My Heart Nearly Stopped!!!!!!!!

Needed to off load some pix so I could head off to a retirement / birthday party shoot.....so I plug in my current working drive......damn thing starts sputtering the lights on flickering and it will not show up in Disk management...so I switch to my back up ....same thing.... and then the 3 rd copy....same thing...my heart is racing and pounding like Vesuvius when it buried Pompey....time was running out so I dumped the files onto my c drive and left to go shoot......

Came home...fired up the 'puter and plugged in main working drive....again it flickered and sputtered...and so did the other 2........damn how can 3 drives go bad in less than 2 days and at the same time.....it they had been Western Digital or Maxtor's I would have expected it...but not Seagate......I have lost a Seagate drive but never 2 or 3 out of the same batch......so I unplugged my tablet and plugged in my working drive again, directly to computer no USB dock......it fired up, quiet and smooth no hitch......now I feel I can sleep.........check the 2 copy drives...all good.....heart rate down, pulse - normal and blood sugars dropping..........cold sweat gone.........I do have all of the jpgs stored on SmugMug but I was worried about my DNGs..........

Moral ....I need an AC power cable for my laptop cooler and the 2 other usb docks.....they all accept power supplies I just did not purchase them when i purchased the docks or cooler....dummy me......
If you are using any sort of USB dock and it accepts an AC power supply....make sure to use it.


Yup that scared the bejeezers out of me.................and some other stuff also


I let the 3 drives spin all night long connected directly to the computer....they are still nice and quiet 12 hrs later and still spinning.....until tomorrow night when I split them up to their respective off site storage places

Are You in NEED of a POST PROCESSOR???

Are you in need of a post processor because you are just way to busy to keep up with all the processing?? Or maybe you really do not like processing but love creating magical images and wish you had a darkroom tech just like in the film days........Well I will recommend one for you.....He is very particular about his processing and wants clients to be very happy....He is a photographer also.

His name is Chad Dahlquist and is 1/2 of the Happy Fish Design and Post Production Services team.....H.F.D.P.PS. can also help you with the tedious task of designing really great albums also.....the design side is run by his wife Karen.....
For a Price list on Processing follow this link: http://tinyurl.com/4fhzaok .

On the contact form fill out all but the album info and in the comments section ask for a processing price list or ask for a processing and album design price list.

Karen and Chad are great to work with.

You can send your files to them on disk (snail mail) or FTP them to them....FTP is of course the fastest way to deliver and receive the files.....I recommend 2 free FTP clients: FileZilla and FireFTP ...both are from Mozilla and work great with FireFox Browser......and I also recommend SMART FTP but it is not free.

Have a great Friday.

ALIEN BEE STUDIO FLASHES

I have been watching the prices of Alien Bee Professional studio flash units on a few forums and auction sites and i cannot believe what I see......People are more than willing to pay full retail for used flashes....I am talking seeing flashes that are 3-5yrs old selling for full retail + shipping and handling.......I watched one auction with a buy it now of $400 go for more.....just reading the auction it sounded decent, until you took the time to price the flash ($280), the umbrella ($30) the stand ($30) and a softbox ($45)......the prices in ( ) are full retail...this seller paid maybe $400 if you figure in S/H....but everything was 4.5yrs old.....This is just craziness .....

Have a great weekend...............

Want Portrait But Do Not Want to Get Out in Bad Weather or ....

Want Portrait But Do Not Want to Get Out in Bad Weather or ....have small children that you do not want to take out for any pone of several reason, we as parents do not want to take the children out from home.....

Call a Photographer that makes house calls...yes concierge photogs...I have made house calls for ever.....not just the well to do's but also to the average worker, their time is valuable also and sometimes it just makes for a better portrait session for ME the photog to come to you....that way you are in your own element, you feel way more relaxed and can pretty much do what ever you want to..it is YOUR home and space...so if being barefoot is part of being comfy..do it and tell mister photog ...no pix show feet......also no need to PACK CLOTHING changes to go to the studio, clothes stay in closet.....A lot of 'togs charge a premium to come to you...I do not....I have minimum of 3 hours set for every in home portrait and I am normally early..then I carry the lights in and get set up.....this includes office portraits and such also....

