04/8/13

Migration and beak-polishing

After futzing about for a while with Squarespace, I realized that their services just weren’t suiting my online needs. Their integration with Flickr, for example, would work only within a narrowly proscribed field, and I kept finding myself bursting through those fields. It was worth the effort, but not any longer. Back to WordPress for me.

What this means for you, dear reader, is nothing except a format change. Some of my posts written for Squarespace will receive a nip and tuck, while the older posts written with my first attempt at using WordPress will largely stay intact. Tags and categories will be revamped, but that will largely be it for changes.

The next entry in my six-part series will be about one of England’s biggest post-war exports: Doctor Who. Those who wish to read should do so, while others can skip ahead to the following entry whenever I get around to writing it.

03/27/13

Trivia Matters

In the last post, “Story Fatigue,” I compared the benefits and drawbacks of shaping a story as either a meme or as trivia, with specific focus on how this shaping elicits a reaction from the story’s audience. I weighed in against the meme side, as memes are designed to reach large audiences with minimal retention of the experience. Trivia, on the other hand, may reach a a smaller audience in comparison, but the higher level of retention inherent in trivia means that those who are reached will feel compelled to retain what they’ve been told. If the choice were to be between 4 million people watching a cat play a keyboard on YouTube, or having 40 people feel a connection with the story behind an Extruded Plastic Dingus, the latter would be the better option if you want your story to resonate with an audience. The two-fold trust approach, detailed earlier, stays intact: the storyteller trusts the trivia format will bring forth a response with a select number in the audience, while these same audience members trust that the trivia they’re experiencing has value and importance.

Trivia has long appealed to me personally as an end in itself, let alone as a storytelling technique. For lack of a better description, this love of trivia has come naturally, as I’ve always found myself keyed into small, overlooked details of the world around me. These small details can obviously become large, self-defining aspects of life if one lets that happen, and I certainly have done so from elementary school onward. Over time, I have been accumulating a large group of interests, most of which have little to do with one another, and whenever I’d acquire something new that interested me, I’d dive into it to find those small details mentioned above. An inconclusive list of these interests in roughly chronological order would have on it:

  • Astronomy: Courtesy of visits to Adler Planetarium, “Star Wars,” the Pioneer and Voyager spacecrafts, and a subscription to “Star & Sky” magazine in 1979.
  • Birds: Which I totally blame on being fascinated by the Quetzal and the Ibis.
  • Science fiction: See the Astronomy listing, and also add the revived “Star Trek” series.
  • British TV: Or at least what I could watch on WTTW on Sunday nights, which also included the original “Doctor Who” series–see Astronomy & Science Fiction.
  • Cars: More on the design, not on the mechanics as I’m notoriously bad with tools.
  • Bikes: A teen-aged me needed a way to get around, so I’ve always looked at bikes as useful tools–like with cars, I appreciate the functionality and design of the whole rather than the individual parts and/or brands.
  • Maps: Useful for collecting, and also as a way to fall asleep–if you’re having trouble sleeping at night, open up a road atlas and start examining it closely; within a few minutes, you’ll be nodding off.
  • Politics: A former love of mine, one which I’ve downplayed lately as it can be exhausting to talk about–never mind that this was my college major.
  • Computers: This almost was my college major, yet I was stymied somewhat in the early 90s by not having a computer of my own.
  • Cologne: Started off in college, but as the years pass, I’ve figured out what works for me. I work in IT, and I choose not to smell like stale farts, cheap cigarettes, and greasy food.
  • Transit systems: Related somewhat to Maps, and also due to using it a lot while living in the Chicagoland area.
  • Urban planning: See Transit Systems and Politics.
  • Photography: If I were to have a tagline for my life, it would be “Observing since 1971.” My first camera was a Kodak Disc from the early 1980s, and it’s been onward and upward ever since.
  • Wine and beer: Both in terms of consumption and understanding how they’re made.
  • Clothing: Somewhat related to Cologne, and probably the most current of interests. I’m old enough now to look the part of not looking young, so adjustments are being made accordingly.

One interest I’m reluctant to place on the list is Sports. It’s not because I don’t have the room, but rather because the relationship is complicated. I grew up in a sports-happy family, and for a few years in the early 1980s, I tried my hand at basketball, baseball, and football. My hand is not a coordinated one, so while I’m somewhat glad for the experiences, I’m even happier that this all stopped once high school began. I have picked up some sports knowledge as trivia, but I don’t actively seek it out–it’s more passive knowledge, if that makes sense. Still, even this facile knowledge of sports has paid off for me, as it was a key element when I was part of a 16-versus-1 game of Trivial Pursuit around nine years ago. I was the 1, and I lost on the very last question of the game. To win Trivial Pursuit, in case you’ve forgotten, you must have all six wedges of your “pie,” and you must land on the hub of the wheel on the board. When you land there, you have to answer all six questions on the card to win. I answered five correctly; the other team got all six right. Looking back at that game, I remain impressed and scared that I could compete that well.

