Andrew Moore on Skip Caray

Posted by Jim - 07/08/08 at 07:08:13 am

An excerpt from an article from upstatetoday.com written by Andrew Moore on the passing of Skip Caray:

David Justice on. Sid Bream on. Francisco Cabrera at bat. 2-1 count. I had made it just in time. And then Skip Caray talked to me.

“Lotta room in right-center, if he hits one there we can dance in the streets,” Caray said in a nasal, matter-of-fact delivery I had grown to love. “The 2-1. Swung, line drive left field! One run is in! Here comes Bream! Here’s the throw to the plate! He is….”

Skip Caray died Sunday, and with him, so did a part of many of us who grew up listening to him. Like many who enjoyed Caray’s wit, sarcasm and undeniable love for the Braves organization, I felt like I knew him without having ever met the man.

It’s a nice article and a great read for any Braves/sports fan.

[Read the rest of the story here]

Movie Review: The Dark Knight

Posted by Jim - 02/08/08 at 05:08:55 pm

I’ve had a week to digest the movie that I had pegged as the summer’s must-see movie after seeing the first previews. And for once, a movie lives up to most of the hype. All of the glowing reviews about the movie itself and Heath Ledger’s performance as the Joker - all true. The thing I love about this Batman series is that these characters are so much more realistic and dark than the previous series. The villains aren’t silly, but they provide just the right amount of comic relief. The only negative thing I could say is that the movie did run a little long.

I honestly don’t have much to add to all of the things that I’m sure everyone has heard by now - this movie is definitely worth going to see in theaters. I wonder if there will be a third installment in the new Batman series?

Overall rating: 9/10
Official Site

Clemson Football 2008 Desktop Wallpaper - Metal

Posted by Jim - 01/08/08 at 07:08:48 am

Wallpaper - 2560x1600

Since the first wallpapers I made with Clemson’s football schedule got such a good response, I decided to do another one. This time, I’ve used a brushed sheet metal style background. Like last time, I have two sizes available for download from flickr. If neither size works for you, leave a comment here and I’ll see what I can do. Hope you like them.

Click here to download the 2560×1600 wallpaper

Click here to download the 1280×1024 wallpaper

Redirection

Posted by Jim - 27/07/08 at 09:07:19 pm

First off, let me say that if you have arrived here looking for The Graphic Staff News, you’re in the right spot. I’m in the middle of doing a little reorganization and part of this included carrying the blog over to my new domain name. All of the posts and comments from the previous blog can be found here.

I have used a WordPress plugin called Redirection from Urban Giraffe to push traffic to this site instead of the old domain. This strategy worked alright for me, but for some reason I couldn’t do a bulk redirect. I do have the plugin set to send traffic from the main page of the old blog and from some of the more popular posts to this domain. I tried matching the permalink structure and tweaking the source/target addresses, but nothing seemed to work to redirect the entire blog. I very well could be missing something though.

The next phase of the reorganization is going to be getting my graphic design portfolio set up here.

TinEye

Posted by Jim - 23/07/08 at 11:07:07 am

I stumbled across TinEye earlier this morning while skimming a few flickr message boards. TinEye, which is still in beta testing, is a search engine that searches the web using uploaded images like you would search a string of words on Google. It would be awesome to have an easy way to track where your pictures were being used online. I know I’ve had several of my images used on sites without my permission and even several people claiming ownership of the photos. It looks like TinEye can even find variations of the original image.

I haven’t received my invitation to check it out for myself yet, but from what I’ve read this sounds like a really neat tool.

Craigslist

Posted by Jim - 22/07/08 at 10:07:32 am

We had our first experience buying something off of Craigslist last week, as Kathryn and I invested in a Nintendo Wii. The transaction went very smoothly and I like being able to deal with people locally. The package deal came with the console and all necessary cords/cables/receivers, 2 wiimotes with nunchucks, Wii Play, Wii Sports and Super Mario Galaxy. We didn’t like Mario Galaxy, so we traded it in at a local game store for Mario Kart. We have also bought Super Smash Bros Brawl, which has turned out to be my favorite game so far (with Sports being a close second). I would say it was a good investment, as we’ve had a lot of fun with it. Now I need to figure out how to enable and configure the wifi connection so we can play some of our friends online.

