Rants from the Hollow

Last week, the biggest event here in the Ascot area–indeed, one of the big calendar events for the entire country–took place. Royal Ascot is a colorful, fascinating, and bizarrely British annual happening. It started as a horse race, but it got bigger.

The royals have always been keen on horses. They’ve always had a lot of acreage in the area of Windsor, so back in the early 18th century, they built a race track within a carriage ride of Windsor.

The track in Ascot has races and other events all year, but none are as famous or formal as the Royal Ascot week. The queen arrives every day in her carriage (belief is that half the trip is in a Range Rover), which crosses the length of the final part of the race track, and then she and her entourage walk up to the royal enclosure. The strict dress code of the royal enclosure has an impact on the entire event. Even the cameramen wear top hat and tails.

The pictures on my web site gallery are from ladies day last year. This is the Thursday event that includes the most outlandish hats and shoes. Royal Ascot is a place to see and be seen.

To be honest, I hardly saw a horse when we spent the day there last year. The people are a lot more interesting than the horses. It brings out the entire spectrum of English society, from the posh to the potted.

Most of the local cabbies try to avoid the event because they want to keep the back of their cars clean. When Royal Ascot is taking place, we follow the lead of our neighbors and stay off the roads.

In the summer of 2006, my parents renovated the basement of the house they moved into the day after my June 1978 high school graduation. I was given strict instructions to remove ANYthing that I wanted to keep. In addition to my much beloved HO scale race cars, I found a slightly musty cardboard Kodak photo paper box. It contained a stack of contact prints and negatives from pictures I’d taken from 1976-1978.

My English and European friends aren’t fully aware of how sophisticated many of the extra-curricular activities are at an American high school. In addition to sports and music, journalism is also considered and important activity, participation in which can not only lead to a career, but it also helps develop citizens who are well prepared to participate in a democracy. Bay High, my high school in Bay Village, Ohio, has traditionally had a strong journalism program. When I was in school, we not only had a very competent yearbook, we also had a multi-page newspaper, printed on newsprint by a printer on a weekly basis.

Starting my junior year (11 grade), yearbook adviser Judy Coolidge decided that Bay High was going to have the best yearbook in the country. She chose and motivated an editorial staff of talented juniors and seniors, and set them to work over the summer to develop a theme and to choose a layout. They chose to name the yearbook “The Whole Bay Catalog”, as a pastiche of Stewart Brand’s “Whole Earth Catalog.” My senior year of High School, the yearbook was entitled “Where Do You Go To Find.” Planning went into great detail on the chapters, pages, and even page design (’magazine layout’). Although there was always opportunity to squeeze in good shots, much of my work for the yearbook consisted of pictures taken to order, to fit into the pre-planned spreads on specific topics. It was a fantastic experience, and 30 years later, I still enjoy photography, but have never found anything as photographically purposeful and challenging as being part of the journalistic team that turned out 2 of the US’ top-10 yearbooks.

Finding a cache of negatives from such a fun and interesting part of my life was a thrill. These are not just souvenirs of my teen years–this is an important body of creative work. I crawled out of the crawlspace, and spent the next several hours poking through the negatives and prints. It was obvious that they had suffered a bit from their lack of care. I went out the next day to buy an archival storage box and acid-free envelopes, and spent another couple hours taking the negatives out of the cheap and yellowing office envelopes that I’d ‘temporarily’ used when I was a kid, placing the negatives into carefully labeled envelopes. When I was done, my archival storage box was almost full. I counted close to 2600 images.

Most of my favorite shots were there, including some that I’d won prizes for. Unfortunately, some were missing, including a couple that were very important to me. There were also a lot of pictures that I’d taken just for fun, or for practice, including color shots of hockey, baseball and tennis. In some cases, I’ve got contact prints without negatives, and those pictures can be recovered, although the quality is low.

Over a three year period of time, I’ve been laboriously scanning, restoring, and uploading the pictures to a web site. In early 2007, I first unveiled 600 pictures on a commercial photo sharing web site (pbase). During the following several years, I continued to restore and upload photos, sending email about the new additions to a growing list of almost 100 former students, parents and teachers. The lion’s share of the photos were done by the summer of 2008 for 20 minute slideshow for our 30th reunion. There are still some photos that have never been seen–mostly several hundred pictures of hockey. I’m finishing those up now, and uploading them to a gallery on my new, PERMANENT web site–this one.