Do you, Dear Reader, see a pattern to the above list of interests? I really don’t. Some interests admittedly flow into one another–Astronomy and Science Fiction are strongly linked, and Transit systems can emerge from interests in both Urban Planning and Politics. Without the context of time, or further details, it would be difficult to see any sort of developing design. I wouldn’t be able to rank these interests from highest to lowest, in other words. All of them interest me on relatively equal levels, but what I choose to be interested in can be dependent upon too many factors to mention. I am not fully consumed by one interest, which mirrors my academic career up to college as I didn’t feel that I excelled in one field at the expense of any other–well, maybe at the expense of Physical Education. Perhaps this could explain why college threw me for a loop, as I had to actually major in something, a process that took nearly half of my time at Cornell College. It’s also why today, I wouldn’t make for a good otaku, and I’m pretty happy that this is the case.

Much like how “meme” and “trivia” have evolved from their original definitions, so too has “otaku.” In Japan, “otaku” was originally a disparaging term used to describe a particular fan of anime or manga that took his interests in the art to obsessive, awkward levels. The terminology quickly adapted to refer to any person obsessed by a subject or hobby, with the connotation always being negative. Otaku would be stereotyped as young men who spent most of their waking hours talking about their obsession, collecting more items relating to their obsession, interacting only with those who share their obsessions (if at all–it is often presumed that otaku spend most of their time in their bedroom), and so forth. Outside of Japan, “otaku” didn’t have as negative of a connotation, but the obsessive definition still applied for the most part. It has become a term that’s interchangeable with “fanboy,” “fangirl,” or simply, “geek.” Originally, anime or manga was the subject of otaku obsession. As the focus of otaku obsessions have changed, so have the relationship that these subjects have with mainstream culture. While anime or manga have not become mainstream in the US, American comics certainly have, thanks in no small part because of various popular TV shows and movies. Fanfic, cosplay, and role-playing have not become mainstream, yet they have become more commonplace. What was one considered “fringe,” with potentially negative connotations built into that term, has now become less so. 

Finding articles discussing the rise of otaku culture in the US is relatively easy, but I’ll point you to one that made the rounds at the very end of 2010: “Wake Up, Geek Culture. Time To Die.” Patton Oswalt, comedian and occasional actor, writes at length1 about how mainstream acceptance of subjects formerly classified as fringe or geeky is a double-edged sword. His view of the Internet can be summed up in the not-snappy acronym of ETEWAF: Everything That Ever Was, Available Forever2, which he believes is responsible for the rise of weak otaku that don’t have to work as hard as he did when he was into Monty Python or Star Wars3. My concern about otaku isn’t exactly like Oswalt’s, as I’m not really upset that the original subjects of otaku obsession have achieved mainstream acceptance. What does bother me, though, is that the otaku methodology has become mainstream, finding its way into subjects heretofore never considered. Regardless of the subject–and the list is endless, from food to clothes to bicycles and so on–there will be those who will hoover up as much knowledge of this subject as they can handle. Small elements that make up this subject become magnified, the trivia becomes consuming, the minimal gets maximized. Information about the subject of obsession ends up standing in for the subject itself. Collecting this information, or even better, creating this information, is the greater prize4. 

As someone who has lived for many years in a realm where trivia rules, I view the otaku methodology as being quite exhausting. My past would indicate that I should be among those who wants to know the smallest details regarding the coffee I drink, the bicycle I ride, or about the jeans I’m wearing. Why, then, do I not add these to my ever-growing list of interests? The otaku methodology has some faults for me: it’s weak, the barrier to entry is set quite high, and it brings forth a bit of unattractive envy in me that I would rather not show off.

Without explicitly saying so, Oswalt’s worries about “weak otaku” reflect his fears that the current geek culture has become memetic and not trivial. The ease of collecting information online translates to a gotta-collect-em-all mentality, where quantity overtakes quality. I would, if I were in this particular mindset, be more attuned to collecting paper maps or globes, or saving online maps as favorites instead of appreciating them for their cartography skills or what purpose these maps serve. I really wouldn’t have time to delve into the details of the maps, because that would interfere with me collecting more of them. The maps would function more as a meme than as trivia. The action of collecting the maps would likewise become as important, if not more so, than the actual maps themselves5. I don’t fully believe that current geek culture is sliding toward memes, but I understand where Oswalt comes from with his fears.

The otaku methodology also works to create a high barrier to entry for those wishing to pursue their interest in any given subject, and man, do I see this happening in Photography. On the one hand, advances in technology have made photography as a whole more popular than ever. Digital photography, mirrorless cameras, and smartphones that surpass the quality of what point-and-shoot digicams have placed increasingly sophisticated equipment into the hands of more people, who happily document every aspect of their lives and share these photos with others. Perhaps this seeming ubiquity of cameras has brought forth a belief among some photographers as to what makes “real” photography: you must shoot or have shot with film, you must develop your own film, you must only shoot with either Canon or Nikon6, and so forth. Granted, there will always be snobs in any subject matter defining who is authentic and who isn’t, and what constitutes serious support from those who dabble in it. My somewhat jaundiced take on these people erecting barriers is that they do so to justify all the time and money they’ve spent, along with the fear that others can come along with “incorrect” equipment or “insufficient” experience and create quality photographs7. Whatever the explanation may be for these barriers, they’ll end up preventing people from pursuing their interests further, or possibly believing that it’s wrong to merely dabble or be a hobbyist photographer. They will buy the explanation, like at an amusement park, that you must be this tall in order to ride. Personally, I acknowledge these barriers, then do my best to ignore them after that. Instead of worrying about not being tall enough to go on one particular ride, I’ll find another ride for my enjoyment.

