Mike Munhall

Among the many gifts I received for my birthday from the best wife a guy could ask for was a new camera that I asked for.  No, Dorrie didn’t buy me a D300 or anything expensive - just a brand spanking new Holga FN.  If you are one of the three readers of this blog (that’s a 50% increase since a year ago, by the way), you probably don’t have a clue what a Holga is.

A Holga is a $15, plastic, piece of crap film camera.  It takes medium format film rather than 35mm.  The Holga is the least sophisticated camera ever made.  There are two aperture settings (f8, f11) and one shutter speed (1/100 second).  There’s no light meter, so it’s up to the photographer to have a good sense of the lighting required to properly expose the film.  There’s a focus ring on the lens, but without any way to preview what your shots are going to look like, the best one can do is guess how to focus the lens before firing off a frame.  Holgas are known to have significant light leaks which are rectified by taping the seams of the camera body, and even when all the leaks are sealed the images vignette in the corners.

Why would any sane person use a Holga then, with all these problems?  Because it’s fun.  You never know what your images are going to look like; most likely your images will be slightly out of focus, the composition will be weird, and you’ll be lucky if it’s perfectly exposed.  But there’s a really cool artistic quality in these types of photographs.

My new Holga has reintroduced me to film processing.  I processed the film with the images in the above Flickr badge in my bathroom.  I had the film scanned by the local photo mart.  Once I get used to the workflow and the ins-and-outs of the camera, I plan on having some black and white prints made and hand-coloring the them.  Should be fun.

Here’s my new business card. What do you think?

Mark your calendars!

I will be showing (and hopefully selling) 20 to 30 of my framed fine art photographs at the Delectable Egg in downtown Denver (LoDo) from May 17 to June 14.  They are generously giving me an entire wall of the restaurant to display any photos I wish to show.  I plan on showing much of the macro, architecture and nature photography I’ve done in the past year.  If for no other reason, you should plan a visit just to experience their eggs Benedict.

May 17 - June 14, 2008
Delectable Egg - Downtown Denver/LoDo
1642 Market St, Denver, CO 80202

A big, huge thanks is in order to Rena for pushing me to get my photography somewhere to be purchased. Last weekend I opened a store on Etsy. I have only a few pieces up right now, but plan on putting up much, much more in the coming weeks. I’m curious to know what you think of the store. Leave a comment in this post or email me if you have an opinion on how to make it better.

Now, go buy a print. Chop, chop.

Here are a few notable things I’m looking forward to in 2008:

Welcome Dot
My first kid (a.k.a. Dot, for the spec on our first ultrasound picture just a few weeks into the pregnancy) is due April 21. If that’s not something to look forward to , then nothing is. The change that I need to prepare for right now is the change from being a two-income family to a one-income family. I honestly don’t think that there is any amount of preparation that can be done on my part to get ready for my first child, so I’m just going to do the best I can until then.

CameraPhone365
I’ve blogged about this project (http://www.mikemunhall.com/cameraphone365/) a few times. It’s in full swing now, and I’m already finding it challenging to remember to take and post a photo every day. Surely it will become more of a habit as I get used to it.

Blogging Changes
I am no longer going to write about every single book I read. I’m just not into doing reviews, and I struggle trying to find things to say about the books I read. Instead of blogging about each book, I’m keeping a spreadsheet with notes about each one. If I feel like it, I’ll post notes on the items in the spreadsheet occasionally. I want to keep my regular blog reserved for more quality posts, rather than dilute it with dumbed-down entries such as “I liked this book”.

Adobe AIR
I immersed myself into the Adobe AIR APIs several weeks ago. I’ve got a good running start with the technology, and AIR is still in beta. Jumping on the AIR bandwagon before the first official release is a good move on my part, I think. I like the technology, find it useful, and think it will find good adoption. It’s an opportunity to become an expert in the technology from the very beginning and will be a valuable topic on my resume. And it’s fun.

Photography
With the completion of my last photography course, I think I have some ideas on where I want to take my craft. I need to firm up my plans, but I think I can have a fair-sized body of work that I can print, mount, and frame and then sell at some art fairs or online. The first step, though, and one I am taking right now, is to build a consistently-themed body of work.

2008 is a leap year. Does that mean CameraPhone365 is now CameraPhone366? Nah… I think I’ll keep it CameraPhone365 and make February 29 a free day with bonus points if you post anyway. I’ll update the CameraPhone365 post with this information.

Are you ready for CameraPhone365? I am. I’ve been tinkering with a new photoblog (http://www.mikemunhall.com/cameraphone365/) that integrates very well with flickr. This new photoblog will be dedicated solely to my CameraPhone365 project. I still have some tweaking to do and I have to clean up the test photos, but I think it will serve me well. My CameraPhone365 project will begin January 1.