A typical scene in Fort Myers Beach.  Video by Jay G. Heiser

As long as I was going to be in Ohio, I figured I’d leverage my time with a few visits to my company’s customers. The account managers in Charleston, WV and Indianapolis took me up on the offer of my time, so I had a chance to visit college roomie Steve Towne in Indy, and friend Dannie Walker in Charleston.

Elizabeth and I met in WV, spent the first couple years out of school there, and were married at Kanawah United Presby. I haven’t been back there for at least 15 years, so it was fun to get a chance to catch up an old friend (much older than I am) and check out some of my old haunts.

Our favorite restaurant, Tudor’s Biscuit World, is still going strong. Kanawah Presby finally seems to have resolved that dispute about ceiling fans in the sanctuary (along with installing a beautiful sounding and looking semi-tracker organ). A. James is long gone, but he’s got a nephew in politics. Danny Jones, who did a great job as L’il Abner back in the day, is not selling sandwiches or sheriffing, but is now mayoring, and the city seems to be doing well.

Capital Street has fewer stores than ever, but had a new ice cream shop and a sort of left-leaning new bookstore. The building where I used to work has had a makeover. Blossom Dairy still exists, as does the nut shop.

After a day of customer meetings, I drove over to Dannie Walkers, who has retired to a life of fast cars, gardening, and trolling the web for the high-meg movies. We went to dinner in a Mexican restaurant. Charleston has Indian food, and even sushi. How wierd is that? You can even get a latte in the lobby of the hotel. Its almost like being in…..well, Cleveland.

My first apartment was just a block east of the capital, and the apartment where Elizabeth and I lived when were married was just to the west, so I asked Dannie to drive down to the other side of town for a night shoot.

Lincoln is still walking at midnight, mountaineers are still always free, but the dome has been pimped up with some shiny gold leaf. The rumor always used to be that Gov. Moore had scraped off the gold and sold it. Whatever happened , it sure looked like gold paint back in the day. Its shiny bright, now.

Here’s the complete gallery of pictures from that trip.

I managed to squeeze a couple trips to the Hollow around a business trip to Chicago. On the last Saturday in April, I picked up Kirk at school and we spent an afternoon. The following Saturday, the first one in May, Dad and I visited.

I can’t remember the last time I’ve been down in the Spring–maybe I had a chance in college, but I don’t think I’ve been there since then.

On the trip with Kirk, the woods were white with trillium. They were already starting to fade the following week. Between the two trips, I saw spring beauties, rue anemone, bluets, violets, dandelions, and some large daffodils that Mom must have planted next to the electric pole.

Animals included a pileated woodpecker, a great blue heron, a deer, bluegill, and one very large, and still not hooked, largemouth bass.

Both were beautiful sunny Spring days with bright blue skies and yellow sun. Before picking up Kirk, I wandered around Doylestown Smithville taking pictures of barns and other country scenes, and then I went to a small Civil War reenactment in Wooster. I’ve started pulling together a gallery of rural scenes from Wayne, Holmes, and Coshocton counties.

America isn’t unique in having an affinity for pedigreed politicians (Bush, Kennedy, Adams, Taft, Roosevelt, and that once-again popular new breed, the Clinton). Lots of third world countries also choose their leaders from a small pool of advantaged families. Europe does also, with the Saxe-Coburg und Gothas  providing the breeding farm for royalty, although most of that breed are mascots without any ability to cause any harm beyond the occasional politically incorrect remark.

It recently hit the local news that the great symbol of British character, the English Bulldog, is considered to be inbred and genetically deficient. Last year’s symbolic RSPCA boycott of Crufts was just responded to by a kennel club pledge to improve the standard of several hundred breeds.

Who could have known that a Bulldog was inbred just by looking at one, right? Although with their mouths shut, Kennedy and Bush both look better than a Bulldog, neither  have the sort of eloquence that a selective breeder might desired. For inbred dogs, their bite is worse than their bark. For politicians, the opposite is the case.

Poor Churchill is not considered an appropriate use of the limited NHS funds available for orthodontia. I have to admit to little sympathy for the owners. I’m in support of greater genetic diversity for the dogs, who are really just victims of fashion, if not outright snobbishness.  A few years ago at a high school sporting event, I overheard some 14-year old girl bragging about her expensive Retriever that the white ones were much better than the plain out golden ones. Pity for the dysplasia-prone dog, who will probably be on crutches before her owner outgrows (I hope) her elitist phase.

