![<span id="date">_12/14/10_</span> <span id="title">Scraggly</span>
This unshaven palm tree was near downtown Santa Monica. We had the afternoon off (sort of) and spent most of the afternoon there. One highlight included a free pair of pants! Dockers was doing a marketing campaign where a guy purposely tipped over his cart to see if random people would help him pick up his stuff. We did, so we got some free pants! It's part of their 'Chivalry is not Dead' campaign. Apparently 35 people <em>didn't</em> help the guy before we did. I guess chivalry <em>is</em> dead for them.
<a href="http://www.jawsnap.net/Daily/year2/7157835_BfJPF#741140373_BmXyU">[last year]</a>](https://photos.smugmug.com/Other/Black-and-white/i-NHbrGrL/2/1ac6bec0/L/2010-12-15%20Scraggly-L.jpg)
_12/14/10_ Scraggly This unshaven palm tree was near downtown Santa Monica. We had the afternoon off (sort of) and spent most of the afternoon there. One highlight included a free pair of pants! Dockers was doing a marketing campaign where a guy purposely tipped over his cart to see if random people would help him pick up his stuff. We did, so we got some free pants! It's part of their 'Chivalry is not Dead' campaign. Apparently 35 people didn't help the guy before we did. I guess chivalry is dead for them. [last year]
![<span id="date">_04/07/10_</span> <span id="title">Apple Screws</span>
We got screwed by Apple. My wife's hard drive crashed in her iBook G4. We're holding out for new models to be released before we get her a replacement.
I spent most of the evening disassembling the laptop, which Apple clearly does not want you to do. It took forever to get to the hard drive, but I finally did and was able to recover her files! Yay!
I kept going and unscrewed every screw I could find - here's a picture of them, arranged beautifully over the Apple logo on the back of the screen. I'm not too happy with the arrangement, but it's so freaking hard to position these tiny things that I gave up for the night.
<strong>Back up your files!!!<strong>
<a href="http://www.jawsnap.net/gallery/7157835_BfJPF#507905149_pxJ48">[last year]</a>](https://photos.smugmug.com/Other/Black-and-white/i-zmXLnjN/3/024fb419/Ti/2010-04-07%20Apple%20Screws-Ti.jpg)
![<span id="date">_10/29/10_</span> <span id="title">Building & Sky</span>
And the moon, too! But since this is a desperation shot with my phone, the moon is pretty tiny. My sister came into town today for a weekend visit! Hopefully I'll have some cool daily photos from all the fun places we'll see in the next few days...
<a href="http://www.jawsnap.net/Daily/year2/7157835_BfJPF#696995346_763tE">[last year]</a>](https://photos.smugmug.com/Other/Black-and-white/i-qnTjMK6/2/57bd5dcb/Ti/2010-10-29%20Building%20%26%20Sky-Ti.jpg)
![<span id="date">_12/14/10_</span> <span id="title">Scraggly</span>
This unshaven palm tree was near downtown Santa Monica. We had the afternoon off (sort of) and spent most of the afternoon there. One highlight included a free pair of pants! Dockers was doing a marketing campaign where a guy purposely tipped over his cart to see if random people would help him pick up his stuff. We did, so we got some free pants! It's part of their 'Chivalry is not Dead' campaign. Apparently 35 people <em>didn't</em> help the guy before we did. I guess chivalry <em>is</em> dead for them.
<a href="http://www.jawsnap.net/Daily/year2/7157835_BfJPF#741140373_BmXyU">[last year]</a>](https://photos.smugmug.com/Other/Black-and-white/i-NHbrGrL/2/1ac6bec0/Ti/2010-12-15%20Scraggly-Ti.jpg)
![<span id="date">__01/06/11__</span> <span id="title">Clock Tower</span>
I took this shot of a tower in Westwood as I left work today. You'd think it's some historic building that has a really cool story behind it, but it's not, and doesn't. It is currently home to a dental practice. At least it was the last time I looked.
<a href="http://www.jawsnap.net/Daily/year2/7157835_BfJPF#759217478_52ifA">[last year]</a>](https://photos.smugmug.com/Other/Black-and-white/i-z55v7Hg/2/35f85ec3/Ti/2011-01-0d6%20Quittin%27%20Time-Ti.jpg)
![<span id="date">_09/08/10_</span> <span id="title">Not HDR Stairs</span>
Apple released iOS 4.1 today, which brings HDR functionality to the iPhone 4. I played around with it tonight around sunset with overcast skies, and none of my 18 photos are better with HDR - pretty disappointing. The HDR photos flatten contrasty areas (like the plastic bag) and don't bring a whole lot of extra range - the blown out portion in this photo was still blown out in the HDR version, although you could sort of make out the power line pole. In other photos, there were actual ghosting artifacts which could be explained by hand movement, except I kept my hand pretty still.