Finally, there’s the personal affront that I experience on occasion whenever I encounter someone in thrall to the otaku approach. I’ll admit that I hold a small amount of envy toward someone who appears to “have it,” that is, someone who knows what they like and are willing to place all of their time and energy towards that particular like. It certainly would simplify my life if my above list of interests were a lot smaller, that if I could obsess over a handful of things, I could dedicate so much of myself to them. My envy is something that comes up from time to time, but it’s one that I can generally keep in check by reminding myself that my numerous interests help define who I am, and were that to change, I’d be a much different person. The appeal that trivia has had for me led me to the discovery of all of my interests, and while I never can become an otaku (weak or strong), I’m perfectly fine with that8. If I were to concentrate on a small subset of my above list, I’d miss out on not just other interests, but other people who share these interests. The thrill of discovering something new would also be lost if I were to obsess over a small group of interests, though from time to time, I look upon those who throw themselves in fits of passion toward their passions with a small twinge of jealousy. Incidentally, “passion” is a word I’ve become reluctant to lose, but that’s a topic for a future entry.

Second of a six-part series.

1. Almost as long as what I’m writing here. *cough*↩

2. Or, to paraphrase both Bertolt Brecht and Boards Of Canada, the past is inside the present, and there’s no avoiding nostalgia in the present day.↩

3. There’s more than a whiff of Get Off My Lawn in Oswalt’s post, but nostalgia aside for his own geeky childhood, the piece has merit in and of itself.↩ 

4. A hat tip to William Gibson is due here.↩

5. Instead of saying, “EAT ALL THE THINGS,” I’d be saying here, “COLLECT ALL THE MAPS.”↩

6. Upon hearing such statements, Leica or Hasselblad owners sigh and disdainfully proclaim, “Oh, how cute.”↩

7. The more I use my iPhone for photography, the more I see the wisdom behind the saying, “The best camera is the one that’s with you.“↩

8. An acknowledgement to Jim Coudal‘s Twitter feed is due.↩

 
03/16/13

Story Fatigue

Stories are important mechanisms for conveying values, entertaining audiences, explaining reasons for existence, or any combination of these. Stories are designed to educate, entertain, inspire, anger…and advertise. It’s not hard to miss that in advertisement today, the products being sold want to be more than just a mere commodity. Instead, they want to be imbued with tangential traits, like emotions, personalities, or expressions. How can the XPQ-86 Extruded Plastic Dingus be transformed into something warmer, something that inspires and motivates people to view it as more than a formed hunk of polycarbonate? Easy enough–you tell a story about it.

While not exclusive to the following group, it’s also hard not to miss that small-scale entrepreneurs are in love with telling stories about what they’re selling. You can also call this group indie capitalists, members of the creative class, or even the dreaded term “hipster;” regardless of the term used, there’s no doubt that they’ll use stories to explain everything that went into the Extruded Plastic Dingus you see before you: where the plastic was sourced, how it was formed, why this Dingus exists, and what makes it so compelling and distinctive from anyone else selling Dinguses1. After a while of hearing the stories behind the Dinguses, or whatever the product is that’s being sold, common words and phrases repeat almost to the point of boredom or nausea. It’s really a poor idea to play a drinking game every time someone uses artisan, hand-crafted, local, sustainable, responsible, community, or other like-minded words in their story. For me, it’s difficult to keep all these stories straight as their descriptive terms often blend into one another, leading inevitably toward story fatigue, in which I would neither have the ability to separate one story from another, nor would I care to do so.

Now I’d rather not head down the path toward story fatigue, or worse yet, what may end up following it–parody, mocking, generally being an ass, etc. It’s easy to mock something that exists, but instead of jumping down this lazy escape hatch, it’ll be better for me to figure out what these seemingly similar stories are really about. Are the stories behind the product what they claim to be, that is, are they really stories as defined above2? Or, is it possible that the stories really are something else entirely? How one looks at a story can determine how it is retained, so let’s look at the idea that “story,” in this case, can mean one of two other things: meme or trivia.

The classic definition of “meme” came from Richard Dawkins, as he was using evolutionary concepts to describe how ideas are spread among a culture. A meme is a cultural equivalent of a gene, and operates similarly as a self-replicating unit of transmission. Genes transmit via chemical structures the information necessary to build an organism; likewise, memes carry within itself cultural ideas, symbols, or practices3. The brilliance with Dawkins’ definition comes from how memes spread and evolve over time, much in the same way that evolutionary traits among plants and animals do. Dawkins used fashion, songs, and learned skills in his 1976 book The Selfish Gene to illustrate how memes spread among people, and how they can be altered due to the imperfect ways that these particular objects are copied during transmission. Some element of a song is misheard, some fabrics are chosen for substitutes; the resultant output can be said to have evolved from the original. Fast forward to the present-day, and memes have themselves evolved as  the term now incorporates technological developments since 1976. Advances in data storage, such as audio and video cassettes as well as CD’s and DVD’s, mitigated the imperfections in copying that Dawkins had described. The advent of the Internet and social media rapidly sped up the rate of transmission among an audience. Combine these two technological developments, and the result is a fast way to spread perfect copies of memes to multiple users. 

