Some things go wrong, some things go right

We’ll start with the right stuff first.  Big on the top of that list are more booked jobs. Woo hoo!  My shoot schedule is starting to fill-up for the fall, so if you are interested and haven’t contacted me yet, please drop me a line soon!  If we’ve already talked, then you’re already on my list.

Next up are some new things to make life a little easier. One of them is the Wacom Intuos 4 pen tablet I picked-up a couple of weeks ago.  WOW, does that make a lot of things faster and more intuitive!  Another is Adobe Lightroom, which is just completely cool and helps me to work a lot more efficiently.

Today my North Face BaseCamp duffel arrived (XL size), along with a few Eagle Creek cubes.  The Eagle Creek cubes are basically zippered pouches in a set of sizes that help one to organize items while packing.  They’re nice little pouches.  The duffel is HUGE. They have an XXL size, too–I can’t imagine what one would put in there.  It would probably fit all of me and then some.  The XL size that I got is huge as it is.  It’s a great design, though, made out of waterproofed material with a storm zipper and full storm flaps over the zipper.  The zipper handles have rings to allow a TSA lock or similar locking device to be used on them.  Around the outside of the two long edges are daisy chain web loops, which would be useful for attaching the duffel to other bags, tying it down for transport, etc.  Cinch straps are provided to compress the duffel after it has been loaded.  One of my favorite features are the integrated shoulder/backpack straps, so that the duffel can be carried in a variety of different ways.  It’s bright red, so I’ll have no problem spotting it on the conveyor at the airport or at a campsite at night.  It’s actually a little larger than I had figured, so I’m really glad that it has the cinch straps.  I suppose I might get a smaller one eventually, but we’re going to run with this one and see how well it works.  If the cinch straps are able to contain the mess inside, it’ll be fine.  Shakeout trip #1 will be our trip to Michigan next week.  Shakeout trip #2 will be taking me and my stuff to San Antonio the following week.  I’m excited to see how it performs and how I like it after using it for a few trips.

Finally, in the category of things that go right, Jenny’s new camera bag for the D90 should be here tomorrow, along with a new CF reader for me.  I have a Firewire reader from Sandisk, but this new one is stackable and sees to have a better transfer speed listed.  Woo hoo!

OK, on to the stuff that went wrong.  I ordered a new photo support system to help with the sorts of things I’m shooting now.  I ordered bags and a belt system from Think Tank Photo over the weekend.  Sadly, I should have realized that it might take them a day or two to get them shipped, so the online system estimating delivery by tomorrow might not be right.  They shipped Tuesday from California, with an ETA of the 9th–two days after we leave.  I emailed the company on Monday morning to see if there was anything that they could do.  By the time I got a response on Tuesday, of course, the stuff was already on its way.  I’m vaguely considering having them change the address to get it delivered to us while we’re on vacation.  I was hoping to put it through its paces before I take it to San Antonio the week after we get back from vacation.  I’m going to make some phone calls tomorrow to see what I might be able to do.

In the land of stuff that partially went right and partially went wrong, I am in the middle of converting a giant video file.  The video is a screen and audio capture of me doing my first video podcast on putting together a slideshow inside Final Cut Pro.  I used Quicktime X to record the screen, but then had to dump the file into Compressor to transcode it into something that FCP can open.  Once that is finished, I can edit that to clean it up and then publish it!  Yay!

That’s about all for now.  I’m going to enjoy some iced tea and retire for the evening.