The Mystery, It May Be Solved:

A few days ago, I was telling Alex that I'd noticed a HUGE uptick on my flickr stats (where you can see which of your pictures are being viewed or learn what search words/phrases brought people to your photos). Unfortunately, I hadn't noticed it the day it happened (March 6th) but about 6 days later and so I can't see the particulars of WHY I got such a massive amount of views - 591! In one day! I get, on average, two to three hundred views a week and only when I'm consistently adding content. The periods I sit dormant, my daily viewership drops to 50 or less.

The lightbulb has gone off though, and I think I may have solved the mystery . . .



That rather crappy picture may be what caused the rush of traffic over to my flickr pages. As you can read, I made mention of The Yarn Harlot, Greg Kinnear and a little verb to describe the "style" of photography I was aiming for.

None of that was worth noticing though, until the other day when Greg Kinnear was on the Graham Norton Show talking with Stephanie Pearl-McPhee, The Yarn Harlot, about Kinnear kinnearing himself.

It's pretty damn funny!



I think a whole bunch of Brits in the studio audience went home and photo-googled "Yarn Harlot Kinnear" and found themselves looking at my husband handing in an American voting ballot, lol.

I'm Exhausted From The Explaining - In A Good Way:

The other day, my friend Alex took a picture of one of my cats. Blue is universally loved because of her crossed eyes and her goofy real-life cartoon-y features.

Enter flickr, and the world of outside perception. marakaramazov took a gander at Alex's picture and thought that Blue was taxidermied. No, really.

After Mara expressed her concerns, I did everything to assuage her worry, even linking to my real life pictures of Blue recently.

She loved a few of them, but others had her questioning my motives.

This one, she wrote "Sorry, but the cat look strange".

Yes, the cat looks funny, but so does my husband too! That's the point of the shot!

It has been really fascinating to communicate in two different languages (my English and her Spanish, but really my limited Spanish and her not-so-bad English).

That she cares so much about animals and their welfare means we share a universal language and I hope we can always communicate together.

I'd like to explain to her that Blue is not only very much alive, but shares a home with five other cats and a dog because we love animals, just like she does!

Is a cross-eyed cat a rarity in Latin-American countries? Heck, is a cross-eyed (bizco) cat a rarity in America?

While I'm exhausted from the research, I absolutely love the exchange!

If you were in my shoes, what else would you convey?

The Tree Whisperer:

Remember back when I wrote that one of my pictures on flickr seemed to be pretty popular, but I didn't think it was such a great shot?

You 'member, right? This one:



Last night/today, another one of my pictures got real popular, but this time I had a clue why.

Said picture:



In the comments for this one, a few people congratulated me for being on flickr's Explore page. Flickr keeps track of the daily top 500 pictures that have the most comments/favorites/combination of both attached to them.

Bear in mind that during an average MINUTE at flickr, there are approximately 5,000 pictures uploaded. Every sixty seconds! Being in the top 500 is pretty outstanding on its own, but there *is* a catch to it. Some photographers are very popular and consistently hit the Explore page. The more exposure your picture has (adding it to groups, having a lot of contacts that can view it, etc.) the greater your chance for getting noticed. Of course, it helps if your picture is good, lol.

In my case, I'm part of some local groups (Central Coast, Central Valley, etc.), of course the ravelry-related groups, a few groups pertaining to my camera brand, and lastly a smattering of groups with focuses that interest me (landscape, nature, etc.) If one of my pictures fits the description of that group I'll add it (not always, but usually).

When that first picture got popular, I didn't know why. Once the second picture garnered so much interest, I went looking . . .

Third picture down.

The first picture.

Over at Big Huge Labs, you can search to see if any of your pictures are listed on the Explore page. (Those links may not work if you don't have an account there. It's free and has many fun picture toys to play with so go check it out!)

That's how I just found out my March picture had hit the big time.

You can also look up other people! Sneaky-Pete, I know, but it is all in the public domain. Here's a shot by Mike Baird - a local photographer who is a wealth of information about picture-taking and local nature stuff.

Frecklegirl (Jess if you know ravelry) even hit the #2 spot one day last year!

It seems my forte is taking pictures of trees. I'da never guessed!

P.S. Over at dopiaza.org, you can create a Set Manager - based on the criteria you give it, it will generate a group of your pictures together. In my case, I have it look at my pictures' flickr stats to daily generate a set of my most viewed pictures.

"No on 8" Rally/Picnic in San Luis Obispo

If you have interest, there will be a rally/picnic to get out the "NO ON PROP 8" word.

Details:

When: This Sunday, November 2, 2008 at 2pm
Where: Mitchell Park in San Luis Obispo (Santa Rosa and Pismo streets)

More information can be found by clicking here.

It's the least I can do to help my fellow Californians in their fight for legal equality.

Local Yokel Activity:

Lately, I've taken a few outings around the area.

