amezri: (tillandsia ;; victoria)


I was going to do these tomorrow, but I wanted to do them tonight! The reason I've been wanting to move more plants to semi-hydroponics is because we've been having trouble lately with plants rotting from being too wet or drying out.

 

I purchased new pots and LECA from hydro-orchids. My LECA medium has been soaking for two days, so I was all set to try moving some plants!

 

photos! and stuff )

amezri: (iron man ;; stark ;; suit r&d)
About a year ago I bought a Canon PowerShot SX20IS. It was supposed to be an upgrade to my S3IS.

I fraking hate this camera. Photos are noisy. It's practically unusable at 400ISO. Autofocus is crap. Shutter speed is slow as all hell for continuous shots. Terrible. I've been using it, though, and the pictures I took last year at DragonCon are all sort of.. meh. Soft, not in focus, noisy. I might as well have brought my Sony Cyber-Shot and not worried about the zoom.

While looking to see about a frimware update (there isn't one, BTW), I stumbled on CHDK - Canon Hack Development Kit. I was initially hesitant to install it - it could brick my camera! But then I though, well, I'm not liking this thing anyway, so whatever. Besides, my model has to boot from an SD card, so I'm not actually dumping firmware onto the camera itself - why not?

It took about an hour this morning to get it all on the card. I couldn't figure out how to format to FAT16 with Windows 7, but that was okay because CardTricks will do that and make the SD card bootable for you. You need a card that's under 4GB, though. I have two, so it's not a problem.

There are a TON of features you can enable with CHDK, including shooting in RAW mode - apparently the SX20IS is capable of it, but Canon disabled the feature in software for whatever reason. You can get it back with this. I don't really care that much about RAW, however, so the only thing I've enabled immediately is Super Fine compression. I'd heard that the camera's native compression is what was causing all the noise, so I took some test shots. Here are two of them (click for larger):

without CHDK:


with CHDK:


more photos and thoughts under the cut )
amezri: (x-men ;; jubilee)
I didn't even know we had one of these things here. Anyway...

Albany Comic Con @ Holiday Inn in Albany, NY - April 25, 2010

After some deliberating (and encouragement) I decided to go as Vampire Jubilee to the con, mostly because of this cover that got released last week.

I wasn't expecting too much at this convention. Which is good because it was a room lined with comic vendors and filled with comic geeks. Not that they're anything wrong with comic geeks, but, you know, I'm more of a sci-fi geek. It's a good thing Matthew Dow Smith and his friends allowed me to hang out with them, otherwise I'd probably have gotten some things signed and ran away. Where are my con friends when I need them?

Anyway, I did end up buying the Witchblade Albany ComicCon cover variant that was pre-signed by Ron Marz and Matthew Dow Smith. It's not like I bought anything else at the con (either had it or didn't want it), so whatever.

There weren't too many people in costume at the con. Some kid was Kick-Ass, but I never managed to get a photo. There was a really good Magdalena costume and a great Green Arrow. Drunk!Stark was drunk.

Got my copy of Essential X-Men 2 signed by Terry Austin! (Dark Phoenix was the arc that made me not hate Jean Grey.) He was very nice. I gave him my last Bloody Flora postcard... and I guess he didn't understand that I gave to him? So he found me and tried to give it back :D LOL

Having tweeted with Matthew Dow Smith for the last couple months, I finally got to meet him. He was very cool and when he wasn't busy signing we chatted about various geekery, like Stargate, Doctor Who (of course), comics (and Vampire Jubilee), hatred of Sparklepires, and film production, strangely enough. Anyway. Good times. Hope to be running into that guy again. He seems like good people. I gave him my last Atene postcard and asked him to sign my copy of Doctor Who: Fugitive. Woot!

On a totally "What a Crazy Random Happenstance" note, I ran into two guys I knew in college. They'd come up to Matt Smith's table and they looked so familiar, but I couldn't put my finger on it. I'm sure I was staring. They wandered off, but when I ran into them again, I had to stop one of them and as I was saying, "Hey... I think I know you..." one of the guys was saying, "You look really familiar..." And it was the Labruzzo twins! In college, I'd designed the cover of their first CD (and a website too I think?) and haven't seen or heard from them since they graduated in 2002. I can't believe that eight years later, I'd randomly run into them at a small Albany Comic show. Crazy! We chatted for a while about comics and movies and zombies. Good times.

Overall, I'd say this convention is worth it if you are really into comics, comic artists, or acquiring vintage comics. It's not really the place to go for costuming or other genre stuff. (One of the 501st Garrisons was there and I barely saw them.) Still, it's a good time if you have people there you want to hang out with and talk to. Thankfully, I made some new friends.

amezri: (tennant ;; forming thoughts)
I've just posted two entries of trips that I'd done last year, but never got around to posting. First, is my travel log from Hawaii along with links to photos and then also my experience working on the Polaris set as first assistant camera. Good times. Check it out.