What advantage is there to having a story really be a meme? Using the means of transmission allows for a story to be communicated rapidly. However, given the sheer amount of information going across social media and the Internet, the story risks being drowned in information overload. If a story were to be a meme, its value would lie solely in its existence, and in the rapid environment of online communication, its existence would be akin to that of a mayfly, designed to flourish in massive numbers for a very brief time before dying off. Is it even possible for a story-as-meme to compete with the blink-and-you’ll-miss-it Internet memes? Should there even be an attempt to create recognition for a product by positioning its story to be along the lines of Rickrolling or the Harlem Shake4? Creating something catchy or memorable that can be communicated quickly has its merits if you’re trying to sell a product or convey a concept, but apart from the mayfly-like nature of memes, there’s the real risk that the meme may be all that’s memorable about the product itself–for example, witness the sock puppet from pets.com or the orange Kozmo scooters that long outlived their parent companies. In short, a story-as-meme can exist, but given its ephemeral nature, it may not be worth the effort to shape a story into this mold. Better instead that the story possess a bit more heft, so onward to trivia: the second possibility. 

As defined today, “trivia” refers to detailed, inessential facts and information ranging from popular culture to arcane topics like baseball statistics. Trivia has more structural retention built into its existence when compared with memes; both memes and trivia can be quickly transmitted, but the detail inherent with trivia makes it harder to retain. Additionally, not everyone who comes across trivia will care enough about it to bother with retention. Since there’s more effort required to hold onto trivia, those creating stories-as-trivia can benefit from knowing what they say will resonate with some members of their audience. The obvious drawback to story-as-trivia is based around a word in the last sentence: “some.” What appeals to one person’s interests won’t appeal to another, so unlike memes, trivia has more of a tendency to lead to compartmentalization. You may have 40 million people who have watched the Harlem Shake video online, but you may then have 40 people who really have a predilection for knowing the specific names of hops that went into the IPA they’re drinking (and these are people who are neither making nor selling the beer). 

Regardless of whether a story is really a meme or trivia in disguise, it serves a larger purpose by making a connection with its audience so that a defined end can be achieved. Will the story be rapidly transmitted so that many people can become briefly aware of it, or will the story connect deeply with only a few highly interested people? This is the major question that those creating stories, particularly to advance a product or concept, will have to answer. Inherent in whatever form their story takes is a sense of trust that’s generally tied into the end goal in mind, but it’s important to realize that this sense of trust is two-fold. The storyteller trusts that the audience will be prompted to act in fashion X, which should lead toward the end goal of Y that the storyteller wants. On the other side, the audience for these stories trusts that what they’re hearing is worth their time, and are prepared to act depending upon the story’s payoff. The idea of story fatigue comes into play here if the audience feels overwhelmed by the volume of information, or the subject matter at hand, or by the manner in which the story is being told. Story fatigue is the audience breaking that trust, by saying that for whatever reason, they’ve stopped caring. Whether a story is in the shape of a meme or trivia, the storyteller must keep in mind the trust relationship the audience has with them, and not to abuse it or else fatigue becomes inevitable.

I gave trivia short shrift in the earlier paragraphs, largely because of the follow-up piece for this post. In it, I’ll examine my own relationship with trivia, and how I’m not so enamored of it as I once was. The issue for me is not so much the trivia as it is the methodology behind its collection. Yes, it’s another process-versus-results article, so stay tuned.

First of a six-part(!) series.

1. Side note: if you’re from Buffalo, NY, please note that this is the Dyngus you’re looking for.↩

2. A shorthand for this sentence would be to ask, “Are the stories behind the product what they claim to be, that is, are they stories qua stories?” However, I’d lose most of my audience while they spent minutes looking up “qua,” then many more minutes defining it so they can understand it. Or I’d lose people simply by using “qua,” as they’d write me off as being even more pretentious than I already am.↩

3. Citation needed, citation provided.↩

4. For future archaeologists reading this article, Rickrolling started in 2007-08, while the Harlem Shake was sooooooo early 2013.↩

03/8/13

Sometimes I’m not me.

Last weekend, Laura and I joined many members of my family at a surprise retirement party given for one of my aunts. Herding family and friends was quite a feat, given that the guest of honor lives in Kentucky, the party organizer lives near Boston, and the party itself happened at a restaurant in Oak Brook, IL. My cousin is to be commended for pulling off this task, as it was no mean one.

My aunt, whom I’ll refer to as KT, is the second-oldest of eight daughters born into a Polish Catholic family residing in Summit, IL. Somehow, this family managed to cram themselves into a two-story brick bungalow that was, for a few years in the late 1970s, a block away from where I lived with my parents. The youngest of the eight daughters, “Lisa,” was my classmate at Walsh Elementary for kindergarten through 2nd grade. All of the attendees at this party had, at one time or another, lived in the Summit/Bedford Park/Argo area of the southwest Chicago suburbs. If you are from Chicago, you may not be that familiar with this area by name, but you may recognize it by its smell due to the massive Corn Products (sorry, Ingredion) plant at the corner of 65th Street and Archer Road. On a hot summer day, the delectable aromas from this plant can make their way over to Midway Airport or I-55 near its junction with the Tri-State Tollway. To this day, the smell of Corn Products makes me hungry–specifically for fried chicken, even though corn starch and fried chicken have nothing to do with one another.

