Red Truck.

On a mission at the Home Depot this Saturday I spied a pretty Chevrolet pickup parked over by the tool rental area, and stopped to shoot a few quick pictures of it. It was clean but used, the sheetmetal dinged and dented but obviously cared for.

Pictures on the interwebs indicate it's somewhere between a 1947 and 1953 model, and it's obviously a driver. I like the fact that it's clean, not modified, and doesn't have stupid mag rims or ground effects.

Posted on August 12, 2008 3:11 PM | link to this entry

Wordle.

Ha! This is fun. Wordle takes the feed from your website or weblog and makes a pretty, customizable font cloud from it.

Posted on August 11, 2008 8:59 PM | link to this entry

Eureka! BOOM.

Update from the local Panera: After being chased from the house by an electricity-killing thunderstorm, I have finally, FINALLY cracked a DHTML tab panel problem I've been banging my head against for the last week, which feels like the weight of the world has been lifted from my shoulders. Essentially, the script I'd started with was using the visibility attribute of CSS instead of the display attribute, and in concert with some poorly-advised absolute positioning, the whole thing was appearing outside the document flow (floating above everything else instead of pushing the content downward gracefully). After trying and discarding about ten different scripts, I came back to my old reliable one and finally made it work. Hallelujah.

Posted on July 23, 2008 4:17 PM | link to this entry

That Could Have Gone Better.

Remember when we were kids, and we'd play games out in the street or in someone's backyard, and we'd call a do-over? Somebody'd kick the ball into a bush, or a car would come down the road right in the middle of an important play, and it was universally understood that things would just rewind a couple of minutes and start again, like erasing a videotape. Well, I'd like a do-over for most of yesterday, please.

It started out on an upbeat note; Mr. Scout brought over the window regulator for the Jeep and we tore the door down to put it in; unfortunately, the part was not a match to the one in my Jeep, and there seemed to be no way to use parts from the replacement to fix the broken unit.

We then decided to take advantage of the weather and go back to the pick & pull yard to hunt more Jeeps. It seems that parts (and part vehicles) are more plentiful for Grand Cherokees than for the regular model, both online and in the junkyard, and my particular model (2-door, second generation, power window) is even rarer than the 4-door. We did however find a junked PT Cruiser, which featured luxurious bucket seats that are supposed to be bolt-in replacements for Scout seats. Eight bolts later, we were walking up to the pay area with the seats on our heads, but not before making a detour to a section of the yard we hadn't seen before, featuring some ancient Detroit iron: a three-porthole Buick, a rounded early 50's Ford, and a pair of Opels, among other things. I shot about ten pictures, and we were on our way. As we got up to the counter, the redneck in charge of shoplifting told me they have a strict no-camera policy, and made me erase my memory card after giving me some bullshit about smashing lenses.

Returning to the Scout we'd found last week, we pulled a lot of plastic and other rare parts, having no luck pulling the hubs or the seat bases. It was about this time I checked my phone and found this lovely sight:

I don't know when or how it happened, but it was enough to ruin my day right there. Strangely, I can still call in and out, and the touchscreen still works on the damaged areas. I'm going to visit the Apple store to see if there's some kind of repair they can make; if not, it looks like I'll be purchasing a 3G iPhone earlier than I planned.

My afternoon was spent working on an illustration; I decided to experiment with an idea I'd had a few months ago to see what results I'd get, using the negative space instead of the positive. The results were a lot less than I'd hoped for.

The linework looks cheaper, like a quick marker drawing, and not expressive like I'd imagined. It also could be because I've been having problems getting my cutting nibs to vary line weights properly—they seem to get dull very quickly, which is not what I'm used to. If I could regulate line weight better, I'd be happier with the results.

I took the same sketch and started making a traditional cut, and about three-quarters of the way through I realized the initial sketch, while reasonably good, did not capture McCain the way it should, and the resulting piece looks like someone else (Jen says it's Ed McMahon). His head is not as long as I'd made it here, and his distinguishing features aren't represented well enough.

There were several highlights from yesterday, so it's not like I was constantly followed by a black stormcloud: we have Andersen 400-series windows officially on order for the front porch. Jen had a great client meeting on a new project, and we got our second delivery from the organic farm (I don't know how we're going to eat all this lettuce, chard, and spinach). I was just hoping to produce a success of my own, something I'm sure everyone can understand.

So it's back to the drawing board for Jeep, phone, and scratchboard.

Update: One trip to the Apple Store, my choices were thus:

1. Continue to use the busted phone and guess at everything on the left side of the screen.
2. Wait until July and buy a new 3G iPhone for $200, but take an additional $10/mo. hit on my data plan.
3. Spend $250 to replace my iPhone with another 1st gen model.

I chose 3, because I'd love to have the 3G but I don't want to pay AT&T an additional $120/mo. for features I may not even use. As it was, when the Genius rang me out, he told me happily they'd just reduced the replacement cost from $250 to $199, so I "saved" a little more money.

Upon inspection of the iPhone cases available at the store, only a select few might have protected my phone from catastrophic screen damage, and they tended to be the ugliest offerings on the shelf. (Imitation calfskin? stitched black leather? I don't think so).

Posted on June 13, 2008 8:56 AM | link to this entry | comments (2)

TechShop

Check it—an episode of BoingBoingTV with a cameo by my friend John, about TechShop, a Silicon Valley community tinkering space. Instead of a normal tool library with hammers and drills, this is a shop with stuff like CNC plasma cutting machines, full-size hydraulic presses and three-dimensional printers. The last time I was out in San Francisco, I met up with John for dinner, and he was telling us all about this place—this is yet another reason I would love to move to California.

Posted on May 3, 2008 11:35 AM | link to this entry

Relics and Artifacts

Our new gallette iron (Berarducci model Grand GI-3) showed up yesterday! It's in absolutely beautiful condition when compared to the other one I bought last year. Notice the difference in the size of the patterns—the top is a Petit GI-1. I must now resist the urge to track down a GI-2 to complete the trio.

And, as a heartfelt and thoughtful birthday gift, the Scout's new daddy gave me this beautiful display case, with a fender badge cut from the original sheet metal and a copy of the VIN tag (he needs the real thing to re-register the chassis with the DMV). I need to dig up my Chewbacca action figure and put him in the case too.