The very word ‘purebred’ is a value statement all by itself.

I’ve been aware for some time that purebred dogs not only cost more than mutts, but they are less healthy, and in some cases, are even prone to violent outbreaks. I did do a bit of research into the Bulldog issue, quickly finding a long rant in a blog last year from some guy who spent $6,500 on a Bulldog from someone he thought was a reputable breeder, but the canine turned out to be ugly, and underweight, reaching only 40 pounds, instead of the expected 50.  Its an animal, not something predictable like a mortgage-backed security! A low-resiliency animal, it was deliberately bred to accentuate characteristics that will make it one of the first victims of the coming crisis.  Why people don’t take pride in having pets that can live out a pain-free life of relative health?  Oh, they will claim that its just the disreputable breeders responsible for substandard dogs, and just badly bred owners who are too ignorant or cheap to purchase well bred beasts.  No sale. Look at the picture. How can that possibly be healthy? These things are genetic disasters, fit for no purpose other than human whimsy. Its time for a new standard of pet desirability and breeding practice.  My prediction is that it will never happen until dog-pound dogs are considered ‘cool.’

As gleefully pointed out in When Satire becomes Ironic, a January 2001 article on humor site The Onion, made multiple jokes about the future Bush presidency that would come almost spookily true. Entitled Bush: ‘Our Long National Nightmare Of Peace And Prosperity Is Finally Over’, the satirical article went online 8 years ago today.

Promises purportedly made by the incoming President in his January 2001 address included a promise “to bring an end to the severe war drought that plagued the nation under Clinton,” assuring citizens that the U.S. will “engage in at least one Gulf War-level armed conflict in the next four years”, and pledging to “bring back economic stagnation.”

A Republican congressional leader reportedly said “Under Bush, we can all look forward to military aggression, deregulation of dangerous, greedy industries, and the defunding of vital domestic social-service programs upon which millions depend.”

“For years, I tirelessly preached the message that Clinton must be stopped,” conservative talk-radio host Rush Limbaugh said. “And yet, in 1996, the American public failed to heed my urgent warnings, re-electing Clinton despite the fact that the nation was prosperous and at peace under his regime. But now, thank God, that’s all done with. Once again, we will enjoy mounting debt, jingoism, nuclear paranoia, mass deficit, and a massive military build-up.”

There’s more satire come true in that prophetic piece, on the state of poverty in America, disenfranchisement of black voters, and the need to find and defeat an enemy.

It’s easy to take an “I told you so” attitude, but remember that the majority of Americans supported a pre-emptive war, although many of them subsequently revised their personal history when it went pear shaped.  It could just be a bizarre coincidence that the political humorists at The Onion managed to so effectively predict what actually would happen during the next 8 years, but I think not.  No one would accuse the Bush administration of excessive transparency; indeed, as Bush so eloquently said himself during his final press conference last week, ”We were trying to say something differently, but nevertheless, it conveyed a different message. Obviously, some of my rhetoric has been a mistake.” Forgive me if I’m being ungenerous by suggesting that this was not an elected official who felt a duty to be frank.

In spite of a tendency to obfuscate, spin, and avoid answering direct questions, doesn’t this vintage Onion satire suggest that  the values of the Bush administration were, if not crystal clear (or should I say Kristol clear), discernible from the very beginning?  How much of a surprise can a collapsing economy and 6 years of aggressive war be, when peace and poverty be treated so cynically? It has often been said that a democracy gets the leadership it deserves.  I’m hoping that for the next 8 years, America gets better than it deserves.

NOTE: as verification that the original satire truly was published at the beginning of the Bush years, an archived copy from 19 January 2001 is available on The Wayback Machine.

A famous photographer was invited to dinner party at the city apartment of a woman known as being something of a gourmet cook. As he entered the house, the hostess gushed over him and his work, exclaiming “You must have some very fine camera equipment to produce such fine pictures.”

After the party started to wind down, the photographer made the proper thank you to the hostess for the evening, saying “that was a wonderful meal. You must have some very fine pots and pans to produce some fine dinner like that.”

When people look at my pictures, they often ask me what camera I use, sometimes commenting on the rich colors, or sharpness. I don’t want to be rude, but you shouldn’t expect that your pictures will look like mine, just because you buy a camera like mine.