Among the crowd gathered in Oak Brook was KT’s older sister, “Norma Jean,” who was accompanied by her mother-in-law, Angela. I was surprised to see Angela, as she will be 91 very soon, but she was in great spirits. Angela was familiar enough with spirits, as her family used to run Durka Liquors at the corner of 61st and Archer. Given that the Argo Summit area at that time was heavily Slavic, Angela’s family did well for themselves–some stereotypes about Polacks, Ukies, and Russians are true, after all. Angela’s story is rather lengthy, which befits someone of her years, so I’ll pass on some of the better details to talk instead about her son, and my namesake, Donald Switalski.

If you look at a map that focuses on the corner of 63rd and Archer Road–no, go ahead, look–you’ll see a trapezoidal street grid a couple blocks southward. This small grid, which comprises all of the residential section of Bedford Park, is separated from Summit by a curving railroad track that goes from lower right to upper left. Cutting diagonally in the opposite direction is Archer Road, and on its left (west) side is the Corn Products plant. Often, Argo or Argo Summit is said to describe the two towns and its respective township, though as any resident will tell you, Bedford Park and Summit are quite different from one another. The two towns are inextricably linked by history and resources–Bedford Park was a factory town for Corn Products employees to live in; Summit was where these employees shopped, worshiped  drank, and so on. Young kids living in Bedford Park ended up attending school in Summit from junior high onward, or if they went to one of the two Catholic schools in Summit, from 1st grade onward. In short, there was no way one could live in Bedford Park without knowing people in Summit and vice versa. This, then, was the setup for how my father met and befriended Donald Switalski.

Throughout junior high and high school, Donald and my father were inseparable friends. My mother, who also grew up like my father in Bedford Park, was also friends with Donald before she started dating my father. When graduation came for the Argo HS Class of 1967, it was time for this group of three to go their separate ways in college: my mother first went to Illinois State; my father went to Western Illinois (where my mother transferred after a year at ISU); and Donald made his way out to Dakota Wesleyan. From what I’ve been told, all three kept in close contact while discovering what their respective colleges had to offer during their freshman year.

May 4, 1968 was my father’s 19th birthday. This was also the day he received a phone call, telling him that his best friend had drowned in a completely avoidable accident. Of all the stories I had heard my parents and others tell about Donald, almost all focused upon his intelligence. “Donald was a smart kid,” they’d say. “He only did one dumb thing in his life, and that one thing killed him.” Drinking, eating, and immediately swimming afterward would be that thing in question. Nobody was sure what prompted Donald to do this, but such speculation was really immaterial. My father ended up as one of his pall bearers at his funeral, and to this day, nearly 45 years after the accident, a few drinks and memories of Donald will generate far-away stares and glassy eyes for both him and my mother. When it came time for me to enter the world, there was no other option for my name other than his.

The story of my namesake, as it turns out, has plenty to do with my aunt’s retirement party. It is possible that I may have been told this fact in the past, but my memory tends to be more selective than I care to admit. At the time of his death, Donald was dating KT. Suddenly, the party takes on a different light for me, because I’m pretty sure that given all those who were in attendance, many of them saw or thought of my namesake when they were talking or looking at me. Sometimes I would be me. Other times, someone else would be there instead of me. How much power is inherent in a name? Would my name, combined with the memories of Donald, keep him alive in some way? Or would it only serve as a reminder of what was lost and what could have been? Angela definitely is reminded of her own son and sees him through me, particularly since we now live far enough apart that we don’t see each other very often. My own parents, and KT, know me well enough, but I’m pretty sure that there will be triggers I’ll never recognize that bring the memories of Donald back again.

I’ve lived long enough to create my own memories and my own identity. Every so often, I am reminded that I’m not just me, I’m someone else as well: son of a mother, son of a father, and so on. It’s easy enough to make an identity for yourself depending on circumstance, as the work version of me is much different than the home version of me, and the Don I am at 41 is different than the Don at 31 or 21. I feel that I have some sort of control over these facets of my identity. However, what do I do with the identities others have of me that may not be in my control? There’s no desire to attempt any sort of control over these identities others have of me. A younger Don would have had a different answer, but the current me realizes that trying to control those other identities is akin to yelling at clouds for blocking the sun. Instead, I’m learning to step aside. In the times when Donald takes over from Don, when memories of someone I’ve never met takes over my living memories, I will let it be. Donald still lives on in the memories of those who knew him, and he lives on in my name. I should take some comfort in that, as those who knew Donald take comfort in reflecting upon his life.

Come to think of it, I don’t believe I’ve ever visited Donald’s grave site  My guess is that if it ever happened, it was when I was very young. I should fix this during another visit to Chicago–I think we’ve got a lot to talk about.