Posted on March 28, 2008 10:26 AM | link to this entry | comments (2)

Touring Car

My bride and I have a history of antiquing together. The first time I asked her out was to take a trip up to Frederick to go warehouse digging (this was before all the warehouses got turned into lofts and good, inexpensive antiques were still somewhat available). I found that we gravitated towards a lot of the same things and that our tastes in design and history were very compatible. It was the beginning of a beautiful friendship, and later, a beautiful marriage.

So when she told me about the DC Big Flea, I was immediately interested. We dragged ourselves out of bed and got on the road as early as we could to get the "good stuff", whatever that might be. Having never been before, we weren't sure what to expect, but it turned out to be much better than the average local junk markets found around here. We found huge selections of furniture, pottery, collectibles and other stuff jammed into two large convention halls, stuffed to the gills with shoppers and surrounded by filled parking lots. We took a couple of hours to browse the aisles, but didn't find anything we needed—but lots of stuff we wanted.

Flea markets like this can be overwhelming and numbing after a while, because of the sheer amount of stuff to look at. Every once in a while, something stood out among the clutter. For example: sitting upon one table was a beautiful pressed metal touring car, long and lean, designed with curves and lines from a quarter century ago. But what caught our eyes was the matching bubble trailer behind it, something that looks more like a spaceship from the era of Flash Gordon. The long nose of the car hints at a big V-12 growling under the hood, while the front windows of the trailer remind me of the Rocketeer's helmet, a collection of curves unique to the era.

Of course, the price was prohibitive, but I was able to snap a couple of quick shots of it before moving on.

Posted on January 14, 2008 12:16 AM | link to this entry

The Skeptic.

A few months ago I was contacted through my Flickr account about possible usage of a photo I'd taken in Georgia during a loooong commencement speech. At first, I was a little skeptical about the whole thing, but the gentleman who inquired explained the purpose and scope of the project, and I signed on board. After negotiation of rights and agreeing on a price, I sat back and waited to see what happened. Things were quiet for a while until last week, right before Christmas, when an envelope with an unfamiliar New York address appeared in the mail bearing a check. I've provided a wide variety of creative services over the years, and now I'm happy to add photography to the list.

Posted on December 27, 2007 6:06 PM | link to this entry

Published.

The 2007 Directory of Illustration, page 510.

Posted on December 5, 2007 9:23 AM | link to this entry | comments (2)

Franklintown Inn

Hidden away in an odd corner of Baltimore City lies the Franklintown Inn, which at one time was probably a hopping place, and most likely was a waypoint for travelers on the west side of town. Now the entry to the bar is around back, which caters to a questionable-looking crowd (I'm sure they're all fine, upstanding citizens) and the front parking lot holds an abandoned winnebago and a sad-looking boat. Today the front of the inn is closed up and dark, and a second-floor porch holds a heap of random bicycles, with no indication of use.

This sign is in decent shape on one side, but the neon on the other has been battered by the branches of an overgrown tree. It's another beautiful product of the Triangle Sign Company of Baltimore, who have been in business for seventy-four years, and who are responsible locally for the Brewer's Hill signage, the Port Discovery signage, and for the new signage at Fenway Park.

Posted on November 30, 2007 11:25 AM | link to this entry

Tuck and Roll, Baby

This afternoon I went out to take a look at a Kustom bass cabinet for sale down the street. Kustom was a company making musical amplifiers from the 60's until the early 80's, and their gear was known for its distinctive tuck-and-roll covering, as well as its powerful sound.

Built in Chanute, Kansas, The Bass 250 was available in black, blue, white, red, green, and silver flecked naugahyde, and put out 250 earth-shattering watts through two separate channels and a matching reflex ported cabinet (where a hole with a specially tuned tube increases the low-range frequency response). Unusual for their day, Kustom amplifiers all used solid state transistors when their competitors were still using tubes.

The seller fired the amp up after plugging in a keyboard, and he noodled around a bit while I tested out the controls. The amp shook my teeth at a volume of 2, so it's a fair bet these go to eleven. The naugahyde is in fair shape, if not dirty, and the grille cloth is stained and has several small tears; the face of the amp head is suffering from some rust or water damage. And last but most importantly, while standing in front of the cabinet, I caught the distinct odor of cat pee. Further olifactory investigation was inconclusive—I couldn't tell if the smell was from the big puffy amp or some of the other vintage gear laying around.

Am I considering this? You bet your ass. Do I know his asking price? yes, and it might be a little high. Some cash and a smile might change his mind...

Posted on November 14, 2007 11:08 PM | link to this entry | comments (2)

Full Plate.

As if I didn't have enough work this fall, I've also gotten back to my illustration after abandoning pausing it for a couple of months. The kick in the pants I needed was an email I got from the Directory of Illustration, informing me that the book I've been paying off since April will be shipping sometime in November, which got me both excited and panicked at the same time. I don't have a whole lot of new work to show besides the stuff I published in the book (the Alphabet Project is great, but I need to show a lot of editorial work if I want any jobs) so I'm on a crash schedule for the rest of this month to crank out some new work. I've got about ten non-AP pieces ready, with two more concepts waiting in the wings, so I think I'm on track to have fifteen ready by November 1.

Part of the new assignment is to do an illustration for each of Naomi Wolf's 10 Steps to Fascism, a subject I've been mulling over for the last couple of months. Finding the article was a gift. The first idea came to me in a burst of inspiration, and the next two appeared pretty quickly (even if I'm having a hard time making one of them work correctly). The goal here is to have at least three solid ideas for each new assignment by the end of the year—it's a matter of training the brain to think conceptually again, which is a lot like learning how to write with your non-dominant hand.

I also installed a fresh copy of Movable Type 4.0 on my portfolio site, and I'm going to revamp things around there a bit to make that new weblog a more integral part of the site—I'll use it for showcasing work in progress, illustration subjects and websites, and general art subjects that don't fit here. That should be enough to keep me busy for a while: writing here, there, as well as developing websites and (hopefully) illustrating professionally again. yikes!

Pretty ambitious, huh? I may not have the whole thing up and running by 1 November, but I intend to have something new to share that Thursday. Keep your eyes open and your fingers crossed for me.

Posted on October 19, 2007 4:25 PM | link to this entry

Knives

Another classic, onsite at a client location.

Posted on July 20, 2007 5:10 PM | link to this entry

Slight Interruption of Service.

