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Wednesday, April 20, 2011

Allison & Aaron: Engagement session

Allison and Aaron are getting married this September. They were in town recently, for tastings, arrangements and such; so we scheduled their engagement session while they were here. They brought Aspen along so we could get a complete family picture.

I have to admit, it was a little 'different' to have parents lurking about (they were on their way to the airport) while you are trying to get romantic with your fiancee - but, kudos to Allison and Aaron, they managed to mentally 'slip away' for awhile and made some lovely, relaxed pictures for their guest book.

Hit the jump to see a small sampling of what happened on the way to the airport.

Thursday, April 14, 2011

Sleeping with the Finalists: continued

Well, I hadn't planned on this being such a long task. Sorry, but I want to document my thoughts and feelings as a technical person for the past 40 years, now making a decision on my own computer - trying to keep it separated from my technical needs, while acknowledging and providing for them.

So, I finally settle on the Samsung QX410 as a laptop that gives me a lot of the same user experience I have found on the Macbook Pro. I pick one up for a side-by-side comparison.

This series of blog posts is being written on both computers. I work for awhile on one, then switch to the other and continue what I was writing. I am looking at how it is to work on each one. I am trying to take note of the real differences and how they matter to me. I have to admit that the Mac is very appealing, but the Samsung is cheaper and has a bigger hard drive. They are both about the same size (they fit my criteria for portability), the Samsung is a little bigger, but has a slightly larger 14" screen. Both have wonderful touchpads - I have not used a mouse in all this. I am keeping up with email, paying bills, and even doing some light photo work, etc. on these computers - while working from a variety of places around the house.

Tuesday, April 12, 2011

Sleeping with the Finalists: The Backstory

Okay, so I promised you the backstory.

January 31st held the promise of a major winter storm. The grocery store was full of folks stocking up. Gas stations had lines. In addition to taking care of those basics, I decided that this was a good time to lock myself in with candidates for a new laptop computer.

My old H-P laptop is dying. It still works, but the screen has started flickering, the keyboard drops characters with regularity, the hard drive is full, it's old and slow, the battery is practically dead - which means it's not really portable, and it is just too big (a 17" screen) to be comfortably portable.

Friday, April 8, 2011

Sleeping with the the Finalists

Some days all I can do for the world is breathe.
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Okay, my laptop computer is actively dying. It's old, like 5-6 years old I think. Anyway, it's really slow, and is really not adequate for what I am doing anymore.

I also have a desktop machine, though it actually sits on the floor (a floortop) and is connected to a 37" monitor, it usually runs music during the day, occasional Netflix or DVD, slideshows when I have clients in, and it is where I do photo-editing.

I am trying to get all photo-production work off of the Floortop, and consolidate everything onto a single modern laptop. I know I can do this. This is my adventure.

Well, another part of my adventure involves having admired Apple computers for a long time. They have always been 'different'  - a bit exotic, very well-designed, etc. I would like to give a Macbook Pro a good look as part of this process. I would need to get everything I am doing to work on the Mac, but that would be part of giving it a good look; right?

So, I went to the friendly local Best Buy and got 2 computers (these were the 2 finalists after the qualifying rounds): a Samsung QX410 and a new MacBook Pro 13".

Sadly, only one of these can be the winner. I plan to eat/sleep/breathe with these two finalists and pick one to be my champion. I'll try to give you my thoughts as I work through this process.
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Wednesday, March 2, 2011

The Romantic journey of Lynne and Bert

Imagine. . .
You are in Paris with your lover.

He is working with the Mariah Carey tour. (Imagine!)

You are staying in Pablo Picasso's Paris apartment. (Wow!)

You decide to get married back in your hometown. (Aw)

You plan an intimate family gathering from across the U.S. and Canada. (Sweet!)

You ask me to photograph your intimate wedding (Ok, that is a shameless plug, but hey, I love this job!)