ken Hatch |
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Links and Writings:
Art, Aviation, Photography,
Photoshop, and Politics
email Kenneth M. Hatch
Houston Center for Photography Photoshop Restoration & Retouching Buzzflash Media Whores Online Brad DeLong's Simi-Daily Journal Talking Points Memo The Daily Howler Archives 
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Saturday, November 30, 2002
Al Gore and the Alpha Girls posted on the Rittenhouse Review is as good an explanation for the relentless destruction of Gore by the punditry as any. Friday, November 29, 2002
Thursday, November 28, 2002
I’ve added The Daily Howler to my links. It, along with Media Whores Online, does a good job of exposing Republican spin. The value of The Daily Howler is that while very partisan, it seldom overstates or spins, it's kind'a like Joe Friday, "Just the facts, Sir." Wednesday, November 27, 2002
Carol has a bumper crop of pecans this year. We will use some of that pecan crop to make a couple of pies for Thanksgiving dinner. My mom made the best pecan pie in Texas so I plan on using her pie filling recipe. Mom’s recipe for pecan pie filling: 3/4 cup sugar 1 cup white syrup 3 eggs 1 large tablespoon butter 1 teaspoon vanilla 1 cup pecans pinch of salt Cream butter and sugar Beat eggs lightly Fold eggs into butter and sugar Add and mix: sugar, syrup, vanilla, salt, and pecans. Pour into a unbaked pie shell and bake @ 350F until the center jells (about 1 hour). Tuesday, November 26, 2002
I think it may be time to start the Lucky Duckies party. I have not read the WSJ’s OpEd but if the E.J. Dionne Jr. article is correct those WSJ folks have been smoking some strong shit. Up until now digital image capture has had three problems that I believed needed to be addressed before I made the jump from film. The first is cost. I felt that with the rapid change in equipment that the price of a pro level camera body should be in the range of what my film and processing cost were, to pick a period I figured 18 months, over the expected life of the body technology. Next and most important is chip size because most of my images are made with wide to very wide lens the smaller than 35mm chip size was a deal killer. Last, I have problems with archival storage. The first two problems are no longer problems. With the new Kodak DCS Pro 14n body, the price-chip hold up is gone. The only one left is archival storage, and I think I may have thought through a system that takes care of that problem. CDs and DVDs are not the answer for several reasons. The throughput is too slow (read and write) and both are too labor intensive at every stage. In addition there are questions as to the life of both. I understand 7 to 10 years is the maximum that you can rely on a CD to last. I would expect DVDs have about the same life. I have hundreds of CDs with scanned image files, each took tons of time to make. I don't want to talk about finding a individual image from that stack of CDs or the time once found to transfer it to the hard drive. With today's price of mass storage I believe the answer is mirrored hard drives. I'm going to set up external, mirrored, firewire HDs for image storage. When they are full, I will set them aside and attach two more. When the technology changes, I will transfer the content to the new technology. For now I believe this is the best answer. I would love to hear your thoughts. Friday, November 22, 2002
I guess the problem is fixed. Thomas went to his first formal dance last weekend. Carol and I delivered him, his rental tux, and wrist corsage to the staging area and then hung around to make these images much to Thomas’s displeasure. Thomas and Carol 11/02 I have images to post but for some reason the software is fighting me. I hope to have the problem solved soon. It’s time for some class warfare. From someone who has demonstrated he doesn’t have the brains to pour piss out of a boot. It must be true — look who I picked to be my parents. I can still observe; and I have spent a lifetime with the very rich, in their hunting camps, their vacation retreats and as they relax in the airport lounge. Most are very fortunate they are members of the lucky sperm club otherwise they would be selling shoes at Kenny’s. But I forget we are a meritocracy, so I must be jealous and not able to understand how they made it on their own just like Shrub and his daddy before him. Read Paul Krugman in the NY Times. Tuesday, November 19, 2002
If you want to know why there has not been a 911 commission Joe Conason thinks Woodward has the answer. Sunday, November 17, 2002
Flying an airplane is easy. Not only is flying an airplane easy, as a rule the bigger and more complex the airplane the easier it is to fly. If everything is working i.e. two are turning and none are burning; the WX is good; the wind is down the runway; the PNF (pilot not flying) is smart enough to find the coffee pot and tune radios; all the PF (pilot flying) has to do is keep the airplane in trim. It will fly itself if — and this is a big if — if he doesn’t fuck with it. In addition to airplanes being very easy to fly, there are no barriers to entry for professional pilots other than money and/or time. There is no Bar, no AMA, no CPA or any other governing body. You buy your ratings; spend a little time building experience; put on your “good old boy” act; and before you know it you’re a professional pilot. What’s really frightening about the system is it is almost impossible for employers to judge a pilot’s ability. Even worse because there is no professional governing body, no set of standards other than the ability to pass a FAA check ride. A good number of pilots do not have the ability to recognize another pilot’s lack of knowledge simply because they to have no knowledge. They are so bad they do not know they are bad. The system works as well as it does because of what I said in the first sentence. Flying an airplane is easy. It only becomes difficult when things go wrong in a way that surpasses the crew’s training and skill level. When that happens if the crew is lucky they have a “there I was at 39,000 feet with one burning and one turning and only through my great skill and knowledge” story which they will bore bar patrons with for the rest of their life. If they are unlucky, you see the results on TV. BTW, when you hear a “there I was” story, remember they usually got there in the first place because of a lack of skill and knowledge. Saturday, November 16, 2002