I made some minor changes to the templates around here that had major implications on the layout of the site, so if you see anything busted, please feel free to let me know.

(This is all in advance of a site redesign, which hasn't gotten off the ground due to paying work commitments.)

Posted on May 25, 2007 11:34 AM | link to this entry

Shameless Plug.

Oh, by the way, I finally got this set up today. My quest for global domination has begun.

Posted on April 30, 2007 4:10 PM | link to this entry

...and my right arm, too.

Some quick price checking on the Adobe Creative Suite for both Jen and I leads to a sobering realization: In order to get the components I need (Photoshop, Illustrator) in CS3, I'll have to spend $1,583 on the Web Premium edition. Strangely, the Web Standard edition doesn't come with Photoshop or Illustrator, which I'd compare to selling a new car without an engine or tires.

However, she can get the Design Standard edition for $1,187 with everything she'd need to work—the Design Premium edition includes Flash and Dreamweaver. This is like selling a car with an optional jacuzzi tub and heated sunporch—sure, they're nice, but do they really go with the base product?

Posted on April 11, 2007 9:32 AM | link to this entry

Name That Crazy

Any guesses?

Posted on April 10, 2007 9:32 PM | link to this entry | comments (3)

Going Back To Cali.

It's not quite official yet, but OK, it's official. The word on the street is that I'm headed back out to San Francisco at the end of this month for a project kickoff meeting with a new client (I'm keeping names and places confidential). I will be spending the next two weeks brushing up on several new technologies, a content management system, and my sparkling personality.

* * *

In other news, a brief interruption in Movable Type service here at Idiot Central was traced back to a botched install of MT-Akismet in hopes of stemming the tide of comment spam. I was about to freak out yesterday when all I got after logging in to the management section was a blank page, but I walked away from it for half a day and remembered what things I'd monkeyed with when the site started to go south. So, to sum up: When the manual says that MT-Akismet doesn't work with MT 3.1, it's not kidding.

* * *

I'm finding that installing and configuring a private VPN is about as easy as assembling a nuclear reactor underwater with directions in Chinese. I'm not a stupid man, but do they make this shit impossible to understand on purpose? Seriously, I haven't had to deal with this many acronyms at one time in my life! And it seems like the vendors all have different acronyms for the same thing. Just call it one word and be done with it, you dorks.

* * *

After a good bit of time in development, I've posted a replacement for (what I considered) one of the weaker illustrations at the Alphabet Project, the letter Q. I was trying something different, but I wasn't ever really happy with the solution. The new solution is in the form of a concert poster for a show I didn't attend, and it stars a lady I figured I'd find much more about here on the internets-but didn't. I wound up using screen grabs from a video I found online for photo reference.

I'm also working furiously on new art for a larger project, something I've been threatening to do for years, and something it took a well-timed and much appreciated push from my wife to actually begin: I made a down payment for an advertisement at the Directory of Illustration last week. The Directory is a combination of marketing tools which include a searchable website, a hardback book which gets distributed in the fall, and a pile of other resources for promotion. This means that my work will be seen by a ton of new people very quickly. This also means I need to have a page layout for the book by the beginning of May, and I have space reserved for 20 illustrations on their website right now. Part of my revisit to the Alphabet Project is to clean up the work I'm not entirely happy with, which means that Paul Bremer will get a rework. Mark Felt will probably get looked at (or maybe replaced). And Interpol will probably get cleaned up too. Once I've got that stuff looking tight, I'm going to post a handful on the other site and see if anything happens.

I don't think I'm going to be sleeping much in the near future...

Posted on March 15, 2007 10:30 PM | link to this entry

Separated At Birth.

Waaaaay back in march of last year I wrote about a book I was reading called Imperial Grunts, a current tour of various known and not-so-known US military adventures overseas. As part of my self-assigned illustration series, I did a cover illustration for the book in April of 2006, mocked it up based on the cover of the existing book, then filed it away until I was finished with the Alphabet Project.

Last night, while assembling the next version of my portfolio, I dusted off the image and set it up in my Photoshop template. While Googling for the book so that I could pull a quote for the text of the page, I noticed they'd changed the cover from the first printing:

I don't believe I ever posted this picture to the web (correct me if you think I may be wrong here.) The coincidence made me laugh out loud, although I can't use the image in my portfolio. I've been struggling to get my conceptual brain back into gear for the last couple of months, and seeing this other solution made me believe that I might not be doing so badly after all.

* * *

In other news: Scooter Libby is guilty. Ha ha indeed!

Posted on March 6, 2007 11:41 AM | link to this entry

Checking In.

Yeah, I'm alive. Very busy with work and house, so this space is being neglected. However, I had some spare time a few weeks ago and tackled a long-neglected chore: standardizing and cleaning up my old weblog archives, which were creaky and busted. I got all the way back to mid-2002, but I've hit the point where I was doing a different layout each month (hand coded old-skool, baby) and the process takes a little longer. I have dreams of importing it all into MT here, but that's a task for a month where I have absolutely nothing else to do.

Posted on January 19, 2007 12:15 PM | link to this entry

Democrats '08

Three of the Democratic front-runners.

Posted on December 27, 2006 12:08 PM | link to this entry

Red Top Market

On the way back from New Jersey.

Posted on December 5, 2006 12:47 PM | link to this entry

Enter the Nikon.

I've been looking at DSLRs for years now, wishing I could afford to buy one, and I've spent a ton of time researching and comparing brands and models. My immediate intent was to find a good camera to help Jen ease back into photography, especially after all her film from Ireland Italy was expensively misprocessed and the liars at Ritz Camera tried to tell us it was the fault of the airport x-ray machinery. (They didn't even offer to comp us on the processing. Stay away from Ritz.)

After I got several good-sized paychecks in hand this fall, I paid off some bills, put a chunk in the bank, and started hunting seriously for her camera. The reviews seemed to be pretty even in favor of each brand, which didn't help me much. I've been a proponent of Canon since I bought my G3, and I love the simplicity of their menu/UI systems. The manuals are top-notch, the support is superb, and the camera itself has been bombproof. However, the DSLRs Canon offers in my price range feel cheap and plasticky in my hands, like they were put together with Legos and a hot glue gun. When I picked up a Nikon, it felt real in my hands, like a film SLR does, and that felt reassuring and good. After some exhaustive research, I finally gave up and took this guy's advice, buying a new D50 kit for a delayed birthday present. I think she's happy with it, and I was impressed with it when I held it in my hands. It's a solid camera, the lens is fantastic, and it takes beautiful pictures.

