Periwinkle Photography

I've been tagged by my friend Nano... the rules are simple:

"Once you have been tagged, you have to write a blog with 5 facts about yourself. Then choose 5 people you want to tag and list their names. Then leave a comment on their blog letting them know they’ve been tagged."

So, it's time to tell you about me, and then on to tag some others...

5 Things About Me:

1. I'm not a neat freak.
   I'm not naturally inclined to being tidy.  While I do basic cleaning, I'm not over worried about keeping things spotless - I'm more concerned with living life than keeping my closets tidy.
   
   
2. Purple is my favorite color, but Periwinkle is probably my least favorite purple.
   Ironic, isn't it?  When chosing a name for my web hosting business many years ago, I choose 'Periwinkle' as part of the name, because it had a double meaning.  A 'Periwinkle' can be a very small shell in the sea, and we started as a very small hosting company.  Also, a c-shell (aka command shell) is the command line environment of a Linux server, which I primarily hosted.  (Probably more than you EVER wanted to know - lol).
   
   
3. I love animals, but prefer cats to dogs.
   I've had cats nearly all of my life... but I've had bad experiences with dogs.  The worst experience was when a dog literally stalked and attacked me as I went to the house of a friend's grandmother.  The dog was probably just protecting the grandmother, but was put down a few months later because it had a brain tumor.  I've never felt the same about German Shepherd's again, particularly as this wasn't the first bad experience I've had with them.
   
   
4. I scored nearly evenly on Math and English on my SAT scores.
   Ok, so this isn't such a big deal... but it does explain why although I'm technically minded, I'm a good communicator.
   
   
5. I prefer fresh Raspberries even over chocolate.
   Some who know me will find this just about unbelievable, because I'm a big fan of chocolate (particularly fancy Neuhaus belgium chocolate).  However, perhaps my very favorite flavor in the world is that of fresh, juicy raspberries.  For that matter, I love most berries - strawberries, blueberries, etc.  But it's raspberries that I'm crazy for.  That and fresh cherries.  I'm fussy on both, though - I don't like the artificial flavors of cherry or raspberry...
   

I've tagged Motoed, Zenfishing, Azure LaRoux, asfein, and nico_blue....

What's the best thing since sliced bread?

ATM Machines.  The Internet.  iStockPhoto.com.   Having a new job that I really love... (and not necessarily in that order)

If you came with a warning label, what would it say?
Submitted by chris.

If not operating smoothly, please insert chocolate.

Show us something pink.

One of my very favorite YouTube videos was also my first encounter with the service.  Chris Bliss is absolutely awesome.

How do you eat your pizza:  folded, flat or with a fork and knife?
Submitted by danimass.

Pizza is definitely one of those foods that I prefer to use my hands and eat it flat... unless it is hot, in which case, I'll use a fork and knife until it cools off.

I had a friend when I was young that used to fold his pizza - it was the strangest thing that I had ever seen at the time!

I have to admit it, I've become quite a fan of Ok Go:

I had the recent pleasure of going to PhotoPlus Expo with two friends from the Women Designer's Group, DJ and Terry.  We took the train down to the city, and the bus from the station to the Jacob Javit's Center, where we met up with a few cool friends from iStockPhoto (AndiPantz who was working the booth, and MotoEd, aka Ed Hidden, photographer, podcaster, and all around great guy).  I had the pleasure of meeting both Garth from IStockPhoto (one of the online agencies where I sell my stock images), as well as Ed Hidden's partner in the Light Source Podcast project, Bill Crawford.  For those not yet acquainted with StudioLighting.net website and the Light Source Podcast, I'd STRONGLY urge you to check it out - great stuff.

From there, DJ and Terry explored the trade show, and I followed along with Garth, Bill, and Ed, to the Roundtable on Microstock.  Ed was one of 4

panelists in the session which detailed the state of the stock industry, and the position of Microstock in the grand scheme of things.  Photo District News, which is rather anti-microstock, sponsored the event, which was moderated by David Walker.

Also on the panel was Alan Meckler, of Jupiter Images who not only produces arttoday.com, clipart.com, and photos.com, but was my entry into stock photography with the now defunct RebelArtist.com, which had sent me off to iStockPhoto.com when it closed.  Jupiter Images now has an investment into StockXpert.com, which is another agency where I sell my images.  A representative from Masterfile was in attendance, and Fotolia.com (a third agency where my photos can be purchased) was represented by Oleg Tscheltzoff. 

The biggest surprise, I suppose, was that while David Walker was on the

attack, even the fellow from Masterfile wasn't anti-microstock.  The message seemed to be that the audiences of microstock and the traditional royalty free and rights-managed agencies only have about a 10% overlap.

I was a little disappointed with how little time Ed, as an inspector and contributor for iStockPhoto was given at the event... it seemed rather biased

towards Fotolia.com and the traditional models. I met Chad Bridwell  from marketing of Fotolia afterwards as well.

Afterwards, I met back up with DJ and Terry, and bought my new toy - Gary Fong's lightsphere, a lighting diffuser. There was a show special, which combined the cloud with the white and orange domes, as well as the brand new "Chrome" dome.   Wow - I really love it, especially with the silver plastic chrome dome that steps back up the light loss by the diffusion of the cloud.  After viewing the tables at the conference, it was off to dinner, and then the train ride home - a great day!

Windows, Mac, Linux - What's your preference and why?
Submitted by ramblingsbymark.

Linux!  I'm a command-line junkie, and a LAMP consultant (Linux, Apache, MySQL, Perl/PHP).

As only a photographer could, I've been laughing about this video I ran across today.  The New York Institute of Photography created a spoof of Bravo's Project Runway called 'Project Redeye' - I love it.