I’m going to change my photography portfolio from a custom (albeit poorly coded) JavaScript app to a WordPress photo-blog this weekend to simply make it better while I focus on getting aFrame out of beta, and complete some lab apps for Zend certification.
Once I have that certificate showcasing my awesomeness, I’ll either toss away the WordPress install or wrap it in aFrame.
I went for a walk with Jenz along the Rideau Canal and eventually into a Turkish festival that was happening in Confederation Park.
I’m a Photoshop user. I have been since my mid-teens, and I always gravitate toward it after running the gambit of options that crop up every few years. I think these days, ACR and the Smart Sharpen filter are the draw.
Regardless, these applications don’t run in Linux which caused me to jump between Windows and Mint for two weekends. Who wants to do that? It’s boring, and takes up hours even if you have a simple drag’n'drop recovery protocol (which I do). Sure, you can dual boot but why should I? That’s a UX failure and I just don’t want to be “in Windows” anymore.
VirtualBox came to the rescue with it’s awesome “seamless” mode. I simply put the Windows taskbar on auto-hide at the bottom, and keep my Mint panel visible across the top (personal preference), and Photoshop appears to be running in Linux!
OSX has had this for a few years with Fusion; someone forgot to send out the memo that it was possible in Linux.
Jen and I went to a BBQ and spent the afternoon with friends. We caught the fireworks from home. I have a lot of raws to process.
The migration from Zenfolio to Flickr is going well. I’ve got about 1/4 of the content uploaded. Once it’s all there, I have to create a new interface for the content and expose it from my portfolio. Client content will be password protected, so that’ll be a second phase.
Overall, it appears that I’m going to be creating a custom ecommerce engine that’s Flickr powered.
I’m going to be pulling my gallery offline while I do a major upgrade using my new JavaScript library, aFrame. I’m not really seeing the value in having a so-so SaaS system manage my content with an extremely limited template; when I can make my own do so much more.
Today was the last day for one of my original teammates at work. I’m going to miss his colorful commentary on things, and the smoke breaks (I don’t smoke, I just go for the sunlight & breezes).
I’ve been enjoying having Ubuntu Server 9.04 running on my server at home. It’s been a good learning experience. I’m trying a network upgrade to 9.1 now. I’m hoping that doesn’t go wrong.
Jen‘s produced some awesome pictures this week, you should go look.
I’ve integrated my Flickr account with my website (finally!). It’s still in beta, more eye candy will be rolling out this week.
Saturday morning was pretty chilly at -20c with windchill, but that didn’t stop me from taking a walk around Confederation Park with my fiance; cameras in hand! I opted to use my nifty fifty (50mm f1.4), at a pretty wide aperture of f2.0 for almost all of the photos. ISO100 was required, and there was no filter on the front element.
The full series is available at http://gallery.jasonmulligan.com/winterlude-2010 and will be continually updated while the festival is under way.
I shot the fireworks display from my home last night, mostly due of the cold but also because I got home late from the office and that left little time to get myself weather proofed and outside. Regardless, the show was awesome! I dragged the shutter too long it seems at 4 seconds, so a little “live ‘n’ learn” lesson occurred; usually I get it right.
I’m also doing the final content edit for Optis wedding album. Client feedback has been great, and we both decided to change 2 spreads slightly so there’s better flow in the story telling. I can’t wait to finish the book, it’s going to look amazing once it’s printed by KISS Wedding Books.
Later today I’m hoping to have enough time to walk through the ice carving that’s going on in Confederation Park, not too far from my home. It’s always fun to see the creative ice sculptures.
