GelaSkin for iPad Sunfellow

After a year of waiting for Apple to come out with their second generation iPad, which includes a built-in camera, I lined up and bought an iPad 2 with WI-FI via their online store. It arrived a few days ago and is beautiful. I love it. In a future update, I plan to post a list of my favorite apps.  For now, I thought some of you might be interested in knowing where I ordered a protective cover for the back of the iPad, which is made of beautiful, albeit slippery, aluminum. I ordered the back cover via GelaSkins, which allows you to select from a large gallery of images, or upload your own. I chose to upload my own (included below). The cost, not including shipping, was a surprisingly inexpensive $19.95! Better, GelaSkins also offers stylish clothing for lots of other products, including iPhones, iPods, cell phones, laptops, netbooks, tablets, eReaders, and more.

My only complaint: most of the images that GelaSkins offers -- at least the first few hundred I rummaged through -- were dominated by what I considered to be unattractive, modernistic images -- so I applied to be one of their artists and see if they would like to expand their gallery offerings to include at least a few Native American rock art images from Sedona. We'll see what happens...

Weddings In Sedona

Of all the wedding planners in Sedona, I work the most with Weddings in Sedona. Like most of the wedding professionals in Sedona, the folks behind Weddings in Sedona are warm, caring, beautiful human beings and super-competent wedding professionals. Here's a recent video of theirs that is aimed at the wedding market in Japan (a lot of Japanese toursits visit Sedona every year). The large photo behind Uqualla is one of mine -- it hangs on one of the walls in the Weddings in Sedona office. You can find many photos of Native American weddings on my photo website, including a complete section dedicated to Uqualla.

Superman Obama

I'm not sure who the artist is, but this was too good not to share...

Woman Recounts Life After Death

Here's another post that has nothing, directly, to do with photography, but has everything to do with living a good, clean, conscious, loving life.

Read full story here

Purchase Dr. Long's Book here

RELATED LINKS:

Blind Woman Describes Fascinating Near-Death Experience

The Near Death Of A Child

Bruce Greyson, MD, PhD Speaking About Near Death Experiences At UN Symposium

NHNE Near-Death Experiences Resource Page

Stop Bank Abuse: Move Your Money

Does having an well-developed sense of social justice come along with being a photographer, or pursuing other artistic professions? I don't know. I do know most of the photographers I know have a strong interest in people, social issues, and doing their part to improve the world. So here's something we can all do to move power away from mindless, soulless corporate interests and put it back in the hands of the little guy and our local communities.



For more information, go here.

Fastest State Trooper Alive

This has nothing to do with photography (except that photographers tend to have a good sense of humor). I have also not been able to verify whether or not it is true. A friend emailed it to me and I laughed so hard I wanted to share it with you. Click on the article to view a larger, more readable version.

Scott Kelby's Redesigned Portfolio

Scott Kelby posted a link to a new portfolio that RC Concepcion created for him. I like it! Kelby's blog post can be found here.

Terry White's Best of 2009 Top 10 Gadgets

EXCERPT:

"Happy New Year! It's that time once again to take a quick look at my favorite gadgets of last year. The gadgets I've chosen were the ones that I used the most and that had the most positive impact on my day-to-day life. These gadgets were either introduced in 2009 or had significant updates in 2009. These are the gadgets that I would recommend to a friend without hesitation. So let's get to it…"

Check out Terry White's Best of 2009: Top 10 Gadget Picks

Scott Kelby's “Best of 2009” Picks

EXCERPT:

"It’s important to note right up front that I didn’t say 'Best photography gear' or 'Best Photoshop stuff' (though both of those are represented). Instead, this is just my favorite 'bestest' stuff from 2009, (including things like songs, movies, travel stuff, food, etc.) presented in no particular order. Hope it starts off your New Year right! (By the way; make sure you read my disclaimers at the end of the list)."

Check out Scott Kelby's “Best of 2009” Picks.

Merry Christmas!

50 Beautiful Free Icon Sets For Your Next Design

Click here to see 50 Beautiful Free Icon Sets For Your Next Design.