02/24/13

Proof of concept that I have a camera

Last weekend saw my first significant usage of the new camera. In keeping with the Olympus OM-D’s theme of being powerful and light, I matched up the camera with a thick wrist strap courtesy of Tap & Dye. The wrist strap adds to the camera’s throwback appearance, so I may as well go all-out with it:

Armed only with the kit 12-50mm lens, Laura and I attended the annual Orchid Show held at the Missouri Botanical Garden. Some test shots follow, all of which are JPEG’s straight out of the camera:







Finally, one last picture that some of you may have already seen on Facebook (and yes, you can see me in the reflection of the gecko’s eye):

The full set of the first test is, as usual, on Flickr.

01/12/13

Camera conundrum

The start of 2013 has brought forth a major decision for me: what camera should I purchase? I have decided that it’s time to move away from the DSLR world in  general (and Pentax in particular), as the mirrorless camera format has matured enough to offer the features and convenience I seek. There is a mirrorless Pentax camera, the K-01, which would have accepted all of the lenses I had owned up to last month, but this model has too many compromised features for me to take it seriously as my next camera. Therefore, the Pentax camera went away, and now I’m simply using the iPhone 5 for photos. To illustrate the effectiveness of the iPhone 5 (and 4), click here to watch an entertaining set of photos taken with the Hipstamatic app:

Why mirrorless? I moved from the point-and-shoot world to a DSLR in the spring of 2008, thanks to Jen Santarelli selling off her Nikon D50. The small point-and-shoot cameras were easy to tote around, but I wanted to shoot photos with more detail, as well as to shoot different types of pictures that I couldn’t easily do with a small Canon PowerShot. The Nikon D50, and its Pentax K-x successor that was purchased in December 2009, taught me a lot about photography, and I have been happy with the quality of the photos that both cameras made. What I didn’t like about either of these cameras was the size of their bodies, as it always felt like a production to take one with me for any sort of shoot. They embodied a seriousness that I really couldn’t sell, and their presence alone often elicited a reaction similar to the Hawthorne Effect–people noticed the cameras and lenses, and would adjust their behavior accordingly.

At the time I was looking at the Pentax K-x, the mirrorless cameras had only been publicly available for a couple of years, and the technology behind them was still in its infancy. Only Olympus and Panasonic were making cameras and lenses that supported the Micro Four Thirds system, and the picture quality was not as high as most DSLR’s yet better than the point-and-shoot cameras that were still popular. Three years later, the mirrorless camera format has matured to the point where every major camera manufacturer offers models in this format, though with proprietary lens mount systems that have nothing to do with their larger DSLR brethren. The point-and-shoot world has been largely decimated by the advent of better cameras on smartphones, which is why there’s been a small yet important development of higher-end point-and-shoot cameras like the Sony RX100. The big two camera manufacturers, Nikon and Canon, have deigned to offer cameras in the mirrorless market, though with legitimate fear that success in the mirrorless camera world can cannibalize sales of their lower-end DSLR’s. As of this writing, only Sony’s NEX-series cameras (with the E-mount lens system), and the Micro Four Thirds cameras from Olympus and Panasonic have attracted third-party vendors to provide lenses, flashes, and other accessories. It’s this successful attraction that has placed Sony, Panasonic, and Olympus on my shortlist.

The other big reason for me to go mirrorless is the size factor. Many of the mirrorless cameras are significantly smaller than DSLR’s, and would be easier to carry with me without making its transport such a large production. Smaller cameras may equate to “less serious” in some minds, but I harbor no illusions toward being a serious photographer. For me, it’s a fun hobby, and I take no shame in saying that I am a hobbyist photographer. Between the size of the cameras, and the ability to use lenses from many manufacturers, I would say that the mirrorless system is for me. Now which one to get? That still hasn’t been answered, but I am strongly leaning towards the Olympus OM-D, with the Sony NEX-6 as a second choice. The Sony is cheaper and has a larger processor than the Olympus, while the Olympus offers better lens choices and a higher-quality (yet smaller) processor. Neither camera is perfect, but both offer up options that excite me. By the end of the month, I’ll have made my decision.

01/1/13

Every year sees progress and change. I resolve to keep progressing and changing.

There. That’s a resolution I’ll keep.

If there have been themes to 2012 for me, they would be about evolution and recognition. I recognize that I’m not a young adult anymore, so in conjunction with this awareness, this year has been one of significant investment in updating my appearance. A substantial amount of inspiration has come from the fashion blog Put This On, though more so for a general direction than outright emulation. Other elements of inspiration have come from a belated reaction to the seemingly enforced casualness in attire I see around me at work or at play. When the Saint Louis area goes through yet another one of its scorching hot and humid summers, it makes sense to be as casual and as comfortable as possible. Otherwise, I see no need to do so. As proof of this recognition, many of my Threadless T-shirts will be going away very soon–some will serve as colorful undershirts, but others will end up in Goodwill for younger hipsters to buy. In short, apart from summertime I’m comfortable in slightly dressier attire, and I’m comfortable with this knowledge. So it goes.

