ING announces: Dinner followed by fireworks in Central Park and live entertainment."
Ah - it was a pre-marathon fireworks blast. I wish they'd make some public announcement before they set this stuff off.
ANNOUNCER: Friends, Romans, residents: We come not to scare the freakin' hell out of you, but just to give a bit more promotion to an overly promoted event.
I've seen the orange ING - banners all over the neighborhood for the last week now. Should have put two and two together.
Look - I know the marathon is a great triumph to the human spirit and all that but why do they need to run through the whole city to prove how motivated they are? One thing I'll tell you - they don't stay in the Bronx very long. Just a quick touch and back down to Manhattan.
I know, I know - how inspiring it is. The pubs on the upper east side are happily filled. The sponsors are happily filled. Everybody's happy. It's a great achievement. A monument to the human spirit.
Reminds me more of those dance marathons they used to have to raise money (They Shoot Horses Don't They). There's just something excessive and possibly freakish about the whole marathon around the city thing - and I sort of wish they'd just nip it in the bud. Too late now I guess.
Don't they know that in a couple of years they'll all be sitting around with plastic bands on their knees tottlin' around the town.
The whole thing is just - well - un-American. How are we supposed to compete with our lungs filled with urban soot - against kids who grew up running from one village to another to go to school in the purified air of - oh - Kenya maybe?
Not to mention that our whole country is about 800% overweight according to the last fat poll.
Business sponsors this thing because it symbolizes the purity of purpose of the human spirit. Not exactly what the big banks are all about.
Speaking of big banks, did you notice the last Citibank campaign: there's more to life than money? Live well?
Sorry boys - but I don't buy it. Not from you. You spend every waking minute trying to figure out how to get the last dime out of my pocket and tell me there's more to life than money: that from a bank? You can only Orwell me so much.
Citibank telling me that there's more to life than money? Who do they think they're foolin' with that one.
Anyway - that's my take on the whole marathon thing. Wake me when it's over.
[The views expressed in this post are solely those of Mr. Beckerman, and do not represent the philosophy of DaveBeckerman.com Inc. DaveBeckerman.com is a proud sponsor of the New York City Marathon. We don't actually contribute anything financially to it, but we sponsor it in our own way which must remain classified because of national security. Editor]
11/05/2005
iViewMedia Pro Vers. 3
Finally had a chance to launch iView Media Pro 3. Guess what? Mikey likes it. If nothing else it has a way to FTP to your site when you're done (which is not such a big deal) but finally - you can tell it to SKIP the image files that it hasn't touched. Before, if I made changes to an HTML gallery, I would then go into Dreamweaver, and unless I had added some images, I would just manually upload the changed files (the media page and the index pages).
The only down thing is that Media Pro in the gallery building stage, still seems to want to re-make the jpgs, i.e. when it's done I checked the timestamp of the jpgs and they had been updated. I'm not sure why it wants to do this all the time or if there is a way around it (probably is - I just haven't tripped over it).
Still - that it knows which Image files don't need to be re-uploaded is a big deal.
One other quibble - so far. You could always save certain preferences for each gallery in the settings tab. However - and this seems stupid - it doesn't associate the ftp gallery to load to with your settings. In other words - if you have several galleries - make sure you change where they're going in the ftp settings. They also changed the gallery directory structure slightly. So for example if I were to republish the blog gallery - some images from the blog are going to have to be repointed.
As far as any conversion problems: none so far. Just opened the old version 2 catalogs and everything was as it was - though they have added a much better user-interface for the catalog sets.
There are several sections that relate to gallery building that are new - but I haven't had a chance to play with them yet; but at this point I'll take the shortcut to version II off the desktop and continue using vers. III.
The only down thing is that Media Pro in the gallery building stage, still seems to want to re-make the jpgs, i.e. when it's done I checked the timestamp of the jpgs and they had been updated. I'm not sure why it wants to do this all the time or if there is a way around it (probably is - I just haven't tripped over it).
Still - that it knows which Image files don't need to be re-uploaded is a big deal.
One other quibble - so far. You could always save certain preferences for each gallery in the settings tab. However - and this seems stupid - it doesn't associate the ftp gallery to load to with your settings. In other words - if you have several galleries - make sure you change where they're going in the ftp settings. They also changed the gallery directory structure slightly. So for example if I were to republish the blog gallery - some images from the blog are going to have to be repointed.
As far as any conversion problems: none so far. Just opened the old version 2 catalogs and everything was as it was - though they have added a much better user-interface for the catalog sets.
There are several sections that relate to gallery building that are new - but I haven't had a chance to play with them yet; but at this point I'll take the shortcut to version II off the desktop and continue using vers. III.
More Lulu
I setup a Self-publishing section in the Forum so I can keep track of the Lulu publishing saga.
* * *
I setup my Lulu store: there ain't nothin' for sale there yet - but it won't be long now:
Click here to take a peek.