As fate would have it, an older D70 came up on Craigslist a few weeks later for a very reasonable price, and I bought it. I've been playing with it slowly ever since. It's been a little hard because I only got the body—the seller wanted to keep the expensive lens for his new D80, so I needed something to use in the meantime. As it turns out, Nikon hasn't changed their basic lens mount in ages, so later-model Nikon lenses will fit newer DSLRs, at the cost of some of the advanced features. Jen has a Nikon N65 film SLR, and I've borrowed her Quantaray NF AF 28-80mm lens to learn the camera. The pictures are clear but the contrast is low, which I'm guessing is due to the lens not being made specifically for DSLR cameras, and the lens not talking properly to the camera. I've yet to do a side-by-side lens comparison, but I'm trying to block out some time to try.

My biggest worry was the UI setup: I'm a usability snob, so this is a big sticking point for me. I'm finding the Nikon menu system different from Canon's but not impossible to understand: a philosophical difference. Canon makes everything available from the selector wheel (the multi-directional circle on the back) and adds several modifier buttons based on the model of camera—the UI on my G3 isn't fundamentally different than Jen's Powershot 100. Nikon makes certain things available from the selector wheel but adds combinations of buttons to access special features, like an arcade fighting game. When taken to the extreme, this gets ridiculously hard to remember and physically challenging to accomplish. (This was why I detested the abominable Coolpix 4500, and the reason I took a G3 underwater in Bimini instead.)

I'm finding, though, that the D70 is far easier to use than the 4500, and now that I've begun to understand the UI philosophy, it's beginning to make sense to me. The difference in organization means I have much rewiring to do in my brain in order to take advantage of the camera's features. I've been dicking around with the automated settings and learning the modifiers to them so that I can eventually move into the manual modes and try to remember the aperture/shutter speed math of my SLR days.

One thing that made life easier was a firmware upgrade, bringing the menu system up from the 1.3 factory installation to a 2.0 version—almost identical to that of Jen's newer D50. This, at first glance, is a huge improvement and worth the time.

Overall, I'm pleased with the decision and excited to get further into the camera. I think the decision to go Nikon was a good one, and I'd recommend these two camera models to anyone.

Posted on November 28, 2006 10:06 AM | link to this entry

Talk, Plus.

I've spent about 22 of the last 48 hours working on some last-minute updates for a website I've been building since last year; this included pulling some Flash out of my butt, making a lot of sitewide updates, and a few hurried conference calls with folks in California.

The company's name is TalkPlus, and the deal is that they add services to your existing mobile phone. If your phone has a Maryland area code and you'd like to have a Los Angeles number for your presence there, TalkPlus can give that to you. The service also includes a bunch of features not available with some standard mobile acounts-the ability to screen calls by incoming number, voicemail that can go to your email account, multiple outbound IDs (you could spoof your own caller ID, essentially) and a few other goodies.

They've just opened a public beta, and for a limited time you can try the service out for free. I'm not sure what numbers they have available right now, but if you spend a lot of time on the road, have multiple offices, are dating and wish to keep your actual number private, or just like fooling around with technology, check it out.

Posted on November 14, 2006 4:42 PM | link to this entry

Change of Plans.

The Directory of Illustration is a huge phonebook-sized tome that ships each year to art directors, ad buyers, and designers. A number of years ago, I started getting calls from a rep there trying to get me to sign up. I knew it would be expensive, and it is—several thousand dollars, with the payment coming due either at Christmastime, tax time, or Easter. As part of my plan to get back into illustration I was thinking about joining the Directory next year, but I just got a call from a rep who told me they now have a payment plan spread out over nine months, which makes the whole thing more affordable and convenient. She's going to call back on Wednesday to tell me more about it, and I think I may do it.

Which means I have to get back on the horse and get some more sample work done in a hurry.

Posted on November 6, 2006 2:14 PM | link to this entry

Spinning Head.

Oh, boy, I've blown an entire morning reading about content management systems, the differencs between off-the-shelf blogging platforms and professional CMS applications, the wisdom of hacking at free blogging systems to fill unique needs, and the growing desire to have an easy, extensible framework to build one's own CMS system to do what the user wants without hacking, plugins, or ju-jitsu. (Having bounced around five or six websites, run through the comments, and absorbed the discussions, I feel small and pitiful in comparison to some of the talent that's out there.) You may have noticed the popularity of CMS-based posts in the linkblog recently—that's because I'm still looking for the right one.

Let's say I've got a client who needs a simple update application so that they can add content to their site when it comes up. I can A. hire someone to write such an application, B. buy an off-the-shelf CMS application, or C. use one of the free blogging apps out there and hack away at it myself to get the results I need. A. is usually prohibitively expensive, B. is ridiculously expensive, and C. can be hard to justify and support when everyone is used to the Microsoft model of business applications.

In the last two cases, this also means a certain amount of hacking is in order to excise the "features" the end user doesn't need-comments, RSS feeds, bulletin boards, etc., which often takes more time than is reasonably necessary, often breaks other parts of the CMS, and usually blows up once an upgrade of the engine is performed. (My main complaint of of open-source scripting code and applications are that they are crammed full of "features" the authors thought would be cool, as opposed to stuff that actually might be useful.) I'm not a programmer, nor do I play one on TV; My skills are rudimentary, but I can look stuff up and make educated guesses as to how to fix things. So I can't write the stuff myself; I have to depend on other folks to do that for me.

The solution is to have a framework for developing the application(s) I need. Something that's smart enough to let me define my needs and help me build it, then just work and get the hell out of the way. This is my basic understanding of Django—that it's a framework for building what I need in the method I choose.

I think (you're saying, 'ha ha, Dugan, you're changing course again') that in order to get ahead of the curve and not merely six months behind it, that I'm going to do some more research on Django and Python, buy some books, install the code, and see if I can't roll something of my own.

Bibliography:
Subtraction, The Movable Feast Got Away from Movable Type
Jeff Croft, On personal content management.
Blurbomat, Annual Post Where I Question the Tools I Use.