What is CameraPhone365?
Every day, for one full year, take a picture with your cameraphone and post it to your blog.

Where did this idea come from?
The idea for CameraPhone365 came from two places. I had just finished a blogging project, NaBloPoMo (National blog Posting Month), where you write a post on your blog (not necessarily a photoblog, just a regular blog) every day for the month of November. There was no way that I could actually write every single day, but I knew I couldn’t fail if I could just post a photo from my cameraphone on the days that I didn’t have anything to say. A picture is worth a thousand words, right? There was simply no way I was going to miss a post if all I had to do was simply snap a picture and email it to my blog. As far as NaBloPoMo is concerned, it was sort of cheating, but it turned out to be a fun way to blog.

The other source for the idea of CameraPhone365 is Project 365, another project where you post a photo to a blog every day for 365 days. The difference between CameraPhone365 and Project 365 is that in this project, you snap photos with your cameraphone.

Can I do my own CameraPhone365 project?
Heck, yeah. And I hope you do.

What do I need for my own CameraPhone365 project?
You need a mobile telephone that will take pictures and a blog. You will also need some way to get the pictures from your cameraphone to your blog. How you do that is up to you. I am emailing my photos to my flickr account, and using the flogr photoblog software on my website to display the photos. flogr does all the fetching of images for me so the only thing I need to do is email the photos from my phone to my flickr account. This, to me is the simplest way to do it.

Another option for getting your photos from your camera to your blog using flickr is to set up a special flickr email address that will post images to your Wordpress, Blogger, Typepad or other blog. You can get information on how to do that here. I used this method on my regular blog (here’s an example ) and I found that it worked very well.

You don’t have to have a flickr account to do your project. There are other online photo services that can be used, and there’s nothing wrong with skipping the online photo-sharing sites altogether and using the brute force method of downloading the pictures from your phone to your own harddrive, then manually posting the pictures to your blog. Use whatever method works for you. If you need help, send me an email or ask your question in the comments of this post and I’ll do what I can to help.

Do I have to post every single day?
Yes and no. At the end of your project, you should have 365 posts, each containing a photo from your cameraphone. A different picture should be posted to your blog every single day. I think it would be unreasonable, though, to expect everyone to be able to do the actual posting every single day for a year. The one requirement, therefore, is simply to have a different picture posted every day. If you have the time to download your photos and manually post them to your blog every single day, more power to you. If it is easier for you to create multiple posts in a single sitting, then do that. Just remember to have one post for each day of the year by the end of your project.

What about leap years?
On leap years, February 29 is a free day with bonus points if you post anyway.

Can I post more than one picture per day?
Sure.

Do I have to use a cameraphone?
Yes. Otherwise, this would just be another Project 365. The point of CameraPhone365 is to make it a little easier for non-photographers to start and finish the project. Being a photographer myself, I don’t think I’d be able to actually complete a Project 365 unless I could use a camera that I carry with me every minute of every day - that is, my cameraphone.

Why should I do a CameraPhone365 project?

• It gives you a healthy, clear complexion.
• People will like you.
• It’s fun.
• It’s a great way to document your life.

What else do I need to know?
Nothing, really. But, I would like to know about you. If you plan on doing your own Project 365, tell me by emailing me at (cameraphone365 _at_ mikemunhall.com). I want to know if you think this is a good idea and I’d like to see the progress on your blog. I’m toying with idea of creating a website for this project and letting people (like you) register and see the other participants. It could be its own huge mega CameraPhone365 industry one day.

In response to Dorrie’s Top 10 Desert Island Discs post, for which I was tagged, here are my top ten albums. Keep in mind that my favorites change so often that next week this list would probably be completely different.

Dorrie’s tag came at a particularly good time. I had been working on this post for the last month or so but couldn’t decide what albums to choose. The tag made me decide to just pick any ten good albums. Also, thanks Nate for the Must Haves idea. That obviously came from TNT.

1) Autolux - Future Perfect

I have a bad habit of over-listening to an album when I find one I like. I listen to it over and over until I wear it out. This is the one album that I listen to over and over without it getting old. Autolux has only one album, Future Perfect, and has been promising another for about a year now. I haven’t seen that second album. I know they’re still around, though, because their MySpace page shows that they’re touring.

Must Haves: Here Comes Everybody, Sugarless

2) Morphine - Cure for Pain

This is another album that I regularly wear out, but unlike Future Perfect, I have to give this one a rest every once in a while. I’m always able to come back to it, though. This is a great album by itself, but it has special meaning to me. Perhaps it’s because it reminds of the late-night trips to the campgrounds in Grand Mesa in Nate’s truck (and, incidentally, passing the Wagonwheel Motel that may be the very Wagonwheel mentioned in the song Thursday).

