My friend Heather thinks I owe you a retraction. Remember this post, where I congratulated myself for my level-headedness and maturity in managing to pull myself out of a frenzy of consumeristic covetousness and NOT impulse-buy a new iPhone 4S? She thinks I owe you a retraction because I went out and actually did buy the new iPhone four days later. I think I deserve a medal for waiting for four whole days. And pro haggler that I am, I managed to wrangle a deal on my data plan so that I’m actually paying less per month for wireless than I was for our ancient non-data-plan Krazr, so we’ll save the price of the new iPhone in about a year and a half. Yay!
And oh my sweet lord, what a treat is the new iPhone 4S! I have only barely begun to figure out the voice-activated Siri stuff, but the camera? Wow! Well here, don’t let me tell you — let me show you!
“Hey, look Willie! Mom got a new iPhone!”
I went out for a drive on Sunday to take some pictures and started playing with Hipstamatic, an app I’ve had on my iPhone for more than a year but never warmed to. I’m kinda digging it now! (Do you like the digital sticky tape holding the collage together? I added that in Photoshop.)
This was the view from my office window when the sun hit an icy tree on Sussex Drive, also via Hipstamatic.
And this one is straight-up out of the iPhone, no app required. (I have been coveting a wide-angle lens for my Nikon so I can do this kind of big-nose distortion, but the iPhone’s angle of view is just wide enough to satisfy my creative urge for now!)
And speaking of the Nikon, I didn’t abandon it entirely this week. I’m glad I had it with me on Monday when this spectacular sunrise lit up the sky over the Byward Market. No colour enhancement on this one, I just pointed my camera and clicked.
You might have seen this one in my post yesterday. It’s something I’ve been thinking about for a while, but only recently had enough skill to be able to make it come out like I planned in my head. The text is actually added after the fact in Photoshop, which means I can put up just about any message I want. I’m thinking it might make a fun new blog header one of these days.
As I said on Flickr, stand by for the “I am so much more than just a mom with a camera” version. 😉 Speaking of which, I’ve made a few allusions recently to Internet drama. I thought you guys would get a kick out of this. I got tangled up in a war of words on a Flickr forum recently with Ottawa photographer Paul Couvrette, who called me a “mamarazzi” and criticized me for (among other things) undercharging for prints and making my pictures available online. While the criticism stung at the time, especially since it was more or less unprovoked and definitely overly vicious and personal, the apology he later posted was laugh-out-loud funny. I had no idea at the time, but apparently he had “personified [Dani] as an icon of the ill direction towards which I believe photography may well be headed.” Nice, eh? I’ve never been called an icon of anything, let alone the downfall of an entire industry. And I thought I was just taking pictures because it made me happy. So if I hike my prices next year, you can blame Paul Couvrette. 😉
Mostly, though? I still just love taking pictures.
And hey, this made me feel a lot better. I got my Getty Images sales statement at the end of the week, and this picture from October apparently ran in the Wall Street Journal during December.
And this picture of Willie was bought by a company that makes greeting cards and calendars with titles like “Napping Cats of 2012.”
Hmmm, can you guess which one I’ll be adding to my “as seen in” portfolio? I mean, the WSJ is great, but the Napping Cats of 2012 calendar? Does it get more prestigious than that?!
I suppose this is petty but I laughed forteal at the link you chose to introduce Mr Courvette. Dani, you are GOOD. Dare I say, iconic?
I never forget the lessons that Phantom Scribbler taught us in the early days of blogging, Jody. Long live the google bomb. 🙂 And also? Don’t mess with the mommybloggers.
JEALOUS. So jealous. I have been coveting Siri since, well, FOREVER. DH managed to borrow a 4S from work, and agree – the camera is AWESOME. But thus far have not been able to justify the upgrade. Not yet, anyhow. The ability to dictate blog posts is pretty enticing 🙂
Oh, and it was very diplomatic of you to neglect to mention that Mr. Courvette worked at Sears Portrait Studio. Sheesh, if the salaried photog can’t top that…
My niece really wants to know how you ended up with such a perfect heart shape bitten out of your pear. (I do too!!)
I meant to comment on your last iPhone post, but never had free hands to do it. I totally could have written that post. I did the phone negotiation thing, but didn’t want to wait for the phone to arrive, so I went to the store. When I got to the store they couldn’t give me the same deal as they did over the phone. So I left without my iPhone. That was about 3 weeks ago. I’m still cell phone less. On one hand, I hate not having a phone (and the camera/video that comes along with the iPhone). On the other hand, I love being able to be uncontactable 24/7 because I don’t have a phone. Sigh.
So, you got the phone cause you got a great deal. Can you tell me how great that deal was?
(replying from my new 4S 😉
LOL! Oh, clicking through on the Mr. Couvrette link to see that cheesy photo of Mayor Watson just cracked me up!! You icon, you 🙂
I love you guys. 🙂
Sasha, I *know*. We are approaching the brain-to-blog direct connection that I’ve always coveted. Hands-free blogging FTW!
Mary, my orthodonist loves me. 😉 Actually, I carefully scooped out the heart using the rounded tip of my potato peeler. Easy-peasy!
Gus&Otto, I didn’t go into the details of how agonizing it was to deal with the various agents at Rogers, but OMG it was painful. I had to re-explain myself four times and dealt with SIX different people – two in person and four on the phone. Yeesh! And the longer it went on, the more determined I was to scrape out the best possible deal. I was practically fixated on the idea of some other guy getting a better deal than me. In the end, we ended up paying $45/mos for a straight phone and data plan at 500MB of data a month. It’s $5 less than what I was paying with Telus and $5 less than I was (over)paying Rogers for our straight wireless non-data plan before. Of course, YMMV.
This post is awesome! The link to the photo of Mayor Watson, priceless. Good to know school photo backdrops aren’t just for the kiddies 😉
I read the thread on Flickr with disgust. It was a good reminder why forums aren’t for me!! Enjoy your new phone 🙂
That link is perfection!
Just took a browse of Couvrette’s website & price list . . . yikes! I vaguely remember Paul coming into speak during one of my classes while taking Algonquin College’s 2-year Photography course – and one of the topics covered was pricing. I remember thinking at the time (almost 20 years ago now) that the people willing to pay his prices must have DEEP pockets! I’m just a small-town girl whose total wedding budget was less than Couvrette’s most expensive package!
If you feel that you’ve been fairly compensated for your time & talent, and had fun while creating the marvelous work that you produce, than the Couvrettes of the world can go hang.
P.S. He’s probably just jealous, as the images you post on Flickr are more pleasing to my eye, than what I just saw on his website!
Wasn’t it revealed that it wasn’t actually Couvrette that made those comments? That it was a hack or fake account? *confused*
Confused ain’t the half of it. First someone said it was a fake account, then when I asked Couvrette pointedly on Twitter if it had been him or not he didn’t answer, but a day or so later this “apology” appeared on Flickr.
So, I was just stalking your blog and clicking on a bunch of things and found my way to this post.
I just have to say…What a douche that guy is.
Also…why haven’t we kept in touch? That’s a tragedy. For reals.
It’s because I’m super awkward in person, right?? And a hideous monster. And a HUGE FAN of the CUTTING EDGE photography of Paul Couvrette…..yeah, I couldn’t even type that with a straight face…
Seriously though – I think of you often and I’m glad to see all is well in your world. 🙂