Posted on October 12, 2006 12:16 PM | link to this entry

Sometimes I Doubt Your Commitment To Sparkle Motion.

Sometimes this gig is about making a difference, finding a voice, or adding something valuable to the conversation. It can be challenging and exciting to begin a new project or help something grow. Even when the monetary compensation is less than hoped, the rewards sometimes outweigh the effort spent, because there's a lingering sense of satisfaction and pride on a job well executed.

And sometimes, it's just about doing the shit and getting paid.

Posted on October 9, 2006 3:04 PM | link to this entry | comments (4)

Green Lantern!

I don't honestly know what's cooler- getting a letter postmarked from San Francisco with a Big Fat Check inside one week after the invoice went out, or the fact that it carries a Green Lantern stamp instead of a boring corporate postmark.

Posted on October 2, 2006 4:21 PM | link to this entry | comments (3)

Fabulous Gay Men.

Why, oh why, haven't we found Project Rungay before? Fabulous gay men writing bitchy, catty commentary on each episode of Project Runway. What's not to like? We blew a half-hour this morning reading the first page of the site.

If you haven't already guessed, we're excited for the big show this evening. I'm going to grab some wine and we're going to drink each time Uli says "Miami Party Dress", Michael quietly says something hilarious (Captain Save-A-Ho was our favorite), Jeffrey complains about somebody else, or Laura says anything remotely bitchy.

Posted on September 27, 2006 10:29 AM | link to this entry | comments (1)

Offsite.

The last couple of days have been very busy. I'm set up in an office building in San Mateo where the workmen are still installing network cable, painting drywall and cleaning up dust. The desk I'm at only came out of the IKEA boxes a week or two ago. In a lot of ways I feel like it's 1999 again, except for the fact that I'm not an employee, and that I have to leave for home in a couple of days.

It's been a good week so far, though. I hit the ground running Monday morning, and put in an eleven-hour day before Eastern Standard Time caught up with me. The people working here are wickedly smart—smart enough that I feel like I'm too dumb to belong in a conference room with them—but they've been friendly and welcoming to the country mouse who blew in from Maryland and suddenly told them their cobbled-together business cards looked like shit and that there's been a design approved and ready since last December, had they seen it?

Today is my final day on site, and then I become virtual again, a voice on a phone and a blinking 6AM email message. I'm going to miss the excitement of feeling like a hired gun on a mission, but I won't miss the lousy hotel bed. I really shouldn't complain, though, because it's an exceptionally cheap room with a kitchenette, which came in handy for reheating my Thai leftover dinner last night, and it's less than a mile from the office. This part of California is strange, because in order to get from my hotel to the office, I cross two highway overpasses, one canal, and under two more overpasses. The grid structure here is very mixed as well, which means there's no empty space—malls adjoin suburbs, which are overshadowed by high-rise offices, which butt up to freeways, which dump out into feeder roads everywhere. I now understand why some of the first and most successful internet ventures incubated from the Bay Area were mapping applications, because I wouldn't be able to find my own ass with a flashlight out here without Mapquest.

Happily, my lovely wife is on a plane headed West to join me this afternoon, and we're going to spend the next three days enjoying the warm, sunny California air. My old friends from college have invited us out for cocktails this evening, and we're heading to Napa tomorrow to get shitfaced, and from there, the weekend is an open book. Which, I've recently learned, is the way I like it.

Posted on September 8, 2006 11:45 AM | link to this entry

Laboring Day.

I can't imagine a better subject for this Labor Day than an icon of Mexico from the early 1900's, a man who fought and died for the rights of the common man to own his own land and farm it. I also can't think of a better way to end out the Alphabet Project than to honor a revolutionary who stood up for what he believed in.

Posted on September 4, 2006 10:14 PM | link to this entry

Do The Numbers.

Here's some head-to-head research on the new Mac I'd love to buy myself. (I have a dream, and it's a simple one: One Machine To Rule Them All. One machine, two monitors, two operating systems. No multiple machines on my desktop, with 3X the cabling, power supplies, keyboards, etc. etc. In this dream, I'm able to run all the apps in Windows on one screen, and all my Mac apps on the other. In full, 1280dpi or larger glory.) Here's my wishlist:

• Support for two monitors (non mirroring), with one at least at 1280x 1024
• DVI output
• Dual-bootable OSX/Microsoft
• Portability
• 2Gb of RAM (preferably cheap)
• At least 100 GB of hard drive space
• iSight camera built-in
• Firewire and USB ports (preferably FW800 and USB 2.0)

I had no idea until today that the new iMacs support dual monitors. That alone is worth the price of admission. Plus, twice the hard drive for almost half the money, two FireWire ports, built-in iSight, and cheaper RAM sell me on the deal. Portability? Well, I'll just fall back on the iBook. And with the impending change in my hosting plans, I'll merge over to IMAP mail service, which means threaded mail on multiple machines so I don't need to worry about synchronizing.

The winner: the 20" iMac by three lengths.

Posted on August 24, 2006 4:11 PM | link to this entry

Untitled

Posted on August 23, 2006 1:52 PM | link to this entry | comments (4)

Bandwagonesque.

I stayed up Saturday night and made a hood for my Duaflex II to try the through-the-lens trick, and these are the first shots to test out the rig. Obviously, the lens(es) on my Duaflex need to be cleaned. The G3 is not the best camera to use for this trick, as I need a lot more control over the focus than I currently have. But, not bad for a first try.

Posted on August 20, 2006 10:13 PM | link to this entry | comments (2)

Y stands for I'm Late

The Y entry for the Alphabet Project is live. Because this is a week overdue, it's a two-fer, in Orange Revolutionary goodness. (Well, except for the guy's skin. But, he was poisoned by Bad Guys, so it's not his fault.)

Posted on August 18, 2006 3:09 PM | link to this entry

Through the Viewfinder, Experiment 1.

Using my Duoflex II. I haven't been able to figure out just how to focus on the viewfinder without the autofocus taking a measurement on the reflection of the lens, but I'll work it out. I suppose I need a digital SLR to really make it work...

Posted on August 15, 2006 1:01 PM | link to this entry

Grasping Revolution And Increasing Production

I posted the X entry of the Alphabet Project this morning, after an absence of updates last week. Let's hope the stirring, motivational words of Deng Xiaoping will lead me to fully engage in the movement to increase production and to practice economy to set off a new upsurge in industrial production.