The EXIF data is the same for both the regular and HDR photos, only the file name and file size are different. I'll try some more shots tomorrow in daylight.
<a href="http://www.jawsnap.net/Daily/year2/7157835_BfJPF#643599364_oLLnv">[last year]</a>](https://photos.smugmug.com/Other/Black-and-white/i-BzvFxcz/3/4b095267/Ti/2010-09-08%20Not%20HDR%20Stairs-Ti.jpg)
![<span id="date">__02/17/11__</span> <span id="title">Zapp</span>
I bought a bag of <a href="http://www.zapps.com/">Zapp's</a> potato chips while in New Orleans last week. We'd never heard of them, but apparently they're big there. I can't say I'm particularly impressed - they're just super-greasy and super-salty. Every single chip was translucent. On second thought, I am impressed - that you can get 12 grams of fat from a 1.5 ounce bag of something that used to be a potato.
For this photo, I set the chip on top of a glass pot lid that was resting above a white surface, then bounced my flash off of that surface to get some nice even backlighting. Processed in Lightroom.
Check out my <a href="http://www.jawsnap.net/Travel/NewOrleans2011/15869305_3pC5e"> New Orleans gallery</a>!
<a href="http://www.jawsnap.net/Daily/year2/7157835_BfJPF#790981429_Sc3iy">[last year]</a> <em>bloat...</em>](https://photos.smugmug.com/Other/Black-and-white/i-Q7nbWZK/2/f532284b/Ti/2011-02-17%20Zapp-Ti.jpg)
![<span id="date">_06/25/10_</span> <span id="title">Creeping up the Palm</span>
Got this shot in the botanical gardens during lunch today. I'm not sure what the dead vine is, but it was growing on a Queen Palm (<em>Syagrus romanzoffiana</em>, native to South Africa). I'd like to shoot it again with another lens - I felt a bit limited with my 60mm macro. This was only a small part of the vine skeleton wrapping around the tree - it went pretty high up, too.
<a href="http://www.jawsnap.net/Daily/year2/7157835_BfJPF#574111606_cxEFV">[last year]</a> <em>RIP, MJ...</em>](https://photos.smugmug.com/Other/Black-and-white/i-WSLHG25/3/5bcb079c/Ti/2010-06-25%20Creeping%20up%20the%20Palm-Ti.jpg)
![<span id="date">_12/01/10_</span> <span id="title">Afternoon Needles</span>
Kind of a desperation shot - I walked around at work and liked the way these pine needles were lit up in the late afternoon sunlight. This is not what I had in mind when I took the shot, but it turned out pretty cool with the multiple rays and all that jazz.
Happy December!
<a href="http://www.jawsnap.net/Daily/year2/7157835_BfJPF#729687822_SrfB9">[last year]</a>](https://photos.smugmug.com/Other/Black-and-white/i-jZsKC6F/2/67edc54e/Ti/2010-12-01%20Afternoon%20Needles-Ti.jpg)
![<span id="date">_12/09/10_</span> <span id="title">Cage Reflection</span>
Today I had a meeting in the 'penthouse' of a building - it was a strange small room in the middle of the roof, with lots of HVAC stuff all around it. I took a few shots during a break, including this one that I liked because of the various lines.
In other news, I got a new camera today!!! But since I just got it, I won't be posting any daily photos with it quite yet. Stay tuned for more details tomorrow...
<a href="http://www.jawsnap.net/Daily/year2/7157835_BfJPF#736749656_8PdpN">[last year]</a>](https://photos.smugmug.com/Other/Black-and-white/i-G77rNf2/2/07b72cc0/Ti/2010-12-09%20Cage%20Reflection-Ti.jpg)
![<span id="date">_05/25/10_</span> <span id="title">Sticky Phacelia</span>
Not happy with the way the editing was going on this photo, I switched to drastic mode and came up with this. The flowers are blue in real life. I was trying to focus only on the anthers with the rest out of focus. The effect would have been better close up with a tripod I think, but you get the idea.
The plant is a sticky phacelia (<em>Phacelia viscida</em>, endemic to CA).
<a href="http://www.jawsnap.net/gallery/7157835_BfJPF#548153146_3MB58">[last year]</a> <em>big(gest) trees...</em>](https://photos.smugmug.com/Other/Black-and-white/i-QS2KvZX/3/2b51ceb7/Ti/2010-05-25%20Two%20Flowers-Ti.jpg)
sharkbayte
on December 15, 2010nice shot! and glad to see that Chivalry is still alive!
paulbellinger
on December 15, 2010Very nice photo and good work keeping chivalry alive!