Must Haves: Thursday, Mary Won’t You Call My Name

3) Minor Threat - First 2 7″’s

The songs on this hardcore punk album are hard, fast, and… short. The entire album can’t be more than 20 minutes, and it’s actually two albums - Minor Threat EP and In My Eyes EP. To me, Minor Threat was far more talented and smarter than any other hardcore band.

Must Haves: Small Man Big Mouth, Minor Threat

4) Meat Beat Manifesto - Original Fire

Jack Dangers is the main person behind the band Meat Beat Manifesto. Being a former (reformed?) club DJ, I have a lot of respect for anyone that can craft beats, samples, loops, and dubs into good music and absolutely no one does it better than Dangers. Meat Beat Manifesto goes well beyond dance music (which I’m not so fond of now). It’s just good, creative electronic music.

Must Haves: Helter Skelter ‘97, Radio Babylon

5) Tino - Tino’s Breaks, Volume 4

Tino is actually another Jack Dangers project. Tino produces music similar to Meat Beat Manifesto, but it’s mostly breakbeats and has a latin accent. Tino is a fictional (?) latin character that is sampled throughout the tracks on all of the Tino albums. It’s actually kind of funny, but you’d just have to hear it. I can’t explain.

Must Haves: Ritmos Latinos, I Like it Mambo

6) Arcade Fire - Neon Bible

This one will certainly surprise Dorrie, to whom I complained a lot about this band being played too much on the radio. Recently, though, this album has grown on me rather significantly. It’s too early to truly be able to say it will remain on this top ten list. I don’t think the music is totally-the-best-omigod-you-have-to-listen; The album is here just because I’ve been listening to it so often lately and enjoying it.

Must Haves: Black Mirror, Ocean of Noise

7) Jane’s Addiction - Jane’s Addiction (Live)

It’s sort of amazing to me how much I like this album considering I don’t care for anything else the band has produced. In any case, it’s special and I can understand why the band is respected as much as they are. Jane’s Addiction’s cover of the Velvet Underground’s Rock & Roll is worth twice the cost of the entire record.

Must Haves: Rock & Roll, Chip Away

8) The Pixies - Doolittle

The Pixies were a cornerstone of the alternative music I grew up listening to, but I didn’t really listen to them until a few years ago when a friend asked me if I had Wave of Mutilation on my iPod. He was in a band that wanted to cover the song. I gave it a listen with him and got hooked on the band. A week later I owned nearly every Pixies album available.

Must Haves: Wave of Mutilation, No. 13 Baby

9) The Toadies - Rubberneck

There are two great bands from Dallas/Ft. Worth, where I grew up, that I didn’t discover until after I moved from Texas in my late twenties: Reverend Horton Heat and the Toadies. Reverend Horton Heat has several albums that, on any other week except this one, would make my top ten list. The Toadies broke up in 2001 and I’m surprised they didn’t produce anything of note other than Rubberneck after being together for more than a decade. I hear, though, that the band is touring again and is playing in Dallas this weekend.

Must Haves: Backslider, Quitter

10) Chemical Brothers - Exit Planet Dust

The Chemical Brothers have been producing music much longer than most people realize. Exit Planet Dust is one of their great albums that was released well before their more well-known albums. Here’s some trivia: The original name for the Chemical Brothers was the Dust Brothers, but when they became popular in America they changed their name because there was already another American band named Dust Brothers.

Must Haves: In Dust We Trust, Thee Little Birdies Down Beats

I got an email from a woman at Javis Davis today, letting me know that I am the runner up for the “Pregnancy Announcement” prize on NaBloPoMo. Being the runner up, I guess that means that the pregnancy announcement on my blog (which really wasn’t as much an announcement as it was a statement) was the second in the month of November among all NaBloPoMo participants.

Hi Mike, it looks like you are the winner of a “runner up” prize in NABLOPOMO! Go to our website, www.javisdavis.com, and you can pick out fabrics for a pillow and blanket set. Look under “Fabric Collections” and pick a main fabric for your pillow, and any two “furry” fabrics for your blanket. Furry fabrics are the ones that say “fluff, chic mink, polychenille, and chenille”. Just email me back with your fabric choices and a shipping address and we’ll get it to you ASAP. Congratulations!!

Also, Dorrie and I went for the first ultrasound yesterday. Baby is healthy and normal. We now know the baby’s gender, but aren’t sharing (sorry). Baby must have my sense of humor: In one of the pictures, he/she is sticking his/her tongue out. That’s my boy/girl!