For what its worth, I’m using a Canon 20D DSLR that I purchased in 2005. A mid-range SLR that is getting a bit long in the tooth, it fills up a heavy little backpack when I include 3-4 somewhat expensive lenses, Canon’s high-end electronic flash and a bit of other gear.

My camera is always set to capture images in RAW. This is a a camera-specific format that captures all of the sensor info, which bears some explanation. Virtually all digital cameras output JPG or ‘jay peg’ either exclusively or optionally. This is a compressed format that contains a lot fewer data than your camera’s sensor collected at the time of exposure. When you choose to use camera-generated JPGs, you are allowing your camera to make a number of aesthetically-relevant decisions about the appearance of your image, including color balance, exposure, contrast, and sharpening. When you shoot in RAW, you retain as much data as possible, so that it can be effectively applied when consciously making decisions on exposure, color, contrast, and sharpening after-the-fact in your digital darkroom. This takes more time, but gives you much, much, more flexibility, and most serious photographers do it. You can spend a lot of time on a single picture.; hours, and even days. Press photographers often shoot RAW and JPG simultaneously, so they’ve got something they can immediately upload, but also have a ‘digital negative’ that they can use later for an enhanced version.

It should also be obvious that taking the photo in the first place requires the application of knowledge and experience, in addition to the making of aesthetic judgments on subject, timing, field of view, focal length, aperture, shutter speed, ISO sensitivity, and lighting.

All of that said, the bigger your camera, the more likely you are to get better pictures. No camera can make aesthetic decisions on your behalf, and I’ve seen plenty of lackluster photos taken on high-end camera gear, but the better the camera, the more likely that it will get the exposure correct, freeze motion, be in focus, and be free of distortion. Although its effect can be somewhat ameliorated by several hundred dollars worth of software, lens distortion degrades the quality of pictures taken with less expensive gear, and avoiding it is one of the reasons why my normal lens is inconveniently heavy, and costs more than an entry level DSLR & lens combined.

Buying a Stradivarius won’t turn you into a world class violinist, but if you have some talent to see and capture interesting images, a cheap camera will hold you back. In any craft, the more experienced you become, the better able you are to take advantage of sophisticated tools. A $500 wood plane won’t turn an apprentice into a cabinet maker, but a $50 plane would often prevent a master woodworker from reaching the full potential of their art. You should purchase something commensurate with your skill level. Today’s entry level DSLRs are pretty darn good, and very reasonably priced. Instead of buying a mid-level camera with the maker’s cheapest 18-55mm zoom, spend less on the camera and buy a better lens. Or consider getting a bridge camera, which is similar in layout to a DSLR, but is smaller, and avoids the need for changing lenses.

What’s the matter with the OS I’m using?

“Can’t you tell that your Window’s too wide?”

Maybe I should buy some old Sidekick?

“Welcome back to the age of hive.

Where have you been hiden’ out lately, Sam?

You can’t throw trash till you spend a lot of RAM.”

Everybody’s talkin’ ‘bout the new GUI,

Funny, but it’s still NT to me.

MAKE SURE YOU’VE GOT THE SOUND TURNED UP SO YOU CAN HEAR THE WORDS.

This represents a couple of experiments. I created this slideshow from pictures I took during a weekend in Istanbul last month, using Adobe Lightroom to process the RAW shots, and ProShow Gold to create the slide show and add music. This version in Photodex’ proprietary .px format, which requires a plug-in (it should download automatically if you need it). The second part of the experiment is that this AV presentation is hosted on my web server, and mashed into my blog, and that it plays right inside this post (with no annoying YouTube logo).

You can view this in full-screen, but native resolution is 640×480. I’ve also uploaded one to the Photodex server, which probably has better Internet connectivity than heiserhollow.net does, and will show at a higher res.

For my parents and co-workers who found it impossible to download Photodex’s plug-in, here’s a version in Shockwave that is less attractive and less reliable, but more likely to function.   If all else fails, or you really want to take some time to look at higher-res 1280×1024 versions, you can view the photos in my photo gallery. Note that you can access a non-animated, non-musical slide show from a link at the bottom of that page.

I’d like to upload more of these–let me know if you have problems, or what you’d rather see. Too big? Too slow? Too small? Too technically difficult?