Photo-a-Day: Day 27 - "Let's Go Snowboarding"

01.28.12 (5:52 am)   [edit]

My eldest daughter poses with her favorite winter accessory - her snowboard. Unfortunately, Michigan has been a little lacking when it comes to snow. She has only been out maybe two or three times. So much for the horrible winter all of the meteorologists predicted...

+dan

Photo-a-Day: Day 26 - "Black Hair"

01.27.12 (5:54 am)   [edit]

Another self-portrait - one of the only self-portraits where you will see me smile (kind of). Somebody said something funny, just as I was hitting the shutter release. Anyway, this is the first portrait of my newly dyed, jet black hair. How I missed my black hair...

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The Song Behind 1-25 Photo-a-Day Photo

01.26.12 (3:58 am)   [edit]

If you want to give a listen to the rough mix of the song being recorded in the 25 January 2012 photo-a-day photo, you can hear it at: this link.

All music and vocals by yours truly. Recorded at my home studio, Checksum Studio between January 13-24. Mixed 25 January 2012.

Enjoy!

+dan

Photo-a-Day: Day 25 - "Cloud Factory"

01.26.12 (3:33 am)   [edit]

Since my eldest daughter's science teacher insists that boiling water creates clouds rather than steam, this long-exposure photo clearly shows a factory in which clouds are manufactured. Either that, or this is the Municipal Power stack. In the foreground, light trails made from cars passing by.

+dan

Photo-a-Day: Day 24 - "In the Studio"

01.25.12 (5:55 am)   [edit]

A remotely triggered self snap of me working on a Null Factor track in the home studio.

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Photo-a-Day: Day 23 - Track Marks

01.24.12 (4:10 am)   [edit]

My wife spent the past two days in the hospital with possible heart issues. It turned out that her heart is healthy. She was suffering with a muscle cramp in her back, behind where her heart is located. That was the good news. The bad news? She was used as a pin cushion and has the marks on her arms to show for it!

+dan

Photo-a-Day: Day 22 - Checksum Studio

01.23.12 (6:41 am)   [edit]

The central nervous system of my home recording studio, Checksum Studio. The E-MU 1616m is a PC recording box I would recommend to any home recording enthusiast who doesn't want to dish out a ton of cash for their solution. This unit has a ton of built-in studio quality effects including compressors, gates, limiters, expanders, reverbs, delays, distortions, chorus, flangers, phasers, and pitch-shifters. Since the processing is handled by the 1616m, it frees up your PC's processor for other tasks, creating a true zero-latency studio.

+dan

Photo-a-Day: Day 21 - "Musical Horse"

01.22.12 (7:39 am)   [edit]

This wind-up musical horse is one of the very few things Deidre has to remember her late grandmother by. One of her most prized possessions.

+dan

Photo-a-Day: Day 20 - "Fur Coat"

01.20.12 (11:27 pm)   [edit]

The squirrels were out in large number, despite temps being in the teens (Fahrenheit). Even with their fur coats, this squirrel appears to be huddled up to conserve body heat.

+dan

Photo-a-Day: Day 19 - Lounging

01.20.12 (5:13 am)   [edit]

Alexis lounges comfortably on the Living Room couch.

+dan

Photo-a-Day: Day 18 - Android Deidre

01.19.12 (6:58 am)   [edit]

A VERY quick Photoshop of a portrait of Deidre. This Photoshop treatment is to create a scuffed up android sort of appearance. I wish I had more time to work on it, but it turned out fairly well, for the time I had.

+dan

Tell Your Congressional Leaders

01.18.12 (10:47 pm)   [edit]

In the name of fighting online piracy, two bills are being considered for passage: The Protect IP Act (PIPA) and Stop Online Piracy Act (SOPA). As a musician and photographer, one would think that I would be excited about legislation designed to fight websites that prey off intellectual property. That is a just and noble fight, however, these bills go about it the wrong way. In these cases, the cure is worse than the disease! These bills would effectively censor the web and crush the innovation that the Internet is known for producing. We cannot afford that. The US economy cannot afford that! It's time we tell the government to get their fingers out of places where they don't belong. Trash these bills! They have no place in protecting freedom and liberty, therefore they should not have a place in the law books!

+dan

Photo-a-Day: Day 17 - An Artist At Work

01.18.12 (4:18 am)   [edit]

My middle daughter, Alexis, using a mirror to draw the picture printed on the front of her shirt. Her drawing turned out incredible, by the way...

+dan

Photo-a-Day: Day 16 - Over the Shoulder

01.17.12 (5:42 am)   [edit]

My eldest daughter, Mariah, giving a glance over the shoulder.

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Photo-a-Day: Day 15 - A Hamster In Hand

01.16.12 (3:44 am)   [edit]

Twilight (our hamster, not named after the movie IN THE LEAST) is a Chinese Dwarf hamster. A smidge larger than a mouse, the Chinese Dwarf is the smallest breed of hamster, easily fitting in the palm of my 13-year-old's hand.

+dan

Photo-a-Day: Day 14 - Iced Tree

01.15.12 (2:00 am)   [edit]

A pine stands covered in snow in the back lot of where I live. The snow has been so thick and heavy that it just hangs on everything it lands on - including power lines. A lot of power outages have been reported, but we have been lucky, so far.

