Gallery Update - More Photo Scrap

I took some photos last weekend after dropping my brother off at work. I've wanted to take photos of the buildings down there for a while, so here are a few of the images I've uploaded thus far. I took more than 40 photos, but I will try to put up as many quality images as I can.

Here are some shots of objects:

And some more nature pics:

That's it for now. I have to finish correcting the rest before I upload them.

New image gallery available

I've added more images to my Shareapic.net account. I now have images of buildings available for download.

If you're not sure how to download the images, just click on their thumbnails to get to the full view page, and then right-click to save the image to your computer. Please refer to my previous post for the Terms of Use.

Trying to get back into the swing of things

Well, back into the swing of my hobbies at least. I finally came back to World of Warcraft, working on my hunter to get her to level 70 and acquire her level 60 mount. Yes, I am that slow; I'm enjoying the adventure that comes with the endgame, thank you.

I've also come back to photography. I purchased a Canon PowerShot G9 digital camera this past Sunday, and the camera has been really cool. It's an advanced point-and-shoot with features of an entry level DSLR. The best feature about this camera is that it can take pictures in RAW format. I never got to use a digital camera that could save in RAW, so this is a first for me. AND I LURVES IT SO MUCH. I seriously do not want to go back to jpeg. The only reason I would is to take pictures of not-so-serious stuff (ie catching people being stupid). As for pictures I would seriously consider microstock-worthy, it's RAW all the way. Holy Christ, the quality of RAW. The noise in the RAW images look more like film grain captured by a negative scanner. The only exception to this is when using a very high ISO setting, which is something that plagues all DSLRs or so I've read (in a lot of camera reviews).

So by now I've taken some pics with this lovely Canon PowerShot G9 digital camera, and I'm quite happy with some of the shots I've taken. Of course the lot of them come from our front yard, but hey, my mom has a green thumb. Her roses bloomed beautifully yesterday, and I had to get some photos. I actually thought some of these would be nice to share online. Even though they are of the overly done "nature/home garden" category, I wanted upload them anyway.

I will begin adding these pictures to a Shareapic gallery (for obvious reasons), and they will be available for people to download. Even if these photos are considered a high quality by stock photo agents, nature pics are not hard to come by, so I doubt submitting them to a stock photo site will produce any noticeable revenue. So I'm offering web-sized versions of my photos for free at Shareapic.net. The images are sized to a with of 600 pixels (may be small depending on the height). It's should be a good size to work with for many designers wanting to use them for web purposes. If a designer contacts me to request a larger pic, then discussion of payment will take place. That's the name of the game, yo. Here are the "rules":

I, Alexandria Long, have given consent for all people to download and use my photos in either personal or commercial projects. What you may NOT do with these images are:

1. Resell them as your own. If I find any of my photos on a stock photo site that I'm not a member of, you WILL be hearing from me. If I find them in printed stock photo catalogues or art books, you WILL be hearing from me.
2. Upload my photos to art and photo gallery/album websites and state that you're the creator. You in fact did not create them, and any credit for them should go to me (Alexandria Long). If I find my photos on sites such as DeviantArt, etc, then you WILL be reported.
3. Simply altering one or any of my photos DOES NOT make the result your photo. Anyone with a brain can play with Photoshop/Gimp/Paint Shop Pro filters. Using a photo as a design element in a project is fine, but filtering the photo to high hell for the sake of "making it mine" doesn't cut the mustard. Sale or unauthorized distribution of any altered versions of my images is prohibited.
4. Print them on tangible products such as coffee mugs or postcards meant for sale. Slapping one or some of my photos on a CafePress item and selling it is not cool. You are in effect selling my photos as stated in the first rule, so if I catch you, I will report you.
5. If I, Alexandria Long, were to sell to anyone larger, higher quality versions of my images, that does not give the buyer the right to sell the image. The buyer merely purchased the right(s) to use a higher quality image in whatever project they need it for. The buyer DOES NOT own the purchased photo, and therefore may not sell any of my photos.
6. If my photos were to ever be used in printed materials such as magazine or book covers, then credit MUST be given to the creator (Alexandria Long). I will also be looking further compensation when it comes to book covers. If you use a web-safe version of my image for a 'zine or book cover, expect to hear from me.
7. If my photos were to ever be used in online publications such as online news or blog websites, then credit should be given to the creator (Alexandria Long).

By downloading my images from Shareapic.net or Picable.com, you are agreeing to my terms. Even if you do find other more spectacular photos for free, I still have my rights as a creator.

I'm eventually going to move the T&Cs to their own page. After adding a few more photographs to the first Shareapic gallery, I'll link to it from the sidebar. For now, you can reach it by clicking here. This is the 'Home Garden" gallery, where all of my home's flower pics will go. More galleries should soon follow.

As an 80s child, I fully endorse this webcomic strip

Least I Could Do: Comic 6-23-07

I'm with the fictional characters in this strip - I hope that the incarnations that Michael Bay have created do great justice (or at least decent justice) to my childhood love of the Transformers.

In other news, I've increased the front page post count to 3 posts. I have decided to go along with the plan of separating my portfolio stuff from this web site. Lexi's Lounge is far too personal for my search for real-world work. I will have my portfolio hosted elsewhere, but it will be linked to from this site. I won't say what domain I'll use for it for paranoia of it being bought up and auctioned off. Trust me, it happens. Any work that will be in my web portfolio will be added to the galleries regardless.

Speaking of the gallery, I did mention that I'm its creator, yes? Well, back when I created it, I commented within the scripts to make sure that if I did decide to distribute the gallery as a package it would be decipherable to those who may perhaps have better knowledge of the Perl CGI language. Maybe I didn't comment on the functions as much as I should have, but the scripts are actually quite simple. If anyone is interested in the gallery as a zip file, comment on this post. I'll holla back, and we can work something out.