Hawaii: November 26 - December 4, 2009


Polaris Shoot: December 6 - December 14, 2009
amezri: (h2o ;; cleo ;; dive)
** backdated ** It's actually January 19, 2010 right now, but if I don't back date this entry, I'll never find it later.

Mom has always wanted to go to Hawaii and this year she decided to make it a family trip. I'll be honest and say that I wasn't all that keen to go -- sun & sand? Not really things I enjoy. But, overall, I did have a good time, mostly due to all the tours we went on (didn't have time to get bored) and the shopping (I do love shopping).

I wrote the below on my NIT810 during the trip, so tenses might be a bit weird. I'm not editing it too much except typos and correcting information.


Thursday, November 26

Actually haven't slept at all since getting up Wednesday morning (when I saw Boondock Saints and did some final packing things). I decided that since we had to leave for the airport at 3:30am, it didn't make sense to go to bed. After I finished packing late Wednesday, I caught up on DVRed TV (V, Castle, Ghost Hunters Academy [which gets worse every week]).

Showered, dressed and set to go by 3am. Crazy. Shao looked really sad as we were rushing to go. I'm sure she knew we were all leaving her. She followed us closely as we put stuff in the car. Poor puppy!

Decided to use the Park, Ride & Fly, so I left my car there. I'm a little scared to read the disclaimer on the back of the ticket that reads, "not responsible for stress damage to windshield." Uh... what are you doing, stacking cars on top of each other?!

I've never had a more confusing check-in in my life. My mom had checked in online, but for whatever reason my brother got flagged so he had to check-in in person. So we waited in line, spoke to a very confused ticket agent, and then had to go through one of those computerized kiosks again anyway. I am not at all sure how online check-in saves time.

adventures in air travel )


Friday, November 27

Up at 6am and showered and dressed. Had a blueberry muffin for breakfast. Took a walk in front of the pier while waiting for our tour bus to arrive. Mom and I were going on the Oahu Spirit Tour.

tour & evening luau )


Saturday, November 28

Got up later than the previous days and was planning on going to Diamond Head with my brother and his friend, but we didn't since she had to battle fleas in a place she was house sitting. Instead, we took a walk down to Waikiki Beach and then the various shopping centers in the area, like the Royal Hawaiian Center and the Waikiki Shopping Plaza. Got a few trinkets and a solid perfume set from the L'Occitane shop in the Duty Free Galleria because that's the only place I've been able to find it.

thing much happened today )


Sunday, November 29

Woke up at 6:00am. Dressed and ready to catch the 7:30am shuttle to the flea market at Aloha Stadium. So much stuff to see! Bought lots of trinkets. Found a few stands with Tokidoki knockoffs - they were either weird styles, too expensive, or both. Finally found one stand with good styles and good prices, so I bought two! Walked around for hours; everything started to look the same. Got the shuttle back to the hotel at 3:30pm.

shopping day )


Monday, November 30

Up at 4:30am. Got a bagel and yogurt from the cafe in the hotel lobby. The mini bus for the tour arrived at 7:00am. Once we picked up the other passengers, we headed to Pearl Harbor and the USS Arizona memorial.

Pearl Harbor & Circle Island tours )


Tuesday, December 1

Woken up at 4am by texts concerning the dog from [livejournal.com profile] smashedrecords. Called her to address some questions and went back to sleep. Mom had gotten up to walk to Ala Moana beach. Finally got up about 9am and got a sandwich from the cafe in the lobby. Also asked about taking the bus to Toys N Joys.

shopping day )


Wednesday, December 2

Didn't get up in time to go to the beach with mom. Ended up sleeping until 9:30am. Was sort of crank about the day and just wanted to be alone for the day.

more shopping and beach walks )


Thursday December 3

Another 4:00am morning involving getting ready to go and breakfast from the cafe in the lobby. The shuttle bus was a bit early, but we made it. Got to the airport with an hour before the flight after several stops to pick up others in our group.

Our flight to Hilo on the Big Island was delayed, and that pretty much set the tone for the whole trip. My mom was.. mom and my brother was crankypants. We ended up leaving an hour late. The flight to Hilo is only 45 minutes.

volcano tour )


Friday, December 4

Got up and dressed. Mom and I went out for one more walk around Ala Moana Beach park. Lots of surfers out in the morning. Found some shells and coral to keep. Got a heat rash. Awesome. Apparently me plus sun really does equal a bad reaction.

headed home! )


More Photos:
I took about 1000 photos. You can see most of them in my gallery.