Mr. Hitler Not Happy About The Canon 7D...

Orangutan Photographer A Hit Facebook

PHOTOS TAKEN BY AN ORANGUTAN PROVE A FACEBOOK SENSATION
Daily Mail
December 3, 2009

Original Link

A 33-year-old photographer has become an online sensation with pictures of her daily life at a Vienna zoo enthralling thousands of fans.

But Nonja is no ordinary snapper -- she is an orangutan.

Her pictures have won over more than 8,500 fans on Facebook since the zoo launched an online photo album of her work on Tuesday.

She is proving so popular that hundreds more fans are becoming her online 'friends' each hour.

However, the blurry images of Nonja's climbing rope and food and her companion's shaggy red-brown fur have won lots of admiring comments from fans, the photographer herself appears not so interested.

Using a specially-adapted Samsung ST 1000 digital camera, Nonja is rewarded with a raisin that drops out of the equipment each time she takes a snap.

The Vienna Tiergarten zoo set up the project to help keep Nonja and her three hairy ape friends entertained in their enclosure.

'Of course the apes don't care about the pictures, they are just an accidental side product,' zoo spokesman Gerhard Kasbauer said.

'They just know that when they press the button, a raisin pops out.'

The popularity of Nonja's online album means she is now on her way to becoming a fully-fledged orangutan icon.

Her photos can be seen on her Facebook page here.

2010 "Ancient Sedona" Calendars Now Available

I've been photographing Sedona's ancient ruins and rock art for years, itching to turn these inspiring sights into products that other people could enjoy. Thanks to Lulu, an online publishing company that allows you to print (and sell) a wide variety of products on demand, I finally took the plunge and created a couple calendars. You can check out my first creations here. And find out more by visiting my Ancient Sedona website. These 2010 calendars make unique (and inspiring) gifts for the upcoming holiday season.

Are New Image Sensors About To Revolutionize Digital Cameras?

Cheap Naked Chips Snap A Perfect Picture
By Paul Marks
New Scientist
October 7, 2009

EXCERPT:

How can image sensors -- the most complicated and expensive part of a digital camera -- be made cheaper and less complex? Easy: take the lid off a memory chip and use that instead.

As simple as it sounds, that pretty much sums up a device being developed by a team led by Edoardo Charbon, an engineer at the Swiss Federal Polytechnic Institute (EPFL) in Lausanne. In a paper presented at an imaging conference in Kyoto, Japan, this week, the team say that their so-called "gigavision" sensor will pave the way for cellphones and other inexpensive gadgets that take richer, more pleasing pictures than today's devices. Crucially, Charbon says the device performs better in both very bright light and dim light -- conditions which regular digital cameras struggle to cope with.

Read complete article.

Pulse

This website has pretty much nothing to do with photography. It does, however, have a fantastic collection of daily news, breathtaking videos, mind-tweaking books, cutting-edge links, and some of the best "Twitter Dynamos" in the Twitterverse. Oh, and it's run by yours truly. Come check it out. Here's an example of the kind of videos that can be found in the video section of this website:

Follow Me On Twitter

While I love photography, I'm also interested in a wide variety of other subjects. Here's where to go if you want to see what my other passion are...

Roy Firestone interviews Ansel Adams

Important: Willie Smits: How To Re-Grow A Rainforest

What does re-growing rainforests have to do with photography? Well, if we don't figure out a way to reverse the apocalyptic tidal waves that are headed our direction (climate change, species extinction, pollution, etc.), then photography will go down the drain with the rest of the human race. This deeply inspiring talk offers some real world examples of how some of the challenges we are facing could be reversed in a surprisingly short amount of time.



Related links:

TED Talks
http://www.masarang.org/
http://redapes.org/

Newspapers Covering Obama's Inauguration

Now here's a cool website. It consists of the covers from newspapers around the world covering Barack Obama's inuaguration. But here's the cool part: click on any newspaper and a large image pops up showing the newspaper you've clicked on.