tim merritt [dot] net

I tend to spot fungi when walking. I find the color and texture fascinating. So, click on the red toadstool below to see some pictures taken with my phone.

Our lives are just a bunch of moments. From the fine folks who brought you Words.

Moments from Everynone on Vimeo.

Moments on Devour.com. Total thanks to Shelley for tweeting this.

The coffee was extra good for some reason today – maybe the preceding 9.5 hours of sleep helped. Gracie goes briefly to the vet for routine maintenance, I go pick up some newly-dry-mounted artwork at the bro-in-law’s frame shop, and we visit the neighbor who’s in the hospital (she’s just fine. Whew.). Then tonight to Manuel’s Tavern for another friend’s improv show. Life is so good at the moment.

I went googling for something or other and one of the links was to this.

Timothy McSweeney’s Internet Tendency: McSweeney’s Recommends.

I regained my sense of time after several minutes, and had only scrolled about a third of the page. This is a huge list of podcasts, books, movies, foods, music, experiences, and ideas. You’ll recognize some of them, and think the list is smart, so you’ll keep scrolling to find more familiar items. In the meantime, you’ll find out about more things worth checking into. An honorable time sink.

I used to check this site regularly, but I’ve gotten away from paying as much attention to my iPhone photos.

There are 2,920 photography apps available in the App Store, and more are being added every day. Sorting through and testing each new release—every faux film filter, cropping, and tilt-shift tool—could amount to a full time job. Thankfully, Glyn Evans narrows it down for you on his site iPhoneography.com.

I wanted to make note of this, though, to look at the recommended apps and think through the ones I’ve already invested in. The pic above wasn’t edited on my iPhone, but in Imagewell, which I also used to SFTP the image up here.

Interview with DAVID SIMON in Vice Magazine. Thanks to JD for the link.

It’s a foggy warmish Monday morning. I found this displayed in the window of a clothing shop one block away from my office. First I’ve heard of this.

Commonplaces from Making Light. Please read them all.

“We are prophets of a future not our own.” (Oscar Romero)

“Peace means something different from ‘not fighting’. Those aren’t peace advocates, they’re ‘stop fighting’ advocates. Peace is an active and complex thing and sometimes fighting is part of what it takes to get it.” (Jo Walton)

“You really think that safety can be plucked from the arms of an evil deed?” (Darla, “Inside Out”)

“The whole point of society is to be less unforgiving than nature.” (Arthur D. Hlavaty)

“Armageddon is not around the corner. This is only what the people of violence want us to believe. The complexity and diversity of the world is the hope for the future.” (Michael Palin)

“Just because you’re on their side doesn’t mean they’re on your side.” (Teresa Nielsen Hayden)

“Young men and women, educated very carefully to be apolitical, to be technicians who thought they disliked politics, making them putty in the hands of their rulers, like always.” (Kim Stanley Robinson, Red Mars)

I have a nephew who shouldn’t see this until after Halloween.

I love this old song by The Band, I really like Gillian Welch, and I’m crazy about Old Crow Medicine Show.

YouTube – The Weight – Gillian Welch & Old Crow Medicine Show.

My particular friend Stefan, an attorney who throws pots, was interviewed in the local free weekly after some of his work was in a gallery show in Decatur.

I’ve spent most of the morning photographing flowers and other plants here in Descanso Gardens in La Cañada Flintridge west of Pasadena. Lovely; I’m grateful for this beauty, for the opportunity to see it and make photographs of it. A small snap below, with the promise of a gallery of more to come:

Strolling the stalls at the Art•B•Que show in Avondale Estates east of the city. Immediately found Jason drawing Monsters And Robots I Have Known. See more of Jason’s work at his Red Rocket Farm website. Very fun stuff.

Update: corrected link to Jason’s website.

In concert at St. Bartholomew Episcopal Church. Renaissance and modern choral works, sung with beauty and real appreciation. A lovely concert.

These guys are terrific—amazing energy, great musicianship. They play the hell out of it.

Film treasures of Europe available online: This French Life

One of the would-be idols rendered a pale shadow of Pete Townsend’s Baba O’Reilly this evening. Which sent me back to the original, full strength. And then Won’t Get Fooled Again. Sometimes, I go back to the music that shaped me, and this was an essential part of the soundtrack for me.

Other authors have described this album and its essential songs, and you can find their words with a minimum of searching. I’ll just tell you to listen, loudly.

Via PopUrls.com, 60 Advanced Photoshop Tutorials – Top Web Resources. I love Photoshop tutorials. The more I learn about Photoshop the more I love it.

How I would love to have the chance to follow these tips from This French Life and spend more time in museums in Paris, or just more time in Paris, or even more time to just think about more time in Paris.

VISITING Paris museums and monuments are the things you most want to do in the capital. However, they can often be crowded, overwhelming, and expensive. Here are 10 insider tips, from Richard Nahem, that will make your visit to places such as the Louvre and the Palais de Tokio smooth, efficient, and sometimes cheaper.

It’s shortly before the post-lunch session on day 3 of the conference. I have learned a lot, have a book of workshop handouts as bigg as a phone book, and there’s much more to come. Among the important things I’ve learned here: shoot a lot; shoot RAW if possible, thought JPEG isn’t filthy awful rotten if that’s all you have; there are several subtle techniques for sharpening detail and correcting exposure; there several others for processing to black and white; carry your camera all the time (note that I haven’t shot a single frame here, though I have experimented on several from Grand Canyon and Avignon, which I may upload tonight rather than attend evening sessions); print print print; and much more.

My principal conclusion from this is to think like an artist as much as possible rather than thinking like a technician, and to foster that I need to practice technically with the camera rather than at the computer. By that I mean I need to use the computer for evaluating the work rather than endless noodling with Photoshop.

To that end, I’m trying to spend most of my remaining time here listening to photographers as they discuss their work rather than cramming in more adjustment layer tips that are recorded in the handout tome. This session is by Rick Sammon.