Twitter Posts:
I forgot to switch my location in Twitter, so all of my tweets are marked 5 hours ahead (NY time) of what it really was in Hawaii. Oops. Includes twitpics.

days: nov 26 | nov 27 | nov 28 | nov 29 | nov 30 | dec 1 | dec 2 | dec 3 | dec 4
amezri: (con ;; up to no good!)
New England Fan Experience: Boston, MA: Nov 13-15, 2009.

Seriously? Weirdest con EVAR. Weird people. Weird venue. Just. Weird.

Friday, Nov 13

Got up at 7am and got the rest of my stuff together for con. grabbed cereal for breakfast and headed to Maria's. We left a little after 9.

It was a pretty uneventful drive. Until we got to Boston. We got a little lost at the exits and killed 20 minutes getting to the Boston Common lot. Saw some kids in Boston Common playing Quidditch. Headed to a food court to get some food. Met up with Julian and Karyn. Liz was still a ways off. After a bit of a wander through Chinatown (which is small and filled with food places & not much else), we grabbed our luggage out of the car and dragged it to the hotel. Had some more time to kill so we headed to the Rock Bottom brewery so they could get a drink.

friday arrival, corin, gareth )

Saturday, Nov 14

Woke up at 7am but didn't really get up and moving until 8am. Once everyone was up, we went to the food court in City Place for Dunkin. I got a bagel and a pumpkin donut. Yum!

Once back in the room, Maria and I got in to Evil Alice & Evil Red Riding Hood costumes. Headed down with Karyn to the Corin Nemec Q&A. He was a little late, but once started, he was funny and charming and most of the questions were good. He was telling us that SS Doomtrooper was originally called the Citadel and the story was great and the concept drawings were awesome...then the movie got finished. Someone asked why he did Mansquito and he sort of hung his head. He did say he wanted to do it because it was like the old scifi monster cult films. There was one genius who asked who the main villain of Stargate:Universe would be, as if Corin had some inside information about a show that's two removed from the series he was in.

con wandering )



Sunday, Nov 15

Was freeeezing last night. Apparently someone turned the AC on and never turned it off. Probably the boys when they were using the room as a manhunt base. Got up and showered and went to get breakfast at Dunkin's with Maria.

Finished packing after we got back and woke everyone up. Once everyone was awake, they headed for breakfast and Maria and I checked our bags and then wandered into the dealer's room. Chatted with Rachael about True Blood and LKH/Anita Blake, the latest book is apparently better? Might give it a glance.

time to run away? )



Another con weekend comes to an end. Overall, I think I had a good time.

Additional media:
all photos here
Twitter posts: friday | saturday | sunday
amezri: (geeky hobbits)
A few weeks back, I got my new Canon PowerShot SX20IS. I've only just now gotten around to uploading some test shots.

I've taken about 1000 photos on the camera now and I'm liking it. There are a few weird things about it like the placement of buttons and how manual focus is now a ring on the backside. Also, I don't think the auto-focus is quite as good as on the S3IS. Overall, I'm pretty happy with the photos coming off of it, though. I've ended up using the manual mode much more than I had with the S3IS.

photos of the camera )

Slideshow of test images:

amezri: (con ;; up to no good!)
I had a really awesome time at DragonCon this year even though I didn't go to any of the panels I wanted or see any actors I was hoping to. Instead, I hung out with some really awesome friends I only see a few times a year and got to know some people I only see once a year at DCon a bit better. It was also great to make some new friends. Seriously, right now I am having difficulty letting go. Is it time for the next DragonCon yet?

DragonCon 2009: Sept 3-7, 2009

This year, I once again stayed in one of a block of rooms Joel reserved. We were in the Marriott, which is the new Hyatt? Everything was happening there and it was pretty convenient to just roll out and head to panels or photo ops or what have you. Really great.

Thursday, September 3

Got up at 7:30a and ended up poking around the internet for awhile; emails and such. Showered and got dressed before getting the last of my stuff packed. Still feel like I'm missing something. Nevertheless, all set to go at about 9:30a so I figured I had time for breakfast... except there wasn't anything. Meh.

travel, registration, and day 1 bar shenanigans )

Friday, September 4

Didn't sleep really well. Got up at 8am and showered and dressed in chick SGA costume. Went to the fan table and saw Gareth on the way. Joked that I was following him because we kept running into each other. Dan was still setting up the table. Jason and I went to buy breakfast for the people at the table. Helped with the rest of table setup - they were hanging a Stargate backdrop for people to take photos with.

SG panels, Julie Benz, Lani Tupu, Zombie prom, more bar shenanigans )

Saturday, September 5

Woke up at 7:45 am and got ready for the parade. Got breakfast and snagged [livejournal.com profile] husher315 something since he texted me on the way. It's entirely possible I got to the SFH table and threw his breakfast at him. I was tired and hungry and the fruit cup I got was possibly the smallest I'd ever seen.

