Listing Ones Wishes

Once again this year my mother is participating in the highly commercialized Christmas season and as always she is bugging me for “the list”. It’s that little list I am supposed to work on starting in July and turn into her sometime before the first week of November. Well, in the 20-however-many years I’ve been making this stupid list, I’ve never been on her schedule with it. It also never fails that I have no idea what to put on the list. It feels a little short as well as short-sighted.

http://images.cmkularski.net/blog/ChristmasList2009.pdf

I don’t know where to go with it, and I have very little enthusiasm for it. As if it’s not bad enough that I have to make the list, she will still be obvious about what she is doing because of questions she will ask. Its just no fun, and on top of that, lately the whole receiving gifts thing has started to annoy me. If I don’t need anything, then I don’t need anything, but of course, she will do the frivolous thing as she always has.

Day 53 Delimna

I have been fighting with Day 53’s image for a while today. I had “concerns” about it when I first downloaded it from the camera, but now I am not sure why. Here are the things I have tried (all are versions of 7750 that have been cropped to a left-aligned jock):
Original:
Day 53
Monochrome Adjusted (Infrared filtered/Max Black):
DSC_7750bw1-1
Decolor Grass (isolating jock as the only color):
DSC_7750c1-1
Recolor Grass (using color to highlight and not isolate):
DSC_7750c3-1
Recolor Grass – Balanced and Subdued (Chris’ Suggestion):
DSC_7750c5-1
So far, when asked, everyone seems to hate the monochrome version and at least partially like the original.

Worst Image of M42 Ever

I do believe this is the worst image of the Great Nebula in Orion that has ever existed:

I must say I am at least somewhat proud of it though, since I have never seen anything like this in any of my astrophotographs at all until now. I’m kind of proud of my little pink blur.

Camera Bag Diagram #1

Getting this diagram into a usable form was not easy.

Just an overview of how my camera bag is laid out.

The bag itself is in the center, the two side areas are the two zippered sleeves on the sides. The thing that looks like a square growth on the main bag is the bag for the SB-600, which is attached by external straps, similar to the way the Gorillapod is attached on the other side. Not very orderly, but hopefully it shows how I think through my bag. The diagram is #1 because I intend to produce one for the remaining bags.