I got myself a pro account last night. Partly due to frustration, partly in haste. According to my quick arithmetic:

The webspace on my site is only 60mb. But I pay $3/pm on a quarterly basis and I don't need more than 60mb unless I plan to upload lot of snaps. If I go for an upgrade, I need to shell out at least $9/pm for up to 1 gig and bandwidth restrictions. Now 1 gig is a LOT of web space, but according  to my estimations, most of the images in my galleries (the older ones) are just sitting there. I don't think they have too many hits. Now why should I be paying $9 just to 'store' images that really don't do much?

Enter Flickr. I get unlimited uploads and bandwidth. I don't have to code anything. It's got some nifty tools too. Only thing I don't like is the layout. So I am hoping to use Flickr as my primary image storage space, and maintain albums on my website by using Simpleviewer for display. I stumbled upon Flickrviewer which seems to be the way to go to achieve this. Need to investigate further to see if this is the right tool for the job. Nevertheless, at $24.95/yr, Flickr Pro is a cheaper proposition than buying more webspace. But I have to learn to live with the lousy interface of Flickr. 

Update: There are a lot of plugins that help integrate WP and Flickr. Unfortunately, I just realized that Flickr is blocked in most offices here in Bangalore. And almost everyone I know use the net at their workplaces for general browsing. Not a good thing. 

Update 2: The discussion happening here is exactly what I am cribbing about Flickr too. 

I returned from my Himachal/Delhi trip on Monday night after a very delayed take off from Delhi. The weather was quite bad and I don’t think we could hold the airlines staff responsible for the delay. Even at 1 pm, anything beyond 100 mtrs was barely visible!

I have been totally disoriented for most of yesterday and today. The shallowness of office life is hitting me now and I feel an urgent need to escape from it. After having spent 10 days in the ‘real’ world I am back to corporate hypocrisy, faking deadlines, listening to managers with byte-sized IQs et-al. Of course, I could keep myself busy, but his 9-5 behind-glued-to-chair thingy is keeping me from the many things I have to do (like process 5 gigs of RAW files).

I am actually a tad bit disappointed because the snaps did not come as good as I expected. Let me say that again – the snaps are not up to the mark as per my expectations. I was hoping to do some Ansel Adams kinda magic but the cold and having to move along with the rest of the trekking group did not allow me to do quality photography. However my gear withstood the elements, and everything from the bag that I got stitched for my new tripod to my LowePro AW Orion Trekker came in handy during the rain and snow. That is something worthy of mention because when you have gear worth your life’s savings and are trekking in a jungle which can kill you with just the cold, you gotta have piece of mind. The only let down were those SterlingTek batteries. They did not last even as long as the regular Canon one. They are supposed to last longer because they are of higher capacity. I think I got duds. In any case this trip has been a good practice ground for a Leh trip which I am eager to do sometime next year. And this time I will not go with YHAI. With all due respect to the very capable field officers and camp leaders, I have certain hygiene standards which I’d like to maintain always and that was very difficult when there were 50 other people crammed in confined spaces. Sorry, even National Integration is not a good excuse for such overcrowding. I think I’ve seen enough of this in our unreserved compartments (read, bad loos). However the good part that came out of all this is the fact that I survived -1°C and learnt a few important things about warm clothing and backpacking.

Apart from the trek itself, the 2 days in Dharamshala and 3 days in Delhi were a blast. We were unprepared for that part of the trip too – we weren’t carrying extra empty bags! Both these places are shopping havens and I now miss not having shopped more Dharamshala is also a great place for street photography and this brings me to another crib – overhead wires criss-crossing all over the towns, country sides, jungles, highways…. These darn wires make the nicest of scenes ugly

Anyways, got to get back to work now. Hoping to complete processing the snaps and writing the catalogue by the end of this week.

Climbing to Kalatop. First signs of snowfall

Creative Zen Vision W 30 GB Widescreen Multimedia Player

I chose this over the iPOD video/Zune because:

• Takes in CF cards – I can backup photographs when traveling (although I cannot view RAW files).
• Wide 4.3 inch screen. Videos on this totally rock! Crisp, clear and super!
• Good rating on Amazon.
• Closest I can get to having a backup solution without spending $350 plus.
• Plays a wide variety of video formats.
• I really need music when traveling! My discman is a little bulky to carry around.

Things to crib about (and I am being very picky):

• No accessories available on the market yet. I really need a skin to protect this thing. Spare batteries would be a big plus. None of this is currently available.
• Little big, so doesn’t fit into my pocket

All in all, I am very happy

Since the death of TV and new exciting music in my world, I haven't quite been inspired or blown away by any other's creativity in a long time. I picked a book – Life on Planet Rock by Lonn Friend recently and this post is a result of that. After reading the book, I revisted GN'R by watching some videos (like Estranged and November Rain), but the feeling I used to get some years ago did not come over me again. My hair didn't stand on the back of my neck, and I didn't play the air guitar. Instead, I started recalling those Axl worshipping days and tried to see what I knew then, that I seem to have forgotten now. What did we see in these musicians? Why did we place them on a pulpit? Why aren't there new heroes to replace the ones who have faded, thanks to Time and the general spinning of the earth? What is the brainfeed I seek now?