Our group gathered at SFH table before heading out. We had several SG-1 people, a few Atlantis people, and a group with the new Stargate: Universe uniforms. Liz was wearing her new Hak'tyl costume, which looked awesome. I was wearing my SG-2 chick variant. Eventually, we made our way to parade start. It threatened to rain, but thankfully it didn't. The BSG group was definitely larger this year! Parade was fun and the weather was great. Spotted [livejournal.com profile] speakerwiggin in the crowd toward the end.

parade, Ben Browder, Michael Trucco, Charlaine Harris, TCF party fail )

Sunday, September 6

Got up at ungodly hour and got dressed in SGA gear. Grabbed some breakfast at the cafe in the Hyatt. Went down to the Flanigan photo op with [livejournal.com profile] husher315. It went really quickly and Joe was pretty nice. While in line waiting, Paul walked by and his handler pointed me out again and Paul stopped to say hello. :D [Also, I really need to stop doing these photo ops because I always look like a goon.]

flanigan, scifihero dinner, late night walking )

Monday, September 7

Weird day. Up at 10am. Dressed. Got food. Talked to Jeffrey, who just joined TCF. I told him to check out scifiHero.net. Met up with Jason who had to check out of his room. He needed to drop off his armor tub in my room for a while before he moved it to Dan's room. We got the rest of his stuff to Dan's room at the Hyatt before going to the food court so Jason could get lunch. I went to walk of fame for awhile. No one was there really, but bought art from Lani Tupu who was just about to leave. Had a quick chat with him and told him that I've been wanting one of his pieces for a long time.

dealer's room, con winding down :( )

Tuesday, September 8

Awake after 8 hours of sleep. That was definitely the longest sleep I had the whole weekend, but I felt wiped. Got dressed and had breakfast at the Corner Bakery with the rest of the St. Pete crew, Carlos, and Ben. So tasty! Why was I not having breakfast here every morning? Went back to the hotel to finish packing and check my bag at the desk. Said goodbye to the gang driving back to Florida before dashing over to the Hyatt to say goodbye to Dan and Jason. Wandered around the Marriott and sat in the Pulse Loft for a while with Ben.

the LONG journey home )


Additional links and media:

+ all my DragonCon photos are here
+ daily tweets (with pics): thurs, fri, sat, sun, mon, tues
+ Phil's photos
+ Blackhawk's photos: parade, con
+ Tim Fritz's photos
+ Michael Hogan attacking a cake at the SFH dinner
+ Abe the Alien at a Thriller dance practice
+ Paul McGillion panel on Friday
+ DragonCon parade: part 1, part 2, part 3 (ScifiHero is at 2:33 in Part 3)
+ Shatner & Nimoy panel (7 parts)
+ Stargate SG-1/Atlantis Panel (7 parts)
+ Stargate Multiverse Panel (7 parts)
+ crapload of other youtube vids

And that concludes my awesome DragonCon trip for this year. I can't wait til next year when, hopefully, [livejournal.com profile] smashedrecords will be coming with me as I know she will have an awesome time.
amezri: (con ;; time for con)
I'm leaving this as is now, but I think later on I'm going to back-date it so I'll actually be able to find it when I go looking for whatever reason. Sorry it's taken so long to post this stuff (if anyone cares?) - I've been really lazy and procrastinating like a mo-fo.

Shore Leave 31: July 10-12, 2009

Back to the old Hunt Valley Marriott, but we were staying at the Courtyard Marriott down the road. It did help that I had Agathon with me so I could type up my con report at the con and then send myself an HTML file. As such, some of this report is written in present tense. Can't be bothered to correct it that much. I did have internet and could probably have even posted entries daily. May try that out for DragonCon.


Friday, July 10

Left home at 7:30a. Got to [livejournal.com profile] smashedrecords' to pick her up, but then had to go home as I forgot the artwork I wanted to enter in the show. Meh.

Arrived at Courtyard Marriott at 2:30p. Good room, though not at the con hotel. Changed into doll & handler outfits - [livejournal.com profile] smashedrecords' doll name was Bravo. Got badges and registered pieces in art show. Wandered and saw actors already signing.

