I can be a pretty compulsive photographer — not a professional by any definition, but I do enjoy shooting…perhaps a bit too much. (When I recently told a friend that I shot about 950 photos on our weeklong Disney vacation, he commented "I don't think my parents took 950 photos of my entire childhood.")



But unlike a lot of people today, I still have them printed and organized in albums. I used to use Snapfish but switched to Shutterfly for the simple reason that they had an iPhoto plugin. Even though I preferred snapfish.com's user interface, allowing me to export my photos directly from iPhoto was worth dealing with Shutterfly's crappy site. I don't know when Snapfish finally released their iPhoto Exporter, but when I found it last month I happily switched back.

And as an aside, Snapfish's Christmastime shipping was amazing: I ordered almost 450 photos on December 21 as a gift to my in-laws (I printed and organized their photos for the year). I didn't expect to get the prints until early January, but they were delivered on December 24! So kudos to Snapfish for (unexpectedly) coming through — my in-laws loved the photo albums!

Hummer Production to End (NY Times):

GM will halt Hummer production at its Louisiana plant until sale of the brand to a Chinese company is completed.

I loved this reader comment:

Can't wait to see a Chinese-made Hummer with a big ol' American flag slapped on the back window.

I've never really been a fan of HDR images. There are a lot of examples on Flickr; some really boost the colors to near-cartoon levels, and others push their photos to a have a more dreamlike look. While many are interesting, I don't want that look for my photos, so I decided I didn't like HDR.

Well, like I ask my kids to at least try something once — "How do you know you don't like it if you've never tried it?" — I decided to give HDR photos a legitimate try. So yesterday on a trip to Plymouth I took my tripod and did some shooting while Jill did a little shopping. New England winter photos probably aren't the best to play with colorful HDR photos, but it did show me something: a more subtle use of HDR can really enhance photos — especially those with big variations in light and dark areas — without having to push it to overly-unrealistic looks.



I put some of my HDR photos on Flickr. I'll keep experimenting — especially when the colors of spring arrive — but I think having another photo tool available to me is a good thing to have, and I don't have to push it as far as some photographers do. (I agree with a commenter who said that too much HDR makes the technique the subject of the photo, rather than the actual photo subjects.)

If you're interested in creating HDR photos, check out this how-to.

Here's 2009's soundtrack. This is the first year that there's no real punk or hardcore on my annual list (not that I didn't listen to any, but there were no clear picks for 2009). Perhaps I'm mellowing with age?

1. People Under the Stairs: "Acid Raindrops (Instrumental)"
2. The Beatles: "Dig A Pony"
3. Beck: "Chemtrails"
4. Neko Case: "This Tornado Loves You"
5. The Smiths: "Rusholme Ruffians"
6. Vampire Weekend: "Bryn"
7. Interpol: "PDA"
8. Wire: "Perspex Icon"
9. Pixies: "Velouria"
10. Rush: "Far Cry"
11. Paul McCartney: "I’ve Got A Feeling"
12. Lee "Scratch" Perry & The Upsetters: "Jungle Lion"
13. Q-Tip: "Won’t Trade"
14. Chali 2na: "Comin’ Thru"
15. RJD2: "A Beautiful Mine"
16. Squarepusher: "Hello Meow"
17. Radiohead: "15 Steps"
18. People Under The Stairs: "Trippin’ At The Disco"
19. Rodrigo y Gabriela: "Triveni"

Update: if you want to hear these, download a podcast of these songs (73MB).

A merry Krampus to you and yours! Hope you're not on the naughty list...

It might be the remaining NyQuil in my system clouding my judgement, but this video was the funniest thing I've seen in years:

Boston.com's The Big Picture published their three-part Year in Photos of amazing and moving shots: part 1, part 2, part 3.

Christoph Niemann uses leaves to illustrate ideas. (via kottke)

This graph that shows that younger people are more supportive of gay marriage than older people. As one person commented, "Looks like the debate will solve itself (mostly) in 20 years or so." One can only hope...



Somewhat strange that a couple of the most supportive states (Maine and California) have recently repealed gay marriage laws. Perhaps it shows that younger people don't vote as much as older people.