+dan

Photo-a-Day: Day 13 - "Lucky Day"

01.13.12 (5:35 pm)   [edit]

It is said that the number 13 is unlucky. Not only is this the 13th day of the Photo-a-Day Challenge, but it also happens to be Friday. Friday the 13th. However unlucky some people view this day, I consider myself lucky to have had the opportunity to photograph the same berries I shot a few days ago. This time, though, covered in a thick layer of snow. What a difference a few days make.

+dan

Photo-a-Day: Day 12 - Make Yourself At Home

01.13.12 (4:15 am)   [edit]

Our Lab, Onyx, made herself very much at home on my bed. Yeah... we spoil our dog, horribly.

+dan

Photo-a-Day Challenge: Day 11 - Berries

01.12.12 (5:04 am)   [edit]

This time of year, these berries are usually complete with a white cap of snow. Today reached 55 degrees! Clear blue skies make for a nice (and warm) backdrop for these berries.

+dan

Photo-a-Day: Day 10 - Love Birds

01.11.12 (4:02 am)   [edit]

This shot was taken around 3:00 PM, this afternoon (10 January 2012). At 5:00 PM, the birds were still there... in the exact same place. And I was afraid that they were going to take off if I didn't hurry with taking their picture...

+dan

Scientific Lack Of Reasoning

01.11.12 (12:32 am)   [edit]

The Photo-a-Day Challenge will resume this evening. But right now, I have something I need to get off my chest. It involves my eldest daughter's science teacher and how he is, without remorse, destroying his students.

Before winter break, my daughter asked me what the substance was called that you can see rising from a boiling pot of water. Without much thought, I answered, "Steam". She replied, "See, that's what I thought, too, but my teacher says that it isn't steam, it's clouds".

Fast-forward to today, after several emails to the school's principal about the apparent ignorance of the teacher. The principal did nothing except forward my concerns to the science teacher. Not very helpful, considering I had already approached the teacher about his questionable teachings, previously. Concerns that the science teacher blew off by ignoring my emails. But, after talking to the principal, the science teacher decided to explain his reasoning - or the lack of.

The teacher's explanation was that, "...if you look at a tea pot full of boiling water, you cannot see anything shooting through the vent hole for about an inch. This is invisible water vapor. However, after the water vapor cools, you can see the water droplets that have turned back into its liquid form. These are clouds."

My argument is that, by definitions widely accepted by the scientific community (specifically, NWS and NOAA), the two terms are defined as follows:

Cloud: - Accumulation of water vapor, ice crystals, and other particles suspended in the atmosphere over a planetary body.

Steam: - The technical term for water vapor, the gaseous form of water, that is formed from boiling water.

Looking at these two definitions, I pointed out that he is incorrectly teaching his students that clouds come from boiling water. Last I checked, those aren't ice crystals rising from the boiling pot.

The teacher replied that he disagrees with me and his opinion is still that what you see rising from the tea pot are clouds.

His OPINION?!? I asked the science teacher, what if EVERY teacher taught their opinion as hard facts? The education system would collapse to its knees. Something that I hope to prevent by getting this teacher to teach FACT rather than OPINION.

He never replied to that message.

What would you do in this situation? The class has no textbooks, so the course curriculum is compiled completely by the teacher. No guidance, nobody to approve what he is teaching, a complete blank check for him to teach whatever nonsense his opinions happen to be.

I did look into the possibility of transferring my daughter out of his class into a class taught by somebody who, at least, is on a first name basis with the subject being taught. However, doing so would mean a complete revision of her schedule. She does not handle change of that magnitude very well, so doing so might be as devastating as keeping her in that class. For that reason, I am at a loss.

Stay tuned...

+dan

Photo-a-Day Challenge - Day 9 - "Alexis"

01.10.12 (4:23 am)   [edit]
My middle daughter is always willing to model for her dad. Lately, I've been doing experiments in single-light portraiture. Single-light portraiture is a great way to create dramatic, high-contrast portraits. Soon, I plan on exploring experiments with a more traditional glamour setup (2 or 3 lights, including a fill light and a hair/accent light). Stay tuned for those photos coming to a photo-a-day challenge near you! Until then, this is today's single-light, high-contrast portrait:

+dan

Photo-a-Day: Day 8 - Guts

01.09.12 (4:39 am)   [edit]
This is the current state of my home recording studio. I purchased an upgrade card from the PCI version of the E-MU 1010 card to the PCI-Express version of the E-MU 1010 card. You can see said card on the left side of the photo. However, the PCIe version was too tall to fit into the current case. So, I moved the guts to a temporary case, until the permanent case arrives. Until then, the guts of my recording studio remain in this state:

.

+dan

Photo-a-Day Challenge Day 7 - "Inbound"

01.07.12 (11:19 pm)   [edit]
Last night, I went to the MKG airport to catch the late flight, inbound from Chicago. As I was 3 blocks away, I saw my flight landing - 20 minutes early! Needless to say, the photo was not a success. So, this morning, I tried it again - this time the early flight. After waiting an hour for the flight to arrive (it was still about 2 minutes early) and being questioned by 2 police offers (on 2 separate occasions), I got the shot I was hoping for. What an awesome perspective - directly under a hollow metal tube suspended by nothing but the left of air pressure under the wings. Absolutely beautiful...

+dan

Photo-a-Day Challenge Day 6 - "Rodent Diva"

01.07.12 (5:31 am)   [edit]
This is our other pet, Twilight - NOT named after the movie! Twilight is a little diva. It took several attempts to get this photo of her. And the only way I was able to get this is courtesy a fast shutter and fast strobe light. She is cute though. Oh, by the way... shortly after this photo was taken, Twilight bit my wife in the hand...

+dan