First product is going to be NEW YORK NIGHT - 2006
Then I'm definitely going to do one of the Mermaid Day Parade
And then a political calendar - NEW YORK PROTESTS
Lester suggested that I do a preliminary calendar based on the book we're writing together: THE 11TH MAN with pictures and quotes from same. At the rate I'm going you may have a calendar and no book. I guess that would be your pre-product publicity.
It really is sort of fun - and gives me a feeling of another avenue of expression opening up.
* * *
Update: from what I can figure out - Lulu is using a Xerox iGen 3 printer for color work. There are all sorts of threads on Lulu about color management, but most seem to recommend sRGB which seems odd given a narrower gamut - but what do I know about gamuts. Not that much right now but I'm going to find out. It would be kind of cool if the Calendar was printed on the iGen 3 since I could begin to make adjustments in my workflow that I could use later on for the book publishing part. The one thing I can say for sure, after reading numerous Lulu threads, is that for the book - you definitely want 4-color output (yes, even for b&w pictures unless you don't care what they look like).
Nowhere, have I read that you should actually use CMYK mode for the images on your end - they want some form of RGB. The actual amount of color management info they give that comes straight from Lulu seems limited. The boards are filled up with people doing various Lulu color tests. Some saying that they've gotten good results; others disappointed. Oh, whatever. Right now I don't see any other alternative.
* * *
I setup my Lulu store: there ain't nothin' for sale there yet - but it won't be long now:
Click here to take a peek.
First product is going to be NEW YORK NIGHT - 2006
Then I'm definitely going to do one of the Mermaid Day Parade
And then a political calendar - NEW YORK PROTESTS
Lester suggested that I do a preliminary calendar based on the book we're writing together: THE 11TH MAN with pictures and quotes from same. At the rate I'm going you may have a calendar and no book. I guess that would be your pre-product publicity.
It really is sort of fun - and gives me a feeling of another avenue of expression opening up.
* * *
Update: from what I can figure out - Lulu is using a Xerox iGen 3 printer for color work. There are all sorts of threads on Lulu about color management, but most seem to recommend sRGB which seems odd given a narrower gamut - but what do I know about gamuts. Not that much right now but I'm going to find out. It would be kind of cool if the Calendar was printed on the iGen 3 since I could begin to make adjustments in my workflow that I could use later on for the book publishing part. The one thing I can say for sure, after reading numerous Lulu threads, is that for the book - you definitely want 4-color output (yes, even for b&w pictures unless you don't care what they look like).
Nowhere, have I read that you should actually use CMYK mode for the images on your end - they want some form of RGB. The actual amount of color management info they give that comes straight from Lulu seems limited. The boards are filled up with people doing various Lulu color tests. Some saying that they've gotten good results; others disappointed. Oh, whatever. Right now I don't see any other alternative.
11/04/2005
NEW YORK NIGHT
I created and self-published New York Night Calendar (through Lulu.com) but it's not available to public yet as I just bought a copy for myself. Should get it in a week or so. On screen, it actually looks pretty good. We'll see.
I probably have two or three shots that don't exactly belong in there - the idea being the beauty of New York at night and all that. I tried to picture someone looking at the same picture for a month.
There really were no apparent hiccups and you get to look through a "print-ready" PDF. The thing I wasn't sure about was whether I should let them do any sharpening for their printer - do they do any? Or is that something I should do? I basically gave them basic sharpening to make up for the scan or the digital capture but not for the output device (as I usually do at least a second sharpening for the inkjet or the web).
My piece of the action for each calendar is about $10 - which considering that if they're doing the packaging / selling / production isn't too bad - is it for a $24 calendar?
I think that's the price I settled on. If the results are decent, I'll do some revising - and make it available for the public. It would be great if it worked out because I have a lot of ideas for calendars. The next one would probably be New York Subway Shots.
Then the Bronx calendar etc. In other words, in that market I could make niche calendars rather than what I'm selling on my web site which is mostly living room prints. I'd love to do a Political Protest calendar as well.
I probably have two or three shots that don't exactly belong in there - the idea being the beauty of New York at night and all that. I tried to picture someone looking at the same picture for a month.
There really were no apparent hiccups and you get to look through a "print-ready" PDF. The thing I wasn't sure about was whether I should let them do any sharpening for their printer - do they do any? Or is that something I should do? I basically gave them basic sharpening to make up for the scan or the digital capture but not for the output device (as I usually do at least a second sharpening for the inkjet or the web).
My piece of the action for each calendar is about $10 - which considering that if they're doing the packaging / selling / production isn't too bad - is it for a $24 calendar?
I think that's the price I settled on. If the results are decent, I'll do some revising - and make it available for the public. It would be great if it worked out because I have a lot of ideas for calendars. The next one would probably be New York Subway Shots.
Then the Bronx calendar etc. In other words, in that market I could make niche calendars rather than what I'm selling on my web site which is mostly living room prints. I'd love to do a Political Protest calendar as well.
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