Resume now online

I replaced the PDFolio link with a link to my updated resume. I also updated the Sketch and Design galleries yesterday night. There are two inked illustrations in the Sketch section and two new [to you] designs in the Design section. I will be adding descriptions to the new entries in the galleries shortly.

I also updated the Links page yesterday night too, and this evening. There are only a few links to the sites I view the most.

I also added more ads to the site. I'm broke, can you blame me? :P I might be coming around to the expiration of my web hosting plan, so any visits to the advertised sites would be appreciated. The lot of them are geared toward my own interests, so no, no pyramid schemes, no links to phishing sites, none of that deceptive crap.

If there is one promotion I'd like to steer you all towards, it's SlashMySearch.com. With this search engine, you get paid to search. Yes, people actually get paid to use their search engine, and users make more money when they refer people to SlashMySearch.com. The reason for this is that SMS pays its users to refer people, thus letting SMS avoid paying out big bucks for advertisement and and outside affiliate programs elsewhere. SMS is partnered with Snap.com, which is a wonderful search engine. With Snap.com, you can preview snapshots of sites before going to them. That way you can avoid unnecessary search results. SlashMySearch.com is in beta right now, but the services offered are pretty good. If you don't mind making a bit of money essentially doing nothing, it wouldn't hurt you to spend a minute signing up there. :)

Chaos? In my poster?

So I goofed up doing my poster, which is supposed to be influenced by the Postmodern graphic style. As far as the postmodernism goes, the design went south.Don't get me wrong, I think my poster is cool. But not only does it not have the strong characteristics of postmodernism, it doesn't fit the game it's mock-advertising well. The game is "Meteos". The poster is retro-looking. Meteos is contemporary and cute. Not necessarily a good combination, but I gave it a try. What is graphic design without a little trial and error? :P

Anyway, the poster needs to be done over. Not all the way over, but some significant changes are in the new poster. The old poster is uploaded to the Gallery nonetheless. It's still good design, and I'm pleased with it. I think it'll even make a nice pop art t-shirt. Not the bottom half with the text and screen shots, just the top half. Any feedback on whether I make it a t-shirt or not will be greatly appreciated! It would be nice to wear something that I designed myself.

I also uploaded an old design I did for an assignment given back in 2004. Someone must have saw my design and decided to take it a step further, putting great detail in the coffee mug and adding books. Whoever the show-off is, I'm still jealous. T_T

Added another one!

Added another piece to the Color Gallery. This one is an illustration done for my Illustration 1 class; medium used is an acrylic wash over white acrylic gesso.The project was to creat an illustration for a game DVD jewel case cover. My illustration was based on GUNZ Online, a 3rd/1st person online shooter that is now being published and hosted in North America by ijji.com. I enjoyed the mayhem experienced playing that game at the time, so that was my decided game.

While she doesn't resemble my past GUNZ Online character, she (much to my happiness) resembles the model used for my photo reference. The girl actually has large eyes, and her lashes were very long. I didn't get the lashes into my character's facial features, but I like the eyes. The model got to see my illustration and was very pleased, exclaiming "Wow! That's me!". Even my teacher, who isn't one for the anime style, liked my illustration. With a bit more contrast, this could've been a much better piece.

You can't see it, but she also has a sword strapped to her waist. In GUNZ Online, a player can use both swords and guns. I didn't manage to get the entire picture in, because I was using a 2 megapixel Kodak camera for "scanning" it into my computer. Aaah, the things I improvise with, eh? On that note, I'm out of here. I'm on my way to my sister's and then to the movies to see Grindhouse. Seriously, that movie looks like fun. :D

Gallerie Update

I updated the Color Gallery 2 days ago, but didn't have the time to post about it. I added two paintings, both from my last semesters Painting 1 class. They're both the last paintings I've ever done for that class and some of the best paintings I've ever done. If anyone thinks I can make some nice quality prints with any of the paintings I have listed, please don't hesistate to give your opinion.

I'm not looking to do any high quality prints like professional painters, just a solution that will look great on anyone's wall. I was thinking CafePress. The company provides good printing services and can provide me a way to make a bit of money while I look for work in my field, which is illustration. Also, I'm looking for an inexpensive way for me to take photos/transparencies of work.

Speaking of photography, I updated the Photography Gallery too. Just one photo this time. I believe it's the best and simplest black and white photo I've ever done. It was a class exercise in foreground and background. I Thought it made an interesting enough piece to add to my photography portfolio at the time; the composition works really well. I think I'll call it "Frenching the Fountain". :P

Added Gallery: Design

Read title. I've added a design gallery for the sake of all of the design work I have. They don't fit into the other categories for obvious reasons, so it was time for a gallery for the stuff that's supposed to increase my chances at getting a job. :P I haven't cleaned out my color gallery like I said I would; there's a lot of crap in there.

I added the Design gallery yesterday, but didn't get to finish completely integrating it into the rest of the site (See the Multimedia message I left earlier this morning). It was easy to add, and integrating it is a cinch. If anyone wants to use the L.E.A.P. Gallery that I use (though there are better scripts out there), please contact me. I would never charge for something so simple for people to use. I may go ahead and put it up for download one of these days. I just have to clean up and update some of the commenting inside of the scripts.

Yup! It looks like the site is coming along nicely. I've been thinking of re-designing the site again. It's cute, but it's just not the edgy design I want for my site. I like using red and black along with some gray, and I want to avoid colors that can be too bold. We'll just have to see. Maybe this time around I'll have a site menu with rollovers. I haven't done anything like that since my old site's flash-based menu.