The weather went all kinds of kooky crazy hot the other day, so Alex and I hit up Pismo the other evening. I love me Weather because it makes a difference in pictures. Overcast, gloomy, windy, whatever. Hot at the beach is rare, so I was looking forward to the opportunity and it didn't disappoint.

Pismo Beach on October 7, 2008.

Another thing going on this week is that The Mike has barely worked so far. Monday he worked a short day and then was off Tuesday and Wednesday. I hate it when that happens, but at least he was willing to go out and about yesterday, so I could take pictures. Although it didn't pan out, he took me on a mystery ride for (what he was hoping would be) creek shots. Unfortunately, the creek was completely dried up. Also unfortunate was that he, not being into picture taking, didn't think stopping the car every so often was necessary. Almost all my pictures were taken from the passenger side while driving a less-than-stellar back road.

Upper Lopez Canyon Road.

Tonight was the monthly meeting of the SLO Camera Club. I'm glad I went, and I'm glad Alex went too. We both think that this club is not going to satisfy our "thirst for photography knowledge", but we do want to check it out a few more times to get a better feel for it. Alex, at 20, was definitely the youngest member. Me, days away from 40, was the second youngest member, lol.

Some pretty neat events are coming up, here locally, and I'm going to be checking them out. First up is an open studio tour (and while I had read about it online, a knitter came to the Sunday knit group and whipped out some postcards about her work.) Another cool thing happening here is gale force winds that should make for some awesome shots at the beach. Also, high tide hits around 8:40 tomorrow morning and I want to be there for that.

Like I said - there is plenty to occupy me, here locally, at the moment. Too soon, my time will be sucked back into work and tax deadlines and 'nose to the grindstone' activity. Right now I just want to breath in all that I love and enjoy.

The Tween Part:

You tell me:

1) Gross no matter what?

2) Gross, kinda, but it's nature.

3) Gross, but killer shot!

4) Killer shot - too bad it's about nature.

5) Oh HELL NO you didn't just make me look at that thing! Nature SUCKS!

I'll tell you from my standpoint - if I happened upon a knitting/generic blog that showed this shot? I would hit the "unsubscribe" button so fast, their mousepad would still be quivering.

I only took the picture because it's a really great nature shot and looking through a lens is so much easier (to me) than seeing it in Real Life. Yeah. I know looking at this spider through my lens - getting close enough, framing the shot, blocking the lighting, yadayadayada, it's also real life and just on the other side of my camera. Believeyoume. I know.

It's something I cannot explain. There is a distance - a wall - a "something" that comes between me and my subject that works for me. It's how I can take picture after picture after picture of bass fish, live and in the flesh and within arm's distance, trying for stupendous shots. If that same said fish touches me? Or jumps out of the bag after the tournament? Freaks me the hell out.

Between me and my camera is a world apart from me and my day-to-day.


Click here if you dare . . .

Busy and Learning:

Yesterday, The Mike got off a little early so we headed over to Los Osos/Baywood Park - him to get his paycheck and me to . . . what else? Snap photos!

Baywood Park set

Montana De Oro set

Los Osos Valley Road set

The weather was really nice and Mike knows the area pretty well because he lived there years ago. We ended up having to get his check right by one of the entrances into the Elfin Forest.Honestly, I wasn't impressed with the "forest" part, but the view from the boardwalk was wonderful! The back bay, from Los Osos to Morro Rock, is in clear sight.

My favorite three shots:





Oh, last Tuesday evening I met up with my photog friend Alex and we took a bunch of pictures in and around the village of Arroyo Grande. I forgot to blog about it - sorry! You can see the set here. I'm not enamored with any of them overall so I'm not picking a top three on those.

On the learning front, this is something I just read and I can't wait to implement the idea!

"Here's a central and obvious principle about photography that is sometimes overlooked even by some veteran photographers — that it's about light. Light makes the image. All cameras, whether film-based or digital are wonders of technology but they don't have a clue about subject; they're designed to transmit and register light and a range of its qualities.

It's true that the history of photography is filled with examples in which the subject and not the light is what the viewer's attention is drawn to and many of those images are powerful and memorable. In photojournalism, for example, when the urgency of an event takes precedence over art, the photographer may not have the time or the interest in waiting for the right light. But amongst the most memorable of those images, the ones that put a lump in your throat are those in which the light was a significant and descriptive player. So think about the subject but shoot the light."

- Malcolm Lubliner, Photographer

Some of his photographs.

Fascinating idea!

On October 9th, the SLO Camera Club has their monthly meeting and this time I'm going. Truth be told, I'm intimidated by "real" photographers but I'm willing to go to at least one meeting just to give it a chance. The worst that can happen is that everyone hates me, lol, but it's not like I KNOW these people so I won't have to ever see them again. That's what I keep telling myself when my little voice gets all Negative Nancy on me :grin: