I've been pondering lately what I need to get my lighting gear back together. See, I've been bleeding strobes. First the one 383 super ended up in the bay, then my MS-1 failed, then my other 383 super failed, which leaves me the Sunpak Digital Flash and my Sunpak 144PC. The Digital Flash is OK, albeit low in power and the 144PC is what I use to trigger flashes, so that's just not comfortable.

I talk about 500 megapixel sensors, diffraction, and the new Kodak 50 megapixel sensor.

Some notes on film, some cool and not-so-cool stuff out of PMA, and a few more tidbits.

A Kodak letter got scanned and passed around the Internet and it looks like another emulsion is gone -- Ektachrome 400X this time. They make some pains to explain that families of film other than 400X are not actually dead in the letter.

There's a fine line one treads when people wearing anything less than the sort of clothing one might wear to a formal dinner are involved in art: Where does something cease to be art and start becoming un-artistic pornography?

A benefit for the SFLNC

So, just a reminder to everybody... Back up your stuff regularly!

When I was recently in Philly, I ate at Iron Chef Morimoto's restaurant. And proceeded to "food porn" my way through the meal. It's fun, it's participatory, and I didn't use my flash or try to disturb anybody else. And now some other high-end chef wants to ban this practice...

I went to New York City lately on vacation and shot a bunch of film while I was there, wandering the streets with three cameras.

Writer Response Theory did an interview with Ken recently.

Apparently a bus-spotter gets called a pedophile and a terrorist by security personnel and so he gave his hobby up after 40 years.

Despite my film-shooting bent, I do like to keep up with the digital scene as well. This is all rampant speculation based on the available facts, given that nobody's dropping any expensive loaner hardware on my doorstop anytime soon.

Canon announces the 1Ds Mk III and the 40D... my G7 is obsolete... and I add commenting

What to do when it's cold out and you don't like shooting winterwear.

A new scam for con artists is to act like a plainclothes policeman and tell you you aren't allowed to take any pictures and ask for your memory card. Nice.