If there is any one stagnant thought I can pick up from the many running in my head, it would be what I described above. Yes, the nostalgia associated with our teen years and rock n' roll is something very stagnant, and little has happened since then although we have grown in years and stacked up abundant music on our hard drives. The feeling has long gone and around us, the generations are becoming shallower and art is becoming bleaker. My radar yearns for new creativity, new brainfeed, but there are are hardly any blips (even when there are, it is surprisingly from our own Eastern music). And since music and creativity is what I have lived off, I now have a choice of gasping to survive, or submitting myself to the darkness and embracing what comes with it. In fact, I have nearly done that and discovered something new. Enter Photography.

Yes, Photography is my new brainfeed in these times superficiality. I once had my hands in my pockets and whistled tunes carelessly while the winds blew my hair. I could do that because my pockets were empty and I could feel the winds. These days I drag myself to work to put some wind into my sails and money into my pockets. All that money I offer at the altar of Photography where I pray for salvation and an all-access badge to the kingdom of creativity. But the so called 'hard work' is not without expectations so there are strings attached. The very same brain that was once freely injected with the rush of Pink Floyd, Led Zeppelin and the like, is now most of the time running full throttle calculating for that telezoom or macro lens or attending stupid meetings to stay on the job. So there is no time to indulge in gay abandon or lesbian voyerurism (;)). Instead, when the calendar presents a holiday or the evening comes with a breath of fresh out-of-office air, I try and go out to shoot. I do it because that is all I can do. For everything else, I depend on friends. I hope to get by with a little help from friends. But too bad I belong to the Lonely Hearts Club Band. And so life has managed to fuck with me again. But hey, there is always some nostalgia and rock n' roll to fill in. 

So this is how it is. That was how it was. How will it be? Where do we go from here? Let's just wait n' see….

Because man proposes and god disposes, many things in the recent past did not go the way I planned. So ended up buying this:

EF 70-200mm f/4L

Now I have three lenses and no camera body

Update: I purchased a new 350D for the same price as I sold my earlier one, on 24th October. I got it with 2 years warranty. Somehow, the 400D just didn’t seem exciting in spite of my initial euphoria. Hopefully Canon will give us a decent DSLR with a pentaprism view finder and better ergonimics (like the D80) in future. That would be a worthy upgrade, not the 400D!

There have been many a times in the past when I have been on the verge of losing it. But for the first time it is for something as materialistic as a digital SLR. Call me mad, but ever since I sold my 350D, I've been a nervous wreck. And at one point of time, I even thought of selling 40k worth of Canon lenses and moving to Nikon because of the new Nikon D80. It took me a while to understand that having to wait for the review of the Canon Rebel XTi was getting too much for me and that is why I was swaying towards buying a D80 (whose review is out, and which has been judged as a gaint leap for Nikonkind). Of course, the irony of the matter is that just when good friend Akshata was supposed to buy either of the cameras from S'pore, she has completely disappeared (and I sincerly hope all is well with her). Not seen her online in a while and that worries me. 

Actually, upon further introspection I realized that the 400D forums on DPreview is a bad place to hangout when you are a cat sitting on the wall. Until recently I was totally convinced that Canon is a great company because of being R&D driven, but after hearing so many rants about the 400D, I almost regretted being a Canon shooter. Hell, I even thought that the 400D is a bad decision!

Of course, now I know better. The 400D forums, remarkable as it may sound, is almost giving rise to an Urban Myth. A Myth that has many shades to it:

• Canon has bad QC because some guy couldn't see readings on the viewfinder when pointing his camera at the TV
• Canon's 400D is a failure because some guy couldn't get sharp shots indoors with flashed turned OFF (!!)
• The 400D underexposes to preserve highlights/show less noise/Canon has a Nikon spy inside it's factory. Some guy even started a thread saying "Buyer's Beware – 400D underexposes". And the best part, he uses the camera in auto mode.
• Some guy is convinced that the 400D has lock up issues. He calls up Canon and points them to the DPreview forums to show them the same. He wants to set the ball rolling on getting Canon to release a firmware update. How he got this strange idea of400D having lockup issues, I don't know. I have seen no one complaining of it.

With so many 'duhs', I won't be surprised if Canon starts including a disclaimer stating that buying a digital SLR does not automatically get you great photos. And when you don't get great photos just because you got a DSLR, don't blame the camera.

From my own learning curve, I can say that photography is both an art and a science. The science part I am yet to completely grasp, and it is indeed fun learning. With new DSLRs falling in price, I am not suprised that many people don't see it that way. Spend more money – get better photos. That seems to be what most people think when they upgrade from a P&S. A similar analogy would be the general thought that having a big car would get you good chicks and that's all you need in life. Ok, I am going overboard here

Nevertheless, I have somehow convinced myself to stick with Canon. On the other hand, the Nikon is really a great camera. Especially the viewfinder. It's addictive, I would say. And that's exactly what I need to go out an shoot more. I need a camera that screams "look at me sitting here doing  nothing. Take me out and SHOOT!" Yes, I somehow deep inside believe that the Nikon D80 is that kind of a camera. As Phil concludes in his review, the D80 is a "photographer's camera". And without even seeing the 400D's review, I can say that Canon's entry level DSLR is just that – an entry level DSLR for P&S upgraders.

However, when it comes to image quality, Canon has always had an advantage, and is still leading over the D80 by a whisker. I would certainly want to opt for the best image quality. But the fact that I want to move up from an entry level DSLR to a 'photographer's camera' makes me still consider buying a Nikon. Aaaarrggghh…..i'm starting it off all over again!!!