Knuckledragger

$1,625 with 4:20 left. Someone page HighLife.

Last year I spent over $200 on slide film, developing, and scanning. I was really underwhelemed with the results. This made me more than a little embittered, so I stopped shooting film after I got back the last rolls. Late last month, my stepfather's oldest son gave me his late 70s Ektragraphic slide projector and screen. Earlier this evening, I set them up and loaded the slides from the first two rolls of Velvia 50 I shot into the carousel and looked at them. The projector has some real issues, its focus knob doesn't work, so I have to manually move the lens with my hand. This makes perfect focus impossible, but it still enabled me to get a very good idea what the slides look like. My discoveries were almost universally positive. There are some underexposed shots, and a few that are poorly composed or have other flaws. By and large, I really liked what I saw. When one shoots transparency (slide) film, there is no negative. The slides are the film that went through the camera. What I saw on the screen is exactly what I shot. Velvia 50's colors are beautiful to the point of being surreal. What is now painfully obvious to me is that the lab I have been using (Iris Photo in Northampton, MA) suck giant festering moose balls when it comes to scanning. They have displayed astounding incompetence in other areas, but apparently they save their best work for film scanning. This is really grating because I pay them $20 a roll to have the film scanned, on top of a $20 developing fee and $12 for the fucking roll of film. In one sense, I'm fortunate that they're around, as there is no other place remotely near me that still develops slide film. Slide film development is a science and not an art. As long as the machine doing the work is calibrated correctly, properly exposed slides come out looking OK. What is now painfully clear to me is that slide processing is all that the Iris staff are good for. I need to buy a slide scanner, and soon. Unfortunately, the good ones are not cheap. Furthermore, proper film scanning is a process nearly as fussy as the actual exposure. The prospect doesn't bother me too much. I put considerable effort into shooting slide film last year, and was rewarded with crummy results. I think I have found a way to correct that.

Do you have either Radioactive Man album or any Two Lone Swordsmen?

I dunno, I think they used Blago's coif. Or maybe John Edwards.

This contains a pretty major BSG spoiler. http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=LW2_2ihIuzI

Nice of you to post some of your home videos, Billy. The original: The meme it spawned:

Attempted to make up for the day I missed this week being ill. Sort-of succeeded. Bought an RF cable for my housemate, who had apparently already got one the day before. Bought a new #1.5 comb for my clippers. The idiot salesdroid kept calling an "inch and a half" comb, even though #1.5 = 3/16" Bought a 5W CFL for my mum, so she can see to get to the washing machine. Explained to mum that CFLs are fluorescent, and are more efficient when left on. Also explained that the 5W CFL consumed the same power as the 5W incandescent nightlight she had been using, even though the CFL was approximately 8x brighter. Bought curtain rods for the front and back doors. Determined that the screws for the the curtain rod brackets were too long. Spent the better part of an hour finding suitable replacements. Installed the curtain rod on the back door. Got tired and hungry, gave up on the front door.

After a nasty bout of food poisoning that kept me in bed most of the previous day, I woke up quite early. I noticed that there was nice early dawn sky. As usually happens, my efforts to photograph it ended poorly. I did manage to snap a couple pictures of my new front door and outside lanterns. I didn't waste too much time framing, as it was bloody cold outside.

Apparently a sharp blow to the head can make the human brain develop super powers.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=3FgMLROTqJ0

HIGH-FIVE INAUGURATION! from Almost Twins A pity I couldn't get it to embed.

Nice 1200, Pete.