Ah, a non-work related update:
Thank you, Office of Student Conduct.
So, because the actual legal system realized this was bullshit, does the campus needs to try another way to fuck me over? Is that what this is? Do I have to call the lawyer again?
Let me just clarify: it is not a UCPD officer’s duty to illegally enter a house. I’m a touch frustrated.
Fuckin’ A.
Beauty and the Beast is playing at a local theatre for the next few months.
The week’s been a touch busy, at least at times. Other times I’ve found myself wondering how I’d possibly pass the time. For instance, today. As I said earlier, I spent a good part of today sitting around waiting for an assignment. After being in the office from 8-12 and checking my email about a fourteen thousand times, Andrew finally gave me something.
So I shot a press call for the Cape Town performance of Beauty and the Beast. I didn’t realize it until I got back, but Andrew basically handed me a front page. A blind, retarded monkey could’ve made a pretty photo out of it, and with the show opening this weekend … well, yeah, knock on wood. The photo that I was told might make the front is the first image.
Note:For the paper I cropped closer to the bottom of the stage, but here I left the conductor in. Thought it made it interesting. Just wish I had a working copy of Photoshop so I could dodge his outline a little bit.
Otherwise, the week’s been good. I’ve been getting out on assignments, though few of them are actually worth mentioning in depth. Rastas and Police Day and horses and comedians and politicians and trying to shoot the sun and a giant freakin’ jersey. That about sums up my week.
… Wow, that actually makes it sound rather interesting.
Whitey likes hats
It goes well overall, I suppose. And that’s about it for the moment. Maybe I’ll talk about my life outside of work at some point. Just have to figure out if I actually have one …
I’ve been on the 8-4 shift this week and find myself consistently wondering how I manage to wake up. It’s been four years since I was able to wake up at 8am regularly.
That being said, I’m at work and have been here three hours now. With nothing to do. I have photos from this week but I can’t put them up from here - computer’s too slow.
… Basically this is just a confirmation (possibly for myself) that I will update with more photos from this week. Soon. Hopefully.
SIX is Southern Ink Xposure. It is also awesome. I’ve recently had quite a bit of interest in tattoos, in tattoo culture and body art. So I was probably going to go, anyway. So this was, to say the least, convenient.
Shaun Nel working on Ross Warwick.
What’s occurred to me as a result, however, is the way in which online photo galleries have affected the job of a photojournalist. While, admittedly, it shouldn’t be that different, I have found myself making a practical distinction in what I take photos of: when working for something with online galleries, every assignment is a photo essay (albeit a short one). Even a speaker shot can have multiple angles and more emphasis on supplemental details. But if it’s just for paper, even though I know I should still look for those little details, I find myself concentrating on the one photo that tells the whole story. I think that ramble made sense …
Whereas back home I would have spent hours upon hours at the event, taking detail photos of the equipment, of the DJs, of the T-shirts and people sitting in a line against a wall (okay, I still took that last one, but it didn’t come out), here I did the same shot over and over: tattoo artist giving tattoo. And while I got that same shot in a number of different ways, it’s still the same shot.
It’s not that I’m unhappy with my shots … I just feel that it makes me, well … lazy? I know that I should keep getting those other shots, but it’s not something that’ll get used because the online content here is - how to put this - scarce. It’s good practice, I suppose, but I hope I don’t get too rusty with supplemental images.
I don’t know. It’s just something that was crossing my mind.
In personal life news (yeah, shocking, I have a life outside work): there is now a third person in the flat I’m in. His name is Pieter and he’s Belgian. I’m trying not to make crappy jokes about waffles or Flemish (which is, let’s face it, a horribly unfortunate name for a language). He and Martin both managed to humble me in poker this evening.
“Learning is about more than simply acquiring new knowledge and insights; it is also crucial to unlearn old knowledge that has outlived its relevance. Thus, forgetting is probably at least as important as learning.” - Gary Ryan Blair
Pretty.
I didn’t care too much for the assignment itself (if I had a nickel for every time I’ve been on an assignment to take pictures of buses … I’d have two nickels). Hell, I wasn’t even thinking about Robben Island, and how gorgeous everyone told me it was. I was really just thinking that I was getting to go on an assignment without another photog, meaning that I might - just might - get something else published.
The ferry ride provided for some of the best nature shots I’ve been able to take. Ever. I think. This is a digitally stitched panoramic from 19 RAW files which, at full resolution, could be printed to about six feet long. I put it vertical just so that it’d kinda fit.
I have at least another half dozen landscapes which I’ll go through tonight and tomorrow. Hooray for pretty things.