Miracle Laurie & Christopher Heyerdahl )


Saturday, July 11

[livejournal.com profile] smashedrecords' not feeling well. Her sore throat got worse :( I got dressed in Roswell uniform & headed to the photo op line. Blarghy. Not good. Romel was headed out to a wedding later in the day, but would bring [livejournal.com profile] smashedrecords to the con hotel later.

photo op, Jason Momoa & Rachel Luttrell, Miracle's Q&A, Masquerade )


Sunday, July 12

Up and out of room by 11a. I headed to the dealer's room and got a Caprica Six and a Vamp Willow for a great deal. Ken is awesome. Found a Callisto fig for $10 and had to have it.

more Miracle!, rolling out )



Other links:
+ all my Shore Leave 31 photos
+ twitter posts: friday, saturday, sunday
amezri: (con ;; up to no good!)
This past weekend I went to Massachusetts to visit Liz & Pano and the Mikes with [livejournal.com profile] queenmaab and [livejournal.com profile] smashedrecords. We took a stroll around Salem while we were there on Saturday and that was pretty fun. I spent entirely too much money at the comic/hobby shop there. Three sets of BSG mini-mates! And a few blind box toys. Photos of those later.

Sunday, though, we went to the King Richard's Faire in Carver, MA. It was pretty cold and drizzly (never turned into actual rain, thankfully!). Pano and I went in SGA gear and met up with a couple people from SG-22. It was pretty fun running around the faire in gear! A group of teens stopped us at one point and wanted photos, which was awesome. There was one incident where a weapons merchant got all pissed that there were people running around in tactical gear, but I guess later on he realized that we were from Atlantis and came and apologized. Thanks, buddy. It was only a joke.

Full gallery here.

a huge selection of photos )
amezri: (Default)
Worked on some website stuff today. Commission-y things as well as tiny updates to my own. Somewhat accomplished? There's still that one that I don't really want to start on. Ugh. Don't care at all.

Tom McRae's site is still down. What is up with that? Have sent an e-mail to inquire. In other news, he will be back in NYC at the Living Room October 29 & November 5. Both are Wednesdays. Hopefully I'll be able to make one of those and go see Tom again with [livejournal.com profile] ozw. In other Tom news, have finally heard the song, "Lipstick" that he did with Wills & the Willing. Like it a lot. Forked over $3 at mbop megastore for a copy as I refuse to touch iTunes.

Made cakes in a jar! Was a bit tragic. I think I filled the jars too much. And the batter I used (Pillsbury Funfetti mix) is a bit sweet. I think it would have gone better if I used smaller jars, so I might go find some and give it another go.

photos! )


Well. That was enough productivity for the day. I think I'll go lay about for a while.
amezri: (firefly ;; she does not comprehend)
Here are some photos of the first go at River' bank heist costume in Serenity.

All items by [livejournal.com profile] queenmaab. She did have to spray dye the fabric used for the dress as the original was too peachy/orange/pink and we also spray dyed the over vest thing. There are things I don't particularly like on it (the vest thing for starters), but I love the cut of the dress and the shirt.

I know she wasn't wearing boots in the movie, but there's no way I'm running around a con in bare feet. The boots are similar to the ones she has later on in the movie, so whatever.

Reference photos for this costume are here.

five photos )

And now I are off to make a batch of Anzac biscuit for a party this afternoon :D
amezri: (amezri in rotorua)
Right. So, globat is being a huge bitch and some stuff is working and some isn't. Eternalvox.net should be mostly back up and running. The tech I chatted with earlier said they had a server outage this weekend and are trying to get everything back up. Great.

Anyway. After work, I had a hair appointment at Jean Paul Salon. Ho.Lee.Crap. Never in my life have I had that expensive of a hair anything. I wouldn't have gone in there without the gift certificate, first of all. My totally was nearly $200 by the time I was done, but a $25 passport got me half off the haircut and one of the color processed, and after the gift card, I only owed $45. Still, Tina did a really awesome job and the cut is pretty exactly what I wanted and the color came out great. You can't really tell from the photos, but the colors are brown and blonde underneath.

photos under here! )

[livejournal.com profile] smashedrecords came by when I got home so I could do a mini photoshoot for some headshots she needs for something. I think there were a couple usable ones out of everything. i really need to get myself a tripod. And a better lighting system. Ugh.

Okay, I need to go get something to eat; I haven't had dinner yet. Starving! No chance of really getting anything done tonight...
amezri: (amezri ;; red corset)
Another costuming binge!

In this post: Updated Ravenclaw costume, fitted tactical vest, River boots, really, really lame River costume.

photos and babble under cut )
amezri: (tennant ;; specs + smile = win)
First off, about the Spitzer thing? I... kind of don't give a crap. It's not that I don't think hiring a prostitute when you're married is wrong, but in the grand scale of scummy things politicians do, it's kind of low on the rung. You know, unless he used my tax money to pay for it, and then I want a turn at hitting him in the head with a bat.

After work, I decided to head over to Sephora. Didn't... really need to, but I wanted to check some stuff out. I ended up walking away with three Tarte products (FRXtion, lip gloss [Odysseus & Penelope], and Lock & Roll [in Patina]).