Posted on July 31, 2006 12:24 PM | link to this entry

Providence.

I got an email yesterday afternoon with a signed proposal, something that will make the next couple of months very busy, and hopefully profitable as well. I can't stress how much of a good a thing this is, considering the (in)frequency of checks coming in the door lately.

We seem to be fighting the familiar first-year battle of balancing our incoming and outgoing cash flow, something that leaves us both exhilarated and terrified at the same time. I think I could speak for the both of us when I say that we're probably busier now than we ever were at 9-5 jobs, with the added roles of bookkeeper, project manager, systems administrator, and salesperson. However, having my best friend work over my right shoulder is a lifesaver—we each provide the other a welcome mix of business advice, sanity check, and aesthetic criticism at those points when judgement is impaired by stress, fatigue, or creative block.

At this particular moment in time, I'll say that it's been a great experience. I'll also admit that I've got less in my savings account than I've had in ten years, I'm living week to week, and sometimes it takes me several hours to fall asleep at night on account of the worrying. However, I've got several long-term projects lined up that I'm excited about, a developing portfolio just about ready to promote, and the freedom to take in a half-price matinee on a Tuesday afternoon with my wife (not that we've taken advantage of that yet.)

Posted on July 21, 2006 9:51 AM | link to this entry | comments (1)

Adios, Scumbag.

I finished an illustration of Ken Lay last night at about 1AM, one that I've had rattling around in the back of my head for the last couple of days. It went very quickly and turned out well, even though I changed it up at the Photoshop stage and added a new section. Let me know if you like it.

Posted on July 18, 2006 9:42 AM | link to this entry

Photoblog, Part 2.

Oh, yeah. Pixelpost is very nice. Between projects this morning, and with a few slight hiccups here and there (mainly MySQL-related admin stuff) I got the app up and running smoothly. Within about two minutes I had two images uploaded, commented, and working. The admin interface is a little rudimentary (I'm spoiled by Movable Type) but fully functional and robust. It supports RSS 2.0, and it's valid XHTML. There's some spam blocking built in, email notification of new comments and comment authorization, and the application supports both .JPG and .GIF formats. I'm digging around the templates now to see how much I can customize the page layout, but this looks promising. And, there's a pretty robust community out there.

Addendum: I think I may go back to Movable Type anyway, just because I'm going to be extending the basic layout to have a sideblog with illustration-related content as well as portfolio work. As much as I'm not wanting to wrangle with the complexities of MT again, it's going to be for the best. Now, I just need to get paid so I can order a new domain and get the ball rolling...

Posted on July 14, 2006 9:16 AM | link to this entry

The Natural Order.

Let's all wish my sister Renie a warm, wonderful 29th birthday today! Renie, we hope it's a great day for you.

There's not much to discuss here in C-Ville, other than the fact that we're A. totally finished with picnic food for a while (them nitrates will clean you out, and not in a good way) and B. embarking on a Campaign To Eat Healthier, all in the wake of the 4th of July Parade. Being left with 24 hamburger patties on the 5th means we gave the FoodSaver a workout, stocking our freezer for the next year's worth of grilling. One of the benefits of post-party cleanup is that we still have a sizeable cache of beer in the basement, something that's been in pretty short supply around here lately.

Also, I finished the V entry for the Alphabet Project this morning, bringing order back from chaos. I'll make a slight detour to work on an obituary piece to commemorate Ken Lay's passing, and then return to X later in the week.

Posted on July 10, 2006 1:35 PM | link to this entry | comments (1)

Skip "V".

I added Wim Wenders to the Alphabet Project today, after a three-week absence brought on by activity and paying work. There is a "V" in the works, but I decided that adding something was better than nothing.

Posted on June 19, 2006 4:57 PM | link to this entry | comments (1)

Praise Be To Allah.

Getting paid is a Good Thing.

Posted on June 9, 2006 12:54 PM | link to this entry | comments (1)

Alpha-Bits.

The U entry on the Alphabet Project is live this afternoon, and there are a few minor changes to the presentation. I'm moving further into the caricature end of things, and so what I posted shows the original pencil sketch and the final artwork that resulted. I also added a pencil sketch for Tarantino from last week.

This one didn't happen as easily as the last few have. I would up cutting it three times—the scale on the first version was too large, and the second suffered from uneven linework. This version is closer to what I have in my head, but isn't one of the top five. Now, I face the difficult task of finding a subject for V. Any suggestions?

Posted on May 14, 2006 5:55 PM | link to this entry | comments (2)

Today's Post Brought To You By The Letter "T".

After a week's hiatus, the entry for the letter T is live on the Alphabet Project. This one is simple black and white, partially because I don't have time to color it, but also because I did it a little differently than the others, and I'm really happy with some fo the detail. I'm flexing the caricature muscles a bit more now, and it feels good. This is progress, people.

Posted on May 5, 2006 9:34 AM | link to this entry

A New Toy.

Our neighborhood sprouts signs like weeds every spring and fall; usually they are centered around telephone poles by busy intersections, and usually they are hand-lettered announcements of tag, rummage, and estate sales in our immediate vicinity. I dragged Jen to a couple this past Saturday morning, after a particular sign caught my eye: CAMERAS DOWN HERE. We found a salty-haired old gent standing in front of a card table with ten or so different cameras, and one caught my eye: a tall black square with two lenses stacked atop each other, looking like a NASA-certified cousin to my Kodak Duoflex. This was something more, though: Large teutonic lettering above the lenses identified it as a Rolleicord, the inexpensive brother to the famous Rolleiflex medium-format twin-lens reflex camera.

I talked to the guy a bit, and he claimed it had been serviced last year (about $100, if one can find a technician who still knows how to service these cameras), and a test of the shutter proved he was right. I paid him for the camera—probably a little more than it's worth, to be honest—and brought it home to add to the collection. Some research indicates it's a Rolleicord III, made sometime between 1950-1953 (s/n 1169169) and it takes regular 120 film, still available at better photographic shops worldwide. The negative is a 6x6cm image, much larger than standard 35-mm film, and with a good lens the image is sharper and lends to larger, clearer blowups.

We took the Duoflex with us on our trip to Ireland last year, filled with black and white TMAX, and shot some pretty amazing stuff.