Oh, the woeful work I do. How horrible and draining and difficult. I don’t know how I can ever keep up with it. Such mental and physical and emotional strain.
Andrew, hard at work.
The long, challenging day started with a delicious port from [I don't have my notes and I can't be bothered to try and read the tiny cursive in the photos]. A nice way to start a day (okay, it was probably about 11, but the point stands). Admittedly, my experience with port is minimal, but a good drink is a good drink is a good drink.
We saw the full view of the valley before lunch and I couldn’t help thinking I was back in Sonoma county.
Not Sonoma. Confusing.
While it’s on the table, a question of journalistic integrity: the two people were asked to walk in front of the vineyards. In the States, that would probably get me fired. It’s altering the scene. That being said, it doesn’t actually alter the meaning of the scene: it simply illustrates how fucking big the vineyards are. Aside from the basic fact that it’s against “the code”, is this actually okay? How else should someone go about it (these are theoretical questions, not so much situational ones)?
This table was AWESOME.
Ah, communes.
More wine tasting, small vineyards and huge. Amazing how it can actually be so exhausting at the end of the day.
Everyone has these shoes.
I think we sampled ... four bottles? Five?
24 million liters of wine come out of this place. One helluva party.
Yes, a difficult life.
There was a moment yesterday, while Obama was speaking during the inauguration, where I felt an odd warmth in my chest and a tug on my throat. I’m not really familiar with what “national pride” feels like. Kinda like an upset stomach, actually.
Maybe 200 or 300 people crowded in to watch the inauguraiton.
And the crowd goes wild.
Side note: I think more South Africans know the American National Anthem than Americans.
Ian: “Did you get anything good?”
Me: “Actually, no. It was all crap. Wherever there were people there was no wind and wherever there was wind there were no people.”
Ian: “Okay, no problem. Figured it was worth a shot.”
After this exchange I saw two scenarios which could have easily been used to illustrate the amount of wind there’s been this past weekend, but each time the situation ended before I could get my camera out. I’d say it was one of those days, but it wasn’t. I did get some decent shots on my earlier assignment: back-to-school shopping.
I’ll try and get some “windy” shots later. It seems to get windier in the late afternoon, anyway.
I’ll try and be more exciting in the future.
I really need to learn to drive manual so that I can actually get out and do more. I’m considering driving school.
There wasn’t anything to do at work today (not necessarily new - the holiday season seems to be slow as shit), nor was there anyone at work today (I have no idea how there will be pictures tomorrow). I spent a large part of the day talking to some of the employees at a restaurant on Long Street. They all seemed nice enough: obviously a little crazy. Just like twenty-somethings in the States.
Saw In Bruges. Quite good.
The most productive thing I did today was study a road guide. I’m finally getting an idea of the lay of the land, I think. Again: I need to start driving manual.
In the interest of a visual:
After about 7 attempts to find a vein to start my infusion: I was getting frustrated.
I have 272 photos taken at 15 second intervals from doing my infusion (Enzyme replacement therapy for Gaucher disease, if you don’t know). Now I just need to figure out how to present them. Ideas?
Well, I have the technological ability of a snail, so I might as well just start doing this whole thing and then worry about figuring out how to code it to match the rest of my site …
Have I mentioned that Cape Town is gorgeous? 'Cause it is.
On the off chance that someone reading this doesn’t already know: I’m in Cape Town working at the Cape Times and Cape Argus (one job, two competing papers: don’t ask) until the end of June. I take pictures and don’t get payed, but the light is so fucking beautiful all the time that I could care less.
Past few weeks have been nice, restful, but I’m starting to feel the itch to get out more. Appropriately enough, my editor talked to me a few days ago and said (loosely): “If this is something you want to do, kick it up a fucking notch. Think of independent assignments and pitch them.” This was, mind you, in the context of actually complimenting a photo from my portfolio, so it really just felt like good advice.
That said, I’m making lists of things to do photo stories on in Cape Town. I was thinking about tattoo culture (it always seems to interest me): there’s an expo next weekend which might serve as a good segway into that. I was also thinking about the townships. But I’ll get into all that later.
I’ve had one photo in the paper so far; a stand alone on the front page.
It's kids on the beach. Exciting. Really.
Of course, it doesn’t deserve to be front page. It’s just not that interesting, inspired, original, or anything. It’s cute. That’s about fucking it. So now I need to deserve a front page photo.
I like to play with flash.
I’ll try and somewhat regularly throw photos and such up here. And, you know, write. But I’m a bit more for the whole “pictures” thing.
Bit of what the past few weeks have been:
So … that’s about it for now.
“It’s a strange world. Let’s keep it that way.” - Warren Ellis