The mixed lighting makes it almost impossible to do a global color adjustment. If I planned on using this image for anything other than a demo, I would have used multiple masks to balance each area individually. The process would be the same but repeated for each area. After adjusting each color channel, adjust the RGB Channel for brightness and contrast. For this adjustment I usually click and drag the curve. Photoshop Lesson continued. First step is to crop. After cropping, I look for a good white point, a good gray point and a good black point. If I find areas I think are usable, I place a sample point on those areas. Initial placement of sample points are #1 the ceiling light, #2 the wall above the left foreground figure, #3 a black area in the background and a 4th on the cheek of the left foreground figure. The fluorescent light gives a overall green cast; that will be the first correction. I go to Image | Adjustments | Curves and select the blue curve to make my first adjustment. Next I place an anchor point by placing the eye dropper over #1 sample point (white point) and Command clicking. Now you can move the curve by either click and drag or by entering a number in the Output box. Most of the time I enter a number. After moving the curve, check the Info box to see what effect the curve change made to your image. When satisfied with the change in that part of the image, Command click on the #3 sample point (black point) and repeat the process. Finally place an anchor on the gray point and adjust. This process will be repeated using the Red curve and the Green curve. Photoshop lesson. I’m trying something new today; this will be Photoshop color correction on the fly. I plan to post notes and screen shots as I work the image this way you can follow the thought process along with the work flow. As always, there are many ways to reach the same end when using Photoshop. I do not claim my way is the best or only way, it is just the way I’m doing it today. If experience is any indicator, 6 months from now I will wonder why my work flow was so primitive. This is the raw scan. It is a good example of mixed lighting. There is window light on the two foreground figures and fluorescent light mixed with tungsten on the rest of the image. The mid tones are too dark, and I think it needs a contrast boost. Tuesday, November 12, 2002
The LearJet is an interesting airplane. Pilots tend to either love it or can’t wait to move on to other airplanes. It has the reputation of being “hot” or in other words taking a “real” pilot to fly, but in reality it is one of the easiest airplanes to fly I have ever strapped to my ass. It does no more or no less than you ask it to. If you pressure the yoke left, it banks left; if you pull back, the nose comes to you. If you add power, the airspeed increases. All very simple and all happens almost instantaneous unlike many other airplanes where you push or pull and something happens but only slowly and seldom in direct relation to the amount of effort. The LearJet is one of the few airplanes that has enough power so that once it reaches cruising altitude, a power reduction is needed to keep the airspeed off the redline. It is the easiest airplane to land I have ever flown. If you are on Vref, all you need to do is to smoothly reduce power to flight idle once the airplane is in ground effect and not let the nose come up. The Lear will roll itself on the runway almost like a autoland system. It is human sized with simple systems, and it’s built like a tank. The best metaphor to describe a Lear is it is like a good tool or a good musical instrument. It doesn’t add or subtract; it neither helps nor hinders. In the hands of a craftsman, it makes art. In the hands of a dilettante, it’s like a white boy trying to play the blues: he knows the notes but he can’t make the music. Good article in the Oil and Gas Journal. Shrub is right. We need a national energy policy. But he and the Rs are wrong on the details. We need a policy that brings the price of oil in line with its true cost, not one that increases production. Once the cost of oil reflects its true cost, other sources of energy can compete and begin the process of substitution. Any rational accounting of the cost of oil must include the military keeping the Middle East pipeline open and the environmental costs of pollution and global warming. Monday, November 11, 2002
The elephant in the living room from the last two elections is money. To mix metaphors, it is a big stinking turd. Until something is done to remove its influence, the public will lose, and big money will win. If the numbers I read are correct, the Rs outspent the Ds by over $150M this cycle. It was money well spent. A change of only 50,000 votes divided between three states would have completely altered the results. Then today we would be talking about Bush and the R’s lack of mandate instead of what happened to the Democrats. Anyone want to take bets on which party spent more in Minnesota, Missouri, and New Hampshire? Bob Herbert’s take on the results of Tuesday are about right. Friday, November 08, 2002
