All of us – including Orion – love you very much!
Author: thedude
Stone Circles – Beauty and Mystery
Andrew took these awesome panoramic shots on a recent vacation trip. The arrangement on the left is the Ring o’ Brodgar, the Stone Circle at Castlerigg is on the right. I don’t know much about how the circles came to be, but then, neither does anyone else.
More Snow Blankets from Wisconsin
Thanks, Bob for the very cool shots!
Audi A4
Farewell, Lincoln. Welcome Audi.
Brunch with the Goyas
Still loving the new camera. Any excuse to shoot with it is good enough for me, but especially when it involves good food and fine friends!
Olive (Rubba-Face) Fontaine and Family
Our Dear neighbors brought their parents up to meet thedude and Kellster. What a great-looking group!
MoNo “Soft Opening”
The new restaurant opened its doors for dinner last night. The invitation-only event, held primarily for residents of the building, neighbors and close friends, was a smashing success. I can say without reservation that the food and wine at our new restaurant is excellent. It was also a blast to hang out with some of…
Coworkers and Friends
Some of the brightest (and best-looking!) people I’ve ever had the pleasure of working with. Elise, Adam, Brant, Ron, Steve, Shannon, Guoying and Harley.
Easter Food Fest
Oh my. I guess I should feel guilty about yesterday’s food orgy, but I don’t. I’m too busy drooling over the pictures. Here’s a taste of the menu at MoNO. After we finished photographing (and eating!) the food, we continued the feast at Chris and Ben’s with champagne and succulent leg of lamb. I can’t…
Spring Has Sprung
I thought my friends in Wisconsin – who I’m told are digging out of more than a foot of fresh-fallen snow – might like to share our day at the Briones Regional Park. Yes, we even got a bit of a sunburn! While Kelly went for a ride with Mary, Magic, Chance and Classy, I…
New Restaurant, New Camera, New Lens – All Excellent!
I had to work at home today so that I could be here to deal with a few building issues. That’s the bad news. The good news is that I finally had the chance to eat lunch at MōNO – the highly-anticipated new restaurant in our building. I am thrilled to report that everything about…
Steve Almost Killed Me on This Hike
I’ve known Steve longer than anyone else in California. He’s in somewhat better shape than I am, so when he proposed I go on a hike with him ten years ago, I was worried about keeping up. He promised to “take it easy”, but we still walked for hours – uphill all the way. I…
No – This *Really* Sucks
Our car was stolen out of our garage today. We’re trying to convince ourselves that it doesn’t matter. It’s just a car – we’ll get another one. Of course, it’s not that easy. We really liked this car a lot. It’s been reliable and fun for 7 years, and we kept it in immaculate condition….
It’s Never Too Late for Photo Fun
This poster was imagined almost 30 years ago. We shot these images of Steve in the living room and printed them by hand at the time. With lots of dodging, I was able to achieve decent results, but was limited to a print 24 inches wide. Thanks to the fact that I preserved the original…
On Film and Friends
Memories flood over me as I see some of these images unfold on my 24″ display. Some of the images really smack me up and down and back up again – for a number of different reasons. A few things I thought when I saw this shot: We must have been having a great time…
My Scanning Workflow
This stack represents about 2/3 of the slides that I have gone through in the last several days. In addition to this was a box containing another thousand or so loose slides. Fortunately, the majority of the slides went straight into the garbage. What remains are slides I definitely want to scan and some that…
Incredible Synchronicity!
My new friend Jeri is dating my other friend Andrew. Jeri recently took a position at Bayer, whose offices are about 10 blocks from the offices of Affymetrix in Emeryville, where I work. One day Jeri passed by one of the lunch rooms on the sprawling campus and saw this shot of her boyfriend laminated…
Photo Advice from thedude
A coworker recently asked for photo advice after seeing the pictures I shot at our company Christmas party. I took the time compose a lengthy response, and figure I might as well share it with my regular readers too! Hi thedude, I was looking at the pictures you took at the party. They are amazing….
My Never-Ending Scanning Project
A few years ago, my best man Steve and I split the cost of a Nikon film scanner. I figured I’d spend a few days scanning the best of the thousands of slides and negatives I have scattered around. Well, this little project has grown into a monster. I’ve been scanning on and off for…
Our Lives in a Box of Old Kodachromes
You never know what you’ll find. I had a few spare moments this rainy Saturday afternoon, and decided to take up my scanning project again. It didn’t take long to find something fun and timely. These old slides were in the first box I opened. I’m sure Jim will love these! Ha! Food has always…
Jack and Tres Revisited
As you know, I took my friends Jim and Wendy to Oakland’s Middle Harbor Park a few days ago. Whenever I’m there, I always tell the story of the first time I ever saw the park – at Jack and Tres’ wedding. This reminded me that I was one of the photographers at the auspicious…
Another Food and Booze-Filled Day
The fact that there is not a drop left of the 3600 cases of Absinthe bottled late last year at St. James Distillery was was more of a disappointment to us than the blustery weather, but the fruity vodkas and liqueurs helped ease our sorrow. Good thing we laid down a substantial grease and carbo…
We’re Going to NASA!
Andrew, Jeri and Jim plan to leave Oakland very early on Sunday morning to attend a super-nerdy event at the NASA Ames Research Center, Moffett Field – home to Hangar One – a truly ginormous dirigible hangar. I’ve been told that it’s OK to bring my camera, so I promise to make a blog entry…
Gettin’ All Ansel With It
We drove to Strawberry, California (Pop. 50) yesterday to take part in a 50th birthday celebration for Kelly’s long-time friend Jeff Marshall at the historic Strawberry Lodge. Along the way we enjoyed a delicious lunch at the Heyday Cafe in Placerville. We arrived at the lodge just in time to see the moon bouncing toward…
Wisconsin Snow Blanket
I’ve been too busy to post anything in such a long time. Then, my pal Dave sent these images from Wisconsin. Seems the snow on his truck either slid or was blown into this amazing magic snow carpet. How cool is that?!?
Last Sunset of 2007
If I had know it was going to be this colorful, I would have set up my tripod in advance. That might have prevented the motion blur in the shot on the right. Oh well – the shot isn’t perfect, and well, neither was 2007. Let’s all work to make 2008 a lot better, okay?…
San Francisco in Ruins
Awesome, scary panoramic image shot from a balloon in 1906.
More Visualizations – Updated
Our association recently insalled Macassar ebony wood paneling in our lobby, and although the results are striking, the overall effect is a bit darker than we’d imagined. To brighten things up just a bit, we’ll be hanging some sepia-toned reproductions of four archival images that previously hung elsewhere in the building. Before we go through…
Holiday Season in Full-Swing
It’s that time of year. Seems like there are parties every night. Trust me – I’m not complaining. Although it does seem like I’m spending a lot of time taking pictures and creating photo albums like this one from our friend Lelah’s party last night. I was supposed to be photographing her and her baby…
Christmas Party – Affymetrix Style
This entry probably won’t be of interest to most of you, but I went to so much trouble getting the images posted on our blog at work that I figured I’d get a little extra mileage out of them by posting them here too. Rumor has it that the people in this photo album are…