Right. So, remember my new Sony camera? I've been walking around with it for almost a month and I've taken 232 photos (which includes a few videos)... and my battery just died after transferring everything. No, really. Just. I'm kind of impressed.

Here's a sample of some of my first 100 or so photos:

random photos )

I did take the camera to the Ten Year Vamp show this weekend and I will probably post those horrible photos at some point. I'm more impressed with the video on the thing, actually.

I was going to do paperwork and taxes today. But. Uhhhh.... I guess not.
amezri: (con ;; up to no good!)
I'm about a week and a half late. I blame plague. But here we go: write up, photos, and even video!

Farpoint 2008: February 15-17, 2008 in Hunt Valley, MD

If there is some extra bitter snark stuck in here, I'm sorry. I can't be bothered to edit at this point in time. Pictures linked within text, or you can use the links at the bottom.

Friday, February 15, 2008

Got up at 5:00am. Showered, dressed, packed up the rest of the stuff in the Jepp and headed to [livejournal.com profile] smashedrecords'. After a last minute scramble for things, we headed out at about 7:30am. It took us about 7 hours to get to Hunt Valley, which included two rest stops - one of which was for gas - and a third random stop in search of Wolfgang Puck sandwiches (don't ask). Once we got to Hunt Valley, we decided to stop at Wegman's before the hotel so we could get some last minute items. Checked in at the hotel and found out we were on the 3rd floor this time (ugh!), but once again we some how parked in the the lot that was closest to where we needed to be. Ha!

registration, art show, bar hijinx! )

Saturday, February 16, 2008

I'm not even going to talk about a certain someone snoring because... well, actually, it didn't bother me enough to completely disrupt my sleep schedule. So, yeah. Woke up at about 6am, though. Rearranged my luggage, got out what I was going to wear today and grabbed a quick shower. Putzed around until about 9am before I decided to eat and get dressed in the Hogwarts gear for the day.

Erin Grey, Marina Sirtis, James Callis, masquerade )

Sunday, February 17, 2008

Had a good night's sleep because uhm... the person who snored relocated. Woke up at 8:00am. [livejournal.com profile] smashedrecords and I got dressed and headed down to checkout the art auction. It turned out none of my stuff was even in the auction. Atene had only gotten the one bid, so it sold for less than I wanted, which was mildly disappointing, mostly because the whole pricing sheet thing was not explained to me properly. On the plus side, [livejournal.com profile] smashedrecords won a piece of pottery with Elvish on it.

loitering, james callis again, art sales )


All my photos are here.
All my videos on youtube here.

Other Farpoint reports/pictures:
+ Liz's photos
+ [livejournal.com profile] tiggerallyn: on the Farpoint experience
+ Rising Phoenix Productions photos
+ Dan and Pano at Cheeburger!!
+ posing for their Cheeburger photo
+ Cheeburger eats Pano
+ another video of James answering the prank question

People who contracted the Farpoint Plague:
+ Dan
+ Dion
+ Bonnie
+ Nate
+ me
+ tiggerallyn apparently
+ and many more!!
amezri: (con ;; up to no good!)
Okay, so no full Farpoint gallery yet, but I just wanted to put a few photos up for you guys to see. These were some of my favorite shots from this year:

five images under the cut )

I'll get all the photos and the report up this weekend. Really!

I've also snapped a pic of my shiny new camera, the Sony DSC-W90. Oh, it's nice. It takes some rather nice photos, too. I'd post some of those, except it's on the internal memory (card in transit) and the batteries died while I was playing so I couldn't use the cable. Oh well.

shiny new toy! )

For residual con geekery, I've just made myself an icon. It's the SG-2 boys. Or SG-20. Where the frak does MA fall? Hm. Anyway. It amuses me. And I love the photo that [livejournal.com profile] smashedrecords accidentally took.

Now, I'm off to go capture some photos of this lunar eclipse I hear is happening tonight and also to watch Jon Stewart on Larry King Live.
amezri: (amezri ;; gategeek)
Well. I'm 5 days out from con and there is still sooo much stuff to do. I did get a lot done today though -- spent all day watching Boomtown and sewing. Fixing buttons, shirts with holes, patches, plus I made a sheath for my wand.. which my brother says looks like a blade sheath, so that may be a problem at con. We'll see.

Still left to do:
+ Module prints
+ print paperwork for art show items
+ check maps

Hm. Not as much as I thought, I guess?

Anyway... took a bunch of photos this morning. Lots of the finished Hogwarts costume and SGA BDUs!!!! I mean, seriously. I've been trying to get an SGA costume these done for like two years. And it's finally all together! Well, minus the vest, which I'm sending to someone to get it resized for me.

Details and pictures of both outfits under the cuts.

gothloli/piratey Hogwarts costume )

SGA: Black BDUs )

Full gallery here.
amezri: (spaced ;; tim/daisy ;; goof)
[livejournal.com profile] erintheodd, [livejournal.com profile] smashedrecords and I went to the Ten Year Vamp show last night, which was once again at Sandy's Clam Bar. Last time I went, I hadn't brought a camera but when I got to the venue, I sort of regretted that as it was a perfect place for photos. You could get right up to the stage and the band has an awesome strobe light that makes for some fabulous photos in an otherwise poorly light place.

The drive down was pretty good (I'm sure it was mostly due to the company) and when we got to the bar, the band was still setting up and the place was mostly empty. It filled in within the hour, though, and the usual suspects showed up. We'd all already put ear plugs in (because I like being able to hear) and [livejournal.com profile] erintheodd and I sort of just stood around looking like idiots in front of the stage. [livejournal.com profile] smashedrecords, however, was chatting away and.. well, sometimes I'm a bit jealous at her ability to just chat people up and have a good time. Well, not really jealous because I know it's my fault for being a bit stand-offish so it's no one's fault but my own. I tend to figure if I don't have anything smart to say,I'm better off not saying anything.

Anyway. The show was great, but I really wish they would.. not play the same goddamn set every single time they play. Sure, it makes photography pretty easy because you know exactly what they'll be doing when, but honestly... change the order or mix in some new songs. I don't know how some of these people can just go to what is essentially a rerun every week. Don't get me wrong, the band is great and they do awesome covers, but seriously, if this is the setlist for the rest of eternity, I'm not sure how many more times I will want to go.

On the bright side: I didn't get a drink spilled on me. I attribute this to the fact that Josh had departed earlier in the evening. Heh.

On the not so bright side, I got hit on three times - twice by the same guy. All three encounters were awkward and totally unwanted, though that third times was really creeptastic. The first guy was... well, he was all right if you went for that type (and were really desperate and very, very drunk). Which I didn't. He started by asking me if the ear plugs helped to which I replied that, yes they did. Then he asked me my name and introduced himself and followed that with really lame lines like, "you're really beautiful, I just thought I'd tell you that." And omg, I could not get rid of him. I sort of smiled and turned away. A few minutes later he comes back and starts in again, so I flat out told him that I wasn't really interested and hey, don't take it personally, it was a good try, but I was completely not interested in him at all. I think he was faking the embarrassment, but either way, I told him that it was fine, but next time he would do better not being so forceful. "So next time I see you I shouldn't be so forceful?" he asks. I say, "oh, no, not with me, with someone else." And then he finally went away. Right after that, a really smelly, overweight guy in an overcoat sidled up and said, "You're like the only Asian girl in here." Swear to god, he said that. "Uh, that's.. cool." I said and turned away. He tried to talk to me again and, fed up with it, I finally said, "Look, if you're trying to chat me up, I am really not interested, so you can just move along." And he was all, "oh, no, just want to be friends," and tried to shake my hand. Uhm, yeah. No. Thankfully, that was the end of that, but holy crap.

Moving on.. One of the main points of me going to the show was to take some photos and practice the whole low light venue thing because fstops and shutter speeds totally defeat me. The photos from the Knitting Factory are total crap because I let the camera handle all that and basically what it did was to crank the ISO to 1600 which... well... it's pretty horrible. Fairly sharp images ruined by unbelievable grain.

I read up on low light photography Friday and was determined to use some of that knowledge at the show. I think it was pretty helpful. With the help of Deb's fabulous on stage strobe, I managed to take some really great shots. I kept switching up the ISO, fstop, and shutter speeds before I finally stopped after the second set because... uh.. I ran out of card space (or was rather close). I took something close to 700 shots, but that was because I was using the continuous shooting mode. This afternoon I got rid of the really blurry ones and ended up with 400 decent shots. The final gallery has about 200. I learned quite a bit, but it was all about experimenting, so I'm wondering how much of that learning process will have stuck. Most of these were taken without flash. A few dozen were taken with the slow-sync flash, and only a couple were with traditional flash settings.

Full gallery is here. Some of my favorite shots are under the cut, along with a video.

photos! lots. )
amezri: (amezri ;; suited up)
So far, so good - no more random shut downs. I had an old 98 machine that used to do the same thing on random websites. Meh. Stupid computers. Anyway. Weekend recap.

Friday
Spent the day at [livejournal.com profile] queenmaab's. We watched Stardust and A Dog's Breakfast while working on various computer things. I got a lot of work done on my movie database; cleaning it up and all that. I'm about 2/3 done filling out info in things already in there, so then I can put in all the ones I have left on the list.