I have also recognized that my time is better spent avoiding people or things that drain me. My last post detailed the thought process that led me back to blogging, so there’s no need to rehash that here. Instead, some additional thoughts: it’s not original of me to say that social media has evolved to the point where relationships there are the same as they are in the physical world. Just like in the physical world, there are people who give of themselves because of their personalities, and those who demand lots of time and emotion but give little in return. The same can be said of the social media platforms, hence why I like the give-and-take of Twitter and dislike the neediness of Facebook. My usage of Facebook is, in some ways, the opposite of what its intent is, as I will often post articles, video clips, songs, and other things that interest me as opposed to talking about myself. In some ways, this is my way of giving outward. It’s nice to have some feedback for what I post, but it’s not required, nor would I ever demand that from anyone reading it. Likewise, with the relations I have with people in the physical world, I make it a point not to be demanding time, attention, or emotions from others. I can make adjustments to how I use Facebook, but I have no desire to do likewise for those people who demand much but give little. With this recognition made manifest, it is up to me to push off the lampreys who do little but suck away at my time, my energy, or my emotion; they need to swim onward and find new prey. 

OK, that last paragraph got a bit heavy in tone, which wasn’t the intent I had in mind when I started to write it. Sorry for the unexpected twist! Going from fashion to lampreys is a huge, non-linear jump, but let’s try to make sense of them both. Both paragraphs reflect some aspects of what life was like for me in 2012, as I have made this year one in which I’ve become more at ease with myself and with who I am. There’s less of a burning desire to prove myself to people, and instead, I’d rather just be myself. You might be inclined to say that this is a year in which I’ve “grown up,” and I wouldn’t be upset if you used that phrase. It’s probably about time, too. 

Next month, there will be a photography post about a new camera I’ll be acquiring, plus another post that follows along the line of this one. The topic of that post will be recognizing that the hipster is the modern-day descendant of the 80s-era yuppie, and how after a lot of reflection, I’m OK with this linkage. Until then, Happy 2013 to you all.

12/5/12

I most certainly am.

Without exercise, the mind goes limp. 

I haven’t really thought about a return to blogging for most of 2012. I ended my updates to my LiveJournal at the beginning of this year, neatly ending a run of exactly 10 years that was largely enjoyable. The social aspect of LiveJournal evolved, or should I say, devolved, near the end of my ten years there, and it became harder and harder to justify writing to a diminishing audience. Whenever I’d look at my LJ profile, I would see the ghosts of former interactions, and much like a dying shopping mall, going there became increasingly sad…so I stopped.

Without exercise, the mind goes limp.

Excepting Twitter, I found other social media outlets unable to fulfill my desire to write and communicate. Tumblr could have been a great format for me, but I loathe its reblogging system for the laziness it seems to inspire in what passes for interaction there. It’s very easy to click on Like or Reblog–and I’m only insulting what I’ve personally done myself–but I consider that to be pretty shallow in terms of social interaction. Reblogging also leads to horribly nested comments that I find practically impossible to follow, so for me, Tumblr’s strength is its weakness. Moving on…

I had some observations about Facebook that I originally typed up in an earlier draft of this post, but to save time, I’ll encourage you to read what Matt Haughey said with regards to comparing Facebook to Twitter. There are two things I need to say in addition to Matt’s excellent post:

  1. Ditto.
  2. Facebook encourages superficial, breezy, pleasantries as being the primary form of communication. It’s a world-spanning site that’s largely small talk. Attempts at trying to break out into long-form communication, or to talk about matters of the day, often end poorly. One only needs to look back at how Facebook discussions regarding the recently-ended Presidential election would often dissolve into ugliness to see what I mean.

My old photography blog, which is saved under the Old Site category, is worth reading if only to remind myself that there’s not a whelk’s chance in a supernova that I can ever stay on one topic. I know myself a little too well for that, so it’s not a surprise that it failed. Additionally, demands outside of home sapped a lot of my mental energy, so I didn’t feel that I was taking enough photos to justify having a photo-centric blog.

This now leads me back, effectively, to where I left off at the beginning of 2012. Instead of looking at LiveJournal or WordPress, it’s time to branch out and use my own name (hosted ably by Squarespace) and exercise my brain for whomever may be interested. Perhaps it’ll be just me, though I doubt that will be the case. Not having an immediate social network to plug into will be a new venture, but I view this particular change as being similar to my decreasing use of online aliases. I’m trying to drop the pretense and the pretend, and just be me. So, whether this is for the first time or the 8789th, the answer to the question is: yes, I’m Don. 

02/29/12

Every Photographer Goes Through a Phase of Disappointment

Ira Glass, of NPR fame, gave a speech about the art of storytelling. An excerpt from the speech has made the online rounds, as it specifically addresses the problem faced by people who pursue creative endeavors and how many of these people give up early on in the development of their craft. If you haven’t read or heard this speech, please spend a couple of minutes at the prior link and then get back to me…Caught up? OK, good.