I'd say the results were good in a LOMO kind of way—the imprecise glass lens of the Kodak added some blurring and distortion to the shots, which added to the general sense of melancholy and mystery.

I'm pretty excited by this find, and it's something I've been interested in for a long time. Thanks to my father, I have an excellent 35-mm Minolta on my shelf, and I'll never sell it. I spent many expensive months attempting to learn how to use it properly in college, and many more expensive months learning how to develop the film. I have a gaggle of antique 620 cameras, each in perfect condition and ready for a new adventure. They will accompany us on our next trip to parts unknown, and bring back imperfect, atmospheric snapshots that mean more to me than a crisp digital file.

This camera, though, is a step above the average, and it demands I take the time to learn how to use it, which is fine by me.

Posted on May 1, 2006 11:30 PM | link to this entry | comments (1)

Smug.

This has been a pretty damn good week for the Lockardugan Design Collective. Superstitious fool that I am, I won't jinx it too much, but I will pass along the news that a piece Jen designed won a Gold Addy (the American Advertising Federation's award for creative design) last night at the Baltimore Regional awards; if I remember correctly, it gets kicked upstairs to the National Addys next. Congratulations, baby.

(Because they suck, there is no listing of winners online as of 10:15 this morning.)

Posted on April 21, 2006 10:02 AM | link to this entry | comments (2)

The Smartest Guy in The Room.

Right. That's why he's on trial in the federal courthouse. And on the Alphabet List as letter "S".

Posted on April 11, 2006 11:42 AM | link to this entry

Twofer.

Last week was kind of a blur. Lots of work, business development, and social appointments made for a lean posting schedule and a lack of illustration. Therefore, the R entry for the Alphabet Project is a double shot of scowling people you may recognize.

In other illustration news, I'm slowly working on solutions for the two self-assignments I gave myself last week. One of the mistakes I've commonly made in the past has been to use the first concept that came to my head, which has yielded mixed results. I'm taking more time to develop ideas for these two, with the hope that the result will work better as a solution and as an image. The science illustration has come full-circle about three times so far, from literal to abstract and back to literal again, but I think I now have something that will work well for the solution. The book jacket illustration is harder, because the concept is a very difficult thing to portray cleanly and simply. I'm at the point where I have to pare down the idea to something that won't reflect the entire complexity of the book, which makes things more difficult and easier at the same time.

On today's agenda: Setting the camera up on the tripod and taking some reference shots in the living room for illustration 1.

Posted on April 4, 2006 9:47 AM | link to this entry

Jen's New Toy.

This morning, as we sat on the couch, sipping coffee and discussing our monetary situation, the doorbell rang. The FedEx guy had dropped off a little package on our doorstep and waved as he drove off:

It was no larger than a breadbox, but once she opened it, the genius of good package design was revealed:

She ordered the Core Duo model with 2 gigs of RAM and the maximum hard drive—essentially, the pimpin'est Mini money will buy. I'm absolutely green with envy.

This is going to be a HUGE leap for her. She's been using a circa 1999 blue and white 400mhz G3 tower, and it's showing its age.

Posted on March 31, 2006 9:31 AM | link to this entry

Friday-Saturday.

Between backing up Jen on a large design job (suffering computer issues that warranted the purchase of a new Core Duo Mac Mini on Wednesday) and various other jobs for my clients, this week slipped past rather quickly. However, I spent part of this afternoon and the majority of the evening working on the Q entry for the Alphabet Project. I also collected a small but tardy invoice from last December, which will hopefully go towards an upgrade of my 1999-vintage PC. I'm looking at a refurbed Dell from a local vendor, trying to save a couple hundred bucks for a business class machine, but my father's experience with his Dell has me wondering what vendor is best. What do you folks out there recommend?

Posted on March 25, 2006 12:31 AM | link to this entry | comments (1)

Working Hard For The Despot.

Between a meeting in Columbia that went on longer than I bargained (and went better than we hoped), various computer woes here at the Lockardugan Command Center, and a surprise obituary posting for a pseudo-client this evening, I didn't get to do anything frivolous today. So tonight I posted the P entry for the Alphabet Project to make myself feel like I got something accomplished.

In more exciting news, my good friend Rob talked a little sense into my head this weekend. He asked why I was waiting around to put all my money into the body of the Scout and not just fixing those parts that are broken and enjoying my truck? (Rob is the man who talked sense into my head about finally taking out a home equity loan and having the kitchen done professionally. So when he talks, I listen.)

I had to stop and think about this for a minute. I've been assuming, because the "B" pillars are all so shot, that I can't drive my truck anymore because the doors won't open, and that I need to focus all my energy on raising the money for a new fiberglas tub. Rob's point was simple: Why open the doors at all? He suggested fixing the engine problems, having a new exhaust put on, pulling the top off, and driving it as an antique, which avoids any of the inspection/emission issues I'd face otherwise. This suddenly made a ton of sense to me, and I wondered why I wasn't thinking like this before.

So, to clean up the cobwebs in my head and organize the plan, here's the task list for the Scout:

• Drop the steel fuel tank and replace it with a new poly tank. ($175)


• Replace the dead battery ($50)


• Clean out the fuel lines/filters


• Replace the plugs, wires, filter and oil


• Install a brand new exhaust (major ducats)


• Resolve the current registration issues (it's suspended because of emissions)

Maybe, with a lot of scrimping and saving, I can get the Scout back on the road this year.

Posted on March 20, 2006 8:44 PM | link to this entry | comments (1)

Wow, This Is Awesome...

Make a super-simple light tent. I've wanted to make a huge one of these for about two years now, and this is exactly what I want without the complicated plan I'd developed myself. As a matter of fact, I happen to have two large empty boxes downstairs ready for this project.

Posted on March 15, 2006 1:19 PM | link to this entry

A Fresh Perspective.

You may have noticed the boat up top is gone. And it's a little less blue around here. While I had some time between projects, I decided to put a new look together for the site here that's less oppressive, cluttered, and, well..blue. Obviously there are some things to be worked out with the templates, but overall it seems to be working pretty well.

Now, I have to wrestle with an install of Movabletype 3.2, which didn't go so smoothly last time. Cross your fingers for me.

Oh, and the search function is wonky. Stay tuned.

Update: Looks like I broke something; the comments on this entry are busted. It doesn't seem to actually be writing the individual HTML file...