We swapped Christmas presents of course :D I got some really nice things! [livejournal.com profile] queenmaab made me two t-shirts (one with a robot and one with monkeys in a barrel) and also got me a Knifty Knitter (with some yarn!) and an organizer I can use for yarn. Dan got me a gift card for the movies ^^

We went to Yip's for dinner. I'd never been there before, but apparently the place has been there since before my parents started their restaurant like 20 years ago. So. Yeah. It was a good place. The food was pretty good, but you can tell they haven't done a major remodel in years XD It was neat, though. I liked it.


Saturday
[livejournal.com profile] smashedrecords and I headed to NYC on the Ten Year Vamp bus once again for the MEANY Fest finals. Uhm. Before we got on the bus, though, we ended up in the wrong parking lot (due to oversight) and I pretty much had to speed to the right lot to catch the bus. The traffic at the mall was killing me, but thankfully, we made it there in time. Actually, we were told if they hadn't been waiting on another passenger, they would probably have left already. Eeep! The trip down was rather uneventful, but due to traffic and things, we didn't get to the Knitting Factory until about 8pm.

Once inside, I met up with [livejournal.com profile] ozw! YAY, Oz! I haven't seen him in ages, so that was cool. Spent the next few hours just hanging out, chatting, and listening to the bands (Ten Year was last in the line up). My absolute favorite was Sonny Marvello, a Glaswegian band. They actually ended up winning the competition. I was really hoping drunken 10YV fans wouldn't be spilling their drinks on me, but alas -- that was not to be. Some girl I'd seen at other shows before was drunkenly flailing to the music and tipped her full drink cup over her head and all over the front of my bag (narrowly missing my camera! the cow.) and Josh, who was standing next to me.

Speaking of cameras, the lighting in the Knitting Factory is pretty crap for my abilities with the camera. I tried shooting in Sports mode, which... well. I dunno. It did take some decent shots, but there is so much grain because of the high ISO I'm sure it was using. I need to learn how to use manual mode better. Srsly. Also? Focusing was not my friend last night. I fail at photography.

After the show and the winners were announced (Maslow as runner-up? Seriously?! Um. Kay.), we sort of just stood around waiting for our bus to show up and take us home. I'd been so enamored of Sonny Marvello that when I spotted the bassist at the bar, I dragged [livejournal.com profile] ozw over with me to ask him if they had CDs for sale. I couldn't quite hear what his name was over the noise of the room (Craig or Greg?) but he was really, really nice. I told him that they put on a great show and congratulated him on the win... then babbled on about how I really wanted to visit Scotland, specifically Glasgow, where the band is from. When I asked about the CD, he wandered off and told us to wait there and he'd go get me one. I offered to pay for it, but he politely declined and said that they wouldn't have any use for US dollars anyway. He told me to friend them on MySpace and we could chat -- so I told him I have a MySpace, but rarely use it, then handed him one of my business cards XD I are smooth. Oz & I wandered off to find [livejournal.com profile] smashedrecords after that.

Somewhere in here there was an encounter with Drunk Bathroom Girl that I was not a part of. I doubt that she will follow me here, but let me say this publicly: I don't really give a shit. There's a reason we call you Drunk Bathroom Girl. I can excuse one time of disgustingly drunken behavior -- I know it happens. But week after week of being a sloppy drunk is appalling. If medication is the excuse, it shouldn't be. If you're on medication, you shouldn't be drinking. Dumbass. I will continue to think of you as Drunken Bathroom Girl until whatever point it is you sober up enough to stop falling over band equipment and stumbling across the floor. Of course, I'll be totally polite to you in person.

The bus came back about 12:30am and we all piled on for the ride home. Fred put in Meet Joe Black for the ride back, which is sort of a depressing movie for a post-show trip, but okay. [livejournal.com profile] smashedrecords and had a nice chat with Pete. He's a cool guy and it would be nice to talk to him again at the next show about whatever. I like intelligent conversation. We also showed him the photos we took. He was happy that I had actually taken photos of him because he's under the impression that people generally don't.

Best moment of the ride back: The girls up front were asking if anyone had gotten photos of the half naked twins on stage; I guess the response was generally a negative until [livejournal.com profile] smashedrecords and I both shouted we had. Someone shouts, "Ha! The two straight girls in the front are the only ones who took pictures!" XD I are amused.

Anyway. MEANY Fest Photos! (My server's being wonky.. sorry if things load slow)

Oz; Oz & [livejournal.com profile] smashedrecords


Maslow


Sonny Marvello:


Ten Year Vamp:


More photos here. Including Super Chix, some blonde twins in shiny outfits, and the winners announcement.

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