Speaking of which, I’m thinking about selling a couple of my older lenses that don’t really get much use anymore on Craigslist and putting whatever I get for those towards a new wide angle lens (most likely the Sigma 10-20mm f/4-5.6 EX DC HSM).

Anyone had any experience selling anything on Craigslist?

Request Week

Posted by Jim - 18/07/08 at 01:07:39 pm

It’s been a good week for online photo use requests. I’ve had three separate inquiries from people wanting to use an image of mine on their websites. All of them have contacted me via flickr to ask permission and have also agreed to give a “photo by” link. Cool.

Clemson Botanical Gardens Bridal Session

Posted by Jim - 18/07/08 at 09:07:37 am

I have a bridal portrait session Saturday afternoon at the Botanical Gardens in Clemson. I’m really looking forward to this shoot because the Botanical Gardens were always one of my favorite places to walk around on campus (with my camera, of course). There are a lot of areas around the garden grounds that ought to make for some really nice scenery for the portraits.

We’re going to hit up a few other places on campus too to get some different shots and a variety of poses. The Tommy Bowden Ladies Clinic is going on Saturday as well, so there’s a chance we might get lucky and get a few shots at the top of the hill with Howard’s Rock. Guess we’ll have to wait and see how that goes.

Movie Review: Hancock

Posted by Jim - 14/07/08 at 03:07:15 pm

I liked the idea for this movie pretty much from the start. Usually, superheroes are clean-cut, all-American good guys. In Hancock’s case, he’s kind of the anti-hero - a scruffy alcoholic that busts everything up while trying to save people. In turn, people don’t really care much for him and his services are unappreciated.

I’m not sure Will Smith was the right person to play the part. Sure, he’s a funny guy, but the superhero stuff seemed a little forced. I enjoyed the movie for the most part, but I started to lose interest about three quarters of the way through. Overall, the movie had it’s funny parts and it had an interesting buildup, but I thought the execution/climax were lacking. I will be surprised if this will be an ongoing series.

On a sidenote, there was a note posted at the ticket office saying that Hancock is rated PG-13 for violence and language. The note went on to say that some folks had complained about the content because they had brought small children to the movie. I don’t know why people complained to the theater though - it’s not their fault. It’s the responsibility of the parent to check movies out before taking kids. I know my parents were always really strict on us about the age recommendations for movies. Will Smith usually holds back on the language and everything, but he seemed to let go a little more for this one. People shouldn’t be expecting a Fresh Prince rerun on cable when walking into this movie just because Smith is in it.

Overall Rating: 6.5/10
Official Site

Movie Review: Wall-E

Posted by Jim - 13/07/08 at 08:07:47 pm

I have to be completely honest…when I saw the first previews for the movie Wall-E, I had no intentions of seeing the movie. It just didn’t look like it would be all that interesting. Once the movie was out, we started hearing really good things about it and decided to give it a shot. I was pleasantly surprised, as the movie was much better than I had anticipated.

The animation in the movie was excellent - I don’t know why I’ve come to expect anything less from the folks at Pixar. In some of the beginning scenes, the landscape looks almost realistic. Wall-E himself is quite a likable character - Kathryn equated him to being a Steve Urkel type personality. I thought they did a good job setting the story up and carrying through with the plot, even though there was very little dialogue between the main characters. This was definitely a childrens’ movie, but there were several more serious underlying themes. Also, look out for a few subtle pop culture references throughout that Pixar is known for including.

Before the movie there is a short cartoon called Presto. This was very entertaining in itself and is worth getting to the theater early to watch.

Overall Rating: 8/10
Official Site

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