My relation to Glass’ speech ties in to the end of last year’s Ireland 2001 Trip project. I became increasingly disappointed at what I had perceived to be a lack of feedback regarding the project; more to the point, the feedback I was hoping to get from the people who were documented in these posts didn’t come. The idealist in me was hoping that, based on my own posts and photos, other family members depicted in the entries would then reminisce about their own journey experiences from 2001. After all, the trip was and still is a seminal point in my family’s history, not only because it was the first trip outside the US for most of the participants, but because it was all about my grandfather wishing to share his personal history with his family. As my idealism faded with the progression of the project, the pragmatist in me simply hoped that the family members would have acknowledged the work I was doing to ensure me I wasn’t posting into thin air. Neither my idealist nor pragmatist side won out; instead, it was disappointment all the way down. That lack of recognition from my family bothered me for quite some time at the end of 2011, and I started to question why I even bothered with photography as a means of self-expression. I am aware how self-discovery and artistic growth can be its own reward, but did I really want to simply be pleasing myself as an audience of one? Life has trained me to handle positive or negative feedback, but indifference leaves me tongue-tied and fumbling about to develop a coherent response.

For the remainder of 2011, my enthusiasm for photography diminished. In spite of some fun excursions in Chicago with my wife, and a separate architecture-themed photowalk with the woman behind This Belongs In A Museum, I had difficulty finding the inspiration necessary to capture the moment. I will admit that there was a partial distraction from November 2011 to January 2012 in the form of a massive computer upgrade, but even if that factor were excused, I still didn’t feel too excited about grabbing the camera and shooting again.

(If you are so inclined, please see my blurry BEFORE and AFTER iPhone photos to find out more about the specs of my new computer. I’m quite happy with the results, particularly as Lightroom actually runs instead of slowing my entire machine to a crawl when processing a photo. Additionally, all the hype about solid-state drives? Totally justified.)

With the start of a new year, and the completion of my PC Upgrade project, it’s time for me to start anew. When I started a new job last May, I threw out the cynical and petty attitude that I held at my prior employer as it proved harmful to me there. A new job means new people and a new environment, so it deserves a new attitude from me. Such an approach has paid off quite well so far, so why not do the same outside of work? I want to wash away all of my pettiness I held regarding my family’s lack of reaction to my Ireland project, and there’s no better way to do that than by gaining a new perspective. The PC Upgrade was a welcome distraction from stewing about how my Ireland project was received, as I needed to give myself a break from overthinking that particular plate of beans. I could concentrate on the specs of the new machine, compare various components, and effectively lose myself into technical minutiae as I am wont to do. Much like in the Ira Glass piece, the PC Upgrade was a project with clear goals and a deadline, so by focusing on building a new computer from scratch, I gave myself that chance to achieve fulfillment and satisfaction in something else that wasn’t photography–and more importantly, I needed that feeling of accomplishment before I was to move onward and rejoin the shutterbug world.

A new audience of photographers came my way when I started taking classes at the Saint Louis Photo Authority through its Meetup group. I have found that I learn best with other people present, as I enjoy the give-and-take from different people (hence one reason why online classes would feel incomplete to me were I to take them). The classes are somewhat free-form to allow for plenty of creativity, yet there’s an underlying structure that allows the participants to achieve an end goal. Maybe that goal is to have five pictures out of 100 that you like, or maybe it’s to finally understand why shutter speeds, aperture, and ISO settings all relate to one another. Whatever that goal may be, there’s a feeling of accomplishment that comes from this work, but here’s a key difference–it doesn’t feel like “work.” The people in these classes prod each other on in their own way, be it in the form of providing advice on model posing, camera settings, or simply by sharing stories of adventures in Argentina. In its own way, the Meetups tie into the “lot of work” aspect Glass mentions, yet by disguising its nature, the dreary obligatory feeling often tied into the concept of work isn’t present.

One last thing about the audience for the Ireland project: I know that the pictures were viewed and commented upon by a cross-section of people on both sides of the Atlantic Ocean. My in-laws followed each entry posted online, and because I shared these entries on Facebook, LiveJournal (now dormant), and Flickr, I was receiving acknowledgement for the work I had done. And yet, while I do appreciate what had been said by the aforementioned, I felt as if that weren’t enough because I could not get the audience I felt I wanted. Perhaps, to make one last tie-in to Ira Glass, the gap between the audience I wanted and what I got was due to my tastes and desires not fully meshing with the output. It’s possible that the Ireland project wasn’t considered to be that meaningful to the family members depicted as they have their own memories, and many of them already have photos of their own from that trip. I could have been expecting the family members to be awed by the finished product when in fact they may have been merely whelmed by it. So yes, I could be guilty of overselling the project’s impact to myself, and I’ll need to adjust my expectations as I do more work in the future. Additionally, I also have to realize that I can’t force an audience to react in any way once the finished product is out there. I can cajole, inflame, or tease the viewer with the photos, but in the end the viewer is responsible for the reaction. Even if that reaction is one of indifference, I have to accept it as just as valid of a response as adoration or hatred or anything in the vast gaps in-between.

So now here I am, with an improved outlook on photography and new people to share it with. Going forward, there will be some significant changes to this photoblog in 2012. First up, actual photo posts–that’s self-explanatory. Second, a new look to the site. Third, a new site URL. Fourth, a new showcase site for the photos courtesy of 500px. I hope to implement these changes throughout March, though I’m pretty sure they won’t all be completed by month’s end. Still, consider yourself notified, and keep watching for more updates. Really.