Some Minor Changes

 
Farewell Orchid by Jay Scott

Okay, here goes nothing. I say that because I have installed a newer version of dictation software and we have no idea how accurate it will be until I get it trained to my voice over the next few months. So, if something I say makes no sense at all pretend it is a game of Mad Gab and slur their words together to try and figure out what I have said. :-) So far it has not made a single error in this paragraph so I am feeling confident about it. On to the topic of this post.

When I decided to trust my photo hosting to 500px I felt like I had made a good choice. Certain features that Flickr has it did not. The community base was much smaller, but Flickr is years old and 500px.com was brand-new. Very recently 500px.com instituted the one feature that I was missing most from Flickr and that was the ability to group photos into sets. As for the community, this website has exploded with people, has an amazing rating system, has excellent support and the commenters and contributors are top-notch.

Previously I was able to group photos into different portfolio collections. You'll still be able to see those by accessing "The Portfolio" but it will be thinned out to contain only the best images. The problem with what I consider to be the best images is that a lot of people like the photos I feel indifferent about. I do not want to limit the photos that are available for sale because of a portfolio collection that has been minimized to show what I consider only the best. Now with the option of creating sets, that is remedied because I can include in that set all of the photos of a specific category that I would be willing to sell as a product.

Because of this change there has been a slight adjustment to the navigation on the right hand bar of this site. It is pretty self-explanatory and should take little to no time for you to determine where to find the photos you are looking for. As always, if you find any dead links or errors I have made, during these blurry hours before bed, would you be so kind as to let me know about them so that I can fix them.

Have a great weekend and I hope to have some more interesting news and photos for you soon. For now I am keeping the details under my hat.

You Get What You Pay For

One of the reasons I moved Jay Scott Photography to the Blogger platform was for the monetary cost being free. The larger reason was to leave the maintenance, updates and performance of the site up to professionals. As the internet evolves and the languages used to build sites grow the complexity increases and I am not able to keep up. I probably could, but a person only has so much time to give and I would much rather outsource my website and focus on photography. Even the opportunity to make a photograph into more than what it is straight out of the camera with post processing techniques is something I could be much better at but I prefer the time with my camera in hand over even more screen time.

What I have noticed lately is that some photos on older posts have started to stop loading from their source location at 500px. All that appears is the clickable text which will take you to the photo. I mentioned this in a previous post. For reasons beyond my knowledge they have stopped loading even when certain techniques are tried such as clearing my internet cache and force refreshing (pressing Ctrl + F5 at the same time). You can still click the text to see the image, but it interrupts the flow or reading a post or, if I have not written anything, makes the post pointless.

I will work to fix this and try alternative methods of inserting the photos. For now, would you my readers, please just leave a comment to let me know if any photos are failing to load on your computer or mobile device. Thank you for your help.

Oh, and it is not the fact that Blogger is free that it is happening. I don't know if it has to do with me, Blogger, 500px or a gremlin in the system. :)

What's Happening

Why the summer was slow for shooting, I do not know. Now that people have returned from holidays and the normal routine has returned I am finding opportunities.

Much photography is needed for our church, Ebenezer Baptist. Congregation photos, event coverage, website photos. The list is actually quite long so I have no excuse to not be shooting. I suppose post processing and office work are reasons. As well, I'm embarking on a fourteen week exercise, nutrition and wellness program aimed at those with mobility impairment. It looks extensive and well put together. I'm happy to have Paul as an accountability partner in this effort.

Labour Day found us at the John Arvat Pond enjoying the weather and watching Paul and his family kayaking with regular taunts asking me if I am going to try it.

Kayaking Quadriplegic by Jay Scott

Next year, I think.

Hot Racks Bakery has approved of my work so tomorrow I will drop off the gift I have for them and see about a few Hot Knots to photograph and enjoy next. Top notch quality from that business. They will do well and we are behind them!

As well, I've become aware of a small number of people interested in learning how to use their DSLRs. Their initiative and enthusiasm has me excitedly preparing to teach again. The classes will be during the weekdays which is ideal for me and though it is a splendid coincidence that days work so well for the first three students, there is room for more if any readers are interested in the details.

So, please keep your eyes on the 500px page as I'm trying to add at least on new photo each day. There may not be time or content to write a deep blog post, but new photos can be found there regularly.

Time Lapse Coffee

I would say that the move was successful. I can see to statistics that people are still visiting the site so I know it is not lost to them and that access is available to the public.

I know I've not been posting any of the photos uploaded to 500px.com but the new uploads are visible, with links to them, in the right-hand bar below the collections section. Ultimately, I would like to find a way to provide a thumbnail of the images, but until I figure that out the text that leads to the image will have to do. And of course you can see the whole gallery by going to the link at the top right of the navigation bar.

As time permits I will try to post a few of the photos as they upload, even though most of them are old. It's really an inopportune time of year for this to all be done. January is an excellent time of year for digital housekeeping. Late summer and fall is not as I try to wrap up all the errands and tasks that are best done before the snow flies.

Earlier this week, while enjoying my first French press coffee with Jason at Museo, I set up the iPod for another time lapse.

It would have been better but for the very restless patron in the purple bunnyhug. I hope you enjoy it, anyway.