So remember that some of us truly enjoy being at YOUR service.......so the next time you need a REAL FAMILY portrait give me a call....even if your family is just you and the python .....or Lassie or Silver...you get the picture.....we can include pets in the pix also.....they actually own us notthe other way around.

Venting some more...yepoo still DGRIN STUFF....

It is funny that 99% of the mods are not actual Photographers...but rather wannbes...they hide in their offices all day as engineers and other such people with a 9-5 paycheck job and take a few pics here and there...they are not out in the trenches shooting for a living......Where did they study photography...they did not...but yet they think they have the proper knowledge to run a photography forum...not hardly...they like the control they can have over others.....the most Fascist are a west coast engineer and an east coast Physicist and he really got bad after earning his PHD......but if the actual head of the forums would simply slap his buddies once in a while rather than allowing them to run off some the most creative people from across the globe then the forum would grow leaps and bounds...instead of people posting that AI am leaving because of how I have been treated by tyrannical mods/admins....it is never the powers that be fault...it is always the forum users fault....if these powers run their homes like they do Dgrin then they are abusing their wives and children......it has been proven over and over again on Law and Order and other law enforcement tv shows.......really what has happened on Dgrin to nite is not much different than Egypt cutting all cell phone and internet and train availability for its people....simply just another form of Fascism but from american tyrrants......

Smugmug came on line with out any really good way to upload photos...ask for a better way..of anything and you get standard run around the bush of answers...but we refuse to give a definitive answer because one of our competitors might be watching....case in point i started hosting my pix there a little over 5yrs ago...but could not upload very fast...sometimes it took days to upload a few pix...a few is under 100 jpegs.....they want to cater to the PRO but refuse to allow us to store raw or dng files, but they partnered with Amazon and offered disk space that for me 5yrs ago would have cost me over $2k/yr to store my Original files whether raw or DNG......
nope not me..so I have a collection of hard drives storing my images by year taken...has cost me less than 1k so far....for 3 copies of each drive......

The real kicker, FTP has been around since April 16, 1971...since its inception FTP has been the FREAKING STANDARD for transferring files.....and the owners of SmugMUg / Dgrin did not allow for its use that is pure and simple idiocy....it is fast as hell it is safe and if your computer or the one being transferred to shuts down...the transfer will start up again when the problem is solved and the path is open again......but no they keep coming up with crap uploaders even when asked to implement the use of FTP........or they tell you to by one from a software developer that hangs on the forum........why the hell buy one FIREFTP is free from Mozilla....get real SMUGMUG

DGRIN is at it again....Forum Fascism coming to the top again

Dgrin and it tyrannical mods (not all are tyrants), but a few are and they are real close to being exactly like the rulers a that oppressed them as children...Oh that is what we learn by our oppressors....to oppress others......

First of all mods and admins do not a forum make...it takes the people who sign up for that forum or group of forums......

To night a very good and informative Photog got banned from DGRIN simply for not agreeing with the Mods and Admins...no profanity was used...no name slinging, no racial slurs..we simply do not agree with the changes they are forcing on us.....they , Dgrin did not ask the us the clients, for our opinion...this is not the 1st time....they closed a forum on a whim...there were tons of photo newbies (for lack of a better term at this time) seeking help and I was in the middle of posting ideas to one such new photographer and I hit post and I found the forum closed....and closed in such away you could not start a discussion on why....when I asked why, I was told that is how it is..there will be no discussion...the title of the Thread to close the forum was the ASININE title of DGRIN is GOING GREEN and people were "URGED" to post their questions in the correctly corresponding forum..so if it was a macro question go to Holy Macro, if it is a wildlife question go to the wildlife forum and so on...we lost a lot of people that day..and no one...I mean no one came to RE-POST their question....Dgrin has been losing in the popularity battle for a while now....they always said they were nicer than Fred Miranda's forum and also DP Review ...but I am seeing a great amount of Fascism in the way they do things.........

I will be banned next more than likely for this posting on my own blog.....or for not agreeing with them on the subject of FTPing for uploading our photos...I come on people FTP has been a standard for almost 40 yrs,,,it will be 40 years on APRIL 16......

Hope I found all my typos...good night

SNOW...this is terrible SNOW!!

taking a short lunch break.........this is not good snow..it is dry, it is blowing...it is terrible......going out of house for lunch with camera.....maybe the photo ops will be better towards evening........

EVERYONE BE SAFE