Update update: I left a few small tags out when I rebuilt the templates. I put them back in, and I'm testing now... Yeah, that was it. One small tag at the top of each page, and MT wasn't writing new pages for each entry (or updating current entries, for that matter.) If the following tag is left out:

<a href="<$MTBlogURL$>" accesskey="1">

MT won't write the various files correctly (or, at all, unless an entire site rebuild is performed.)

Posted on March 14, 2006 5:54 PM | link to this entry | comments (1)

Alphabet Update.

The entry for "O" is online at the Alphabet Project. You may not be able to get a word in edgewise, and don't be surprised if you get told to shut up!

Posted on March 13, 2006 10:23 PM | link to this entry | comments (1)

Paul's Liquor

Posted on March 9, 2006 5:02 PM | link to this entry

Alphabet Update.

I posted the entry for "N" on the Alphabet Project this evening: You'll recognize Big Poppa from his unique eyes.

Update: as of 12:14 EST, my other server is kaput. AGAIN. Stand by while we address the technical difficulties.

Update Update: as of 1:48 EST, It's back online.

Posted on March 7, 2006 9:25 PM | link to this entry | comments (2)

Another Illustration, Minus Hoo-Ha.

I posted the entry for M on the Alphabet Project this morning. Rest assured, there's nothing showing. This one happened pretty fast (I started it at 6PM last night) and wrapped up quickly, with the exception of the hair and some minor details. I'm getting into a groove here, and it feels pretty good. Having the tools here at the house has made life much easier (the copier is working flawlessly, and having some white transfer paper makes the job 1000% easier.) Now, onto N. Any suggestions out there?

Posted on February 23, 2006 11:28 AM | link to this entry

Mom, Dad, I'd Like You To Meet My Girlfriend Courtney.

Last week's entry for the Alphabet Project is live. Now, before you start saying things about my fascination with blondes and their underwear, I'll have you know that this week's entry is also a woman, she's not blonde, and you won't see her underwear. In fact, that would be kind of gross. (I'll also have you know that my wife suggested this one.)

Posted on February 21, 2006 7:35 PM | link to this entry | comments (2)

Humbled.

Well, in light of the fact that John K. (of Ren & Stimpy fame) has a weblog, and that he posted a few caricature sketches, and they make my pitiful attempts look childish and boring, I picked an "L" in the Alphabet Project. I have it almost ready to start. However, I'm helping a friend move tomorrow, and I'm helping someone else put stuff into storage on Saturday, so it may be a while before I get to this one. (Hint: it's a woman, and she's cool.)

Posted on February 16, 2006 7:04 PM | link to this entry

Alphabet Update.

I posted the "K" entry in the Alphabet Project this morning (technically, this afternoon.) Let me know what you think.

Posted on February 9, 2006 12:13 PM | link to this entry | comments (1)

Peep This.

I just posted the entry for J on the Alphabet Project. Now, I have to go press my pants for a client meeting tomorrow morning, and pack an oh-shit bag for another client whose laptop just blew up.

But first, I'm treating my beautiful wife and I to some Ghirardelli hot chocolate.

Posted on February 2, 2006 9:38 PM | link to this entry | comments (2)

Wrestling With Apples.

I know I promised weekly updates to the Alphabet Project, but I haven't been able to get "J" done (well, actually, off the ground) this week. I spent the better part of Tuesday at a client's house, and yesterday I fought Darwin Streaming Server to a draw, attempting to simply hook up a streamed video for a client. Little did I know that Quicktime's method of streaming is somewhat arcane, the directions are oblique, the tools confusing, and the results questionable. I'd blame Apple (shakes fist in the direction of Cupertino) but as far as I can tell, they open-sourced the thing years ago and it's sort of been languishing ever since. (Exhibit A: dig that Garamond Condensed in that last hyperlink. That's so 1999.) Along the way, I booted up Keynote for the first time and fought with it to build a pair of presentations for a client meeting tomorrow morning. My review: I'd say it's pretty, and it works well, but there are some major changes I'd make to the interface and the functionality to extend the program and reduce frustration.

One bright spot: We hit the library yesterday, and I scored a bunch of new (well, new in 2005) music: some Broken Social Scene, some Ted Leo, some Sigur Ros, some Wu-Tang. I also scored a copy of Charles Burns' new hardback, called Black Hole. I'd just have to say, damn. Remember reading Big Baby back in the day and being sort of freaked out by the bugs and weird people and stuff? Now imagine a story about growing up in the 1970's and a bunch of teenagers who have this strange virus that mutates them in different ways—and the way they get the virus is through sexual contact. Add in the social pressures of being in high school, first love, and lots of drugs, and stir. The book is absolutely beautiful. The pages are heavy, the printing is perfect, and his illustrations are incredible. I started it at 11:30 and finished it at 1:15, completely riveted. Check it out. And, while I'm at it, props to my local library for carrying it.

P.S. New illustration coming this evening—I've got it laid out and ready to go.

Posted on February 2, 2006 8:33 AM | link to this entry

Font Explorer X Follow-up.

Imagine if Suitcase loaded all your fonts and didn't crash? Imagine if it didn't take fifteen minutes to preview one single font face? Imagine if it was able not to crash when loading a corrupted font (or if it featured smart enough logic to prevent loading a corrupted font in the first place?) You'd have Font Explorer X.

Add in a vastly better UI, an ability to buy fonts a la the Apple Music Store (if you can use iTunes, this will be very familiar to you, but the available selection for sale is currently very slim), and stability, simple basic stability, and you have a killer font app. This software is beta, so caveat emptor. I have a library of 5600+ fonts, and Font Explorer X handles them all like a charm.

Goodbye, Suitcase. It's been great knowing you, but it's time to move on. Don't call me-I'll call you.

Posted on January 25, 2006 1:39 PM | link to this entry

Busy...

...working on a whole new design for the design section of my portfolio site. It's going to take some time, but I'm excited about the sketches. Special thanks go to my lovely wife, who helped whip an idea into an actual design—no small feat, given what I started with.

Posted on January 23, 2006 3:56 PM | link to this entry

Schooled, Part 2.

I updated the first H illustration with a better one. Pretend the first one did not exist. Another lesson learned:

The importance of scale in the size of the illustration. Depending on the density of detail, making something interesting out of large areas of nothing general