This has been an interesting year. Last December I was “quarter shared.” The company I had worked for for 20+ years sold their airplane, and the top executives bought individual joint ownership positions from Flexjet and Netjet. These joint ownership deals must have something going for them I don’t understand because they make no economic sense. However, that is another story to be visited later. After we sold the Merlin IIIC, I have supported myself by contract flying a Lear 25B. It is an antique, serial #163, built in the early 70s and ugly as grandma’s underwear. But its CJ610s made power and most of the parts made to the landing airport at the same time. Most important I made a couple of bucks each time I strapped it to my ass. Where all this is going is for the last week I have been in ground school and flight training for a new job flying a Lear 25D for an air ambulance company. The charter business has two types of operators: one pencil whips its records and the other tries to do things right. It takes time and lots of money to do the required training so there is pressure to cut corners and just fill in the blanks on the training record forms. The new company has tried to do it right. Good for them. Today was check ride day. In addition to my ride, the company was qualifying a new Check Airman so we had two Feds one from the Pittsburgh FSDO (Lear qualified), our company POI from the Houston FSDO, the new company Check Airman and myself all in a room from 08:30 until 13:00 for the oral exam. After finishing the oral we had to fly the airplane so I could show them I knew the difference between the blue and the brown on the attitude indicator and the new Check Airman could demonstrate that he could tell if I knew the difference. It was a long week and an even longer day. Thursday, November 07, 2002
A must read from Brad Delong’s Semi-Daily Journal: After the fall of Harvey Pitt: we are still in bigger trouble than we realize. Wednesday, November 06, 2002
Damn, we got our butts kicked. Joshua Marshal has it about right: “Well, that really could have gone better. Let's be honest. On the Senate side, the Democrats lost basically every race that was even remotely losable. Not that much different on the governor side ... The reaction among professional Democrats is one of profound shock. And a lot of heads are going to roll over this. Starting at the DNC, moving on to the leadership on the Hill, and likely spreading out from there.” I have to give the Rs credit; they did a masterful political job. If the first break downs of voter patterns that I have read are correct, the vote totals are near the historical low of 1998. The R’s game plan of suppressing the total vote and at the same time getting their base out worked. I forget who said it, but once again we get the government we deserve. Tuesday, November 05, 2002
It appears my nervousness was justified. I haven’t a clue why the vote broke for the Republicans the way it did or why their GOTV worked better than the Dems, but it looks like a bad night for America and the world. Oh well, it could be worse; I could be young and have the next 50 or 60 years to live with the results of the next two years. I’m nervous; my attention span is shorter than a gnat’s; and I’m scared the Rs may pull if off. If they do there will be many factors in play, but the bottom line is the Republican national party has run a brilliant campaign. Even if they do no more than hold their own, I have to accept the fact they are better politicians than my side or money really can buy you love. It shouldn’t be that way. The Rs are on the wrong side on almost every issue. In a rational world they would only represent three constituents: the top 2%of income earners, the bigots, and a final group that either suffers from Stockholm Syndrome or is too fucking stupid to vote their self interest. Maybe I’m too generous with my estimation of the intelligence and kindness of the American public, but I can not believe that 48% of the voting public are bigots, suffer Stockholm Syndrome, or are stupid. That leaves just one possibility: the Rs are damn good politicians with too much money for the good of America. This election cycle is the best argument ever made for public financed elections. While we wait for the results of today’s vote, TPM has the predictions of a cross section of political writers. When the dust settles, it will be interesting to see who, if any, were right Monday, November 04, 2002
Last Wednesday I wrote about flight time/job/age miss match. What started that line of thought was the Wellstone crash and reading the 55 year old pilot of the KingAir A100 had only 5000 hours logged flight time. Also, he listed one of his former employers as American Airlines. It made my Master Warning Light flash. See this Star Tribune link for more on the story. This image is from my “Day Job” series. For several years Bill was my co-pilot and photographic subject. Over time he became my “red couch” a co-artist as well as co-pilot. I can remember before the 2000 election having thought and said that the election of George W. Bush, if it happened, would have little effect on my life. I was of an age where expected Republican policy changes could not do great harm in the short term and in the long term I would be dead. Part of that mind set was because I did not expect Bush to be as reactionary as he is nor did I envision the ability of any government, left or right, being able to make major changes in our social contract. Boy, was I wrong. When I screw up, I screw up big time. A good article from the New Yorker . I don’t want to pile on Gore. I do not think he has received a fair shake, but for once I think the criticism is deserved. |
