Semester In Review

This is my last fall semester of college. It was a long and hard semester that I feel helped me build myself up for graduation. Here is a  slide show to review the past semester and see some highlights of what I have done. Enjoy!

Semester In Review on Dipity.

Weekend Recap

Right Now	Next 36 Hours

	Today	Tonight	Tomorrow
Snow Shower	Snow Shower / Wind	Snow Shower / Wind	Snow Shower / Wind
19°F	21°	16°	21°
Feels Like: 5° Get FREE weather on your desktop	High	Low	High
Past 24-hr: Precip: 0.26 in (est.) Snow: 1.5 in (est.)	Chance of Snow: 80%	Chance of Snow: 80%	Chance of Snow: 90%
Wind: From WNW at 16mph gusting to 22mph	Wind: WNW at 21 mph	Wind: WNW at 22 mph	Wind: WNW at 22 mph

My weekend was consumed of hearing non-stop about the weather we were going to have Sunday, Monday, and Tuesday. Everywhere I looked I was hearing about the next snow craziness.  My roommates wanted to get ready for the snow so we spent most of the day shopping and getting our lives in order for the weather. Then we waited. We had bought movies and food to last days, and yet we still waited. My roommates prayed for a snow day, and we waited. I had my camera ready for all our snow adventures, and we waited. Around Sunday night at 8pm I realized we weren't waiting for anything at this point, it was just a joke mother nature was playing on us. I got up early this morning to find out there was snow, but hardly any. But yet all kinds of schools were closed! Not Point Park! http://postgazette.com/pg/10347/1110473-100.stm        Ohhh my life!!!! So above are some photographs of the snow I wish we had! If you have any great snow photographs feel free to post them here.

Weekend Events!

Weekend List!


Human Rights Day Celebration
Shadow Lounge & Ava Lounge
12/10/2010 5:30pm

Experience a night of social awareness, live music and drinks in order to celebrate the progress of human rights in the world, rather than mourning the abuses and negative aspects that are all too often focused upon.

Begun in 1950, Human Rights Day is an annual event at the United Nations recognizing the 1948 Universal Declaration Of Human Rights (UDHR), the first global enunciation of human rights.

This evening will also highlight the important work that local community organizations are doing to educate the Pittsburgh community and promote human rights around the world.

This event is orgnazied by Global Solutions Pittsburgh, an educational organization that envisions a future in which nations work together to abolish war, protect our rights and freedoms, and solve the problems facing humanity that no nation can solve alone. For more information, (412) 471-7852.

Old Fashion Christmas Evening
Merrick Art Gallery
12/10/2010 7pm

Celebrate the holidays with a terrific night of great food and sing-alongs in this museum, a former train station, rich with the details of Victorian and Edwardian eras including tin ceilings and period fixtures.

The evening will begin the Merrick's holiday season with a family style dinner. Guests will make ornaments and decorate the Main Gallery's Christmas tree. A Christmas sing-along will follow the tree decorating.

Tickets are $25 each. Proceeds benefit the Merrick Art Gallery, the only art museum located in rural Beaver County and features examples of romantic, realistic and impressionistic art by prominent American and European artists. For more information, call (724) 846-1130.

Yes, Virginia, There Is A Santa Claus Window Displays
Macy's (Downtown)
11/20/2010 through 1/7/2011

Inspired by the holiday TV special, the store's classic windows are decorated with scenes about a child's faith.

The 2009 TV special was a retelling of a popular Christmas story of an 1897 editorial in the New York Sun newspaper answering little Virginia O'Hanlon's question: is there a Santa Claus?

With sets and characters made entirely of paper cut both by hand and
laser, the fusion of artistry and technology come together to tell an
inspiring tale of the holiday season in six new magical window displays.

Holiday Carnival
Fifth Avenue Place
12/11/2010 11am

Children will enjoy a day at the carnival with balloon tricks and treats by Giggles The Clown.

Be delighted by magic tricks, and discover circus classics like face painting and magnificent mask making

Admission is free. For more information, call (412) 456-7800.

Blow Your Own Beautiful Glass Ornament
Gallery G Glass
12/11/2010 12pm

Students in this workship can make an original piece of art that will be a great keepsake or a special gift for others.

After choosing the color and pattern, participants will go into the studio and an artist to make their masterpieces.

Each ornament costs $25. For more information, call (412) 683-1700.

Let me know what you think, or feel free to comment about any of the events!

Photo Spotlight Ideas

Photo Spotlight Ideas

I just wanted to give out some ideas on how to capture a fun moment. 

• Keep your camera on you at all times
• Keep your camera on you at all times

• Keep your camera near your body for basically every second of the day.  

This is a great tip from my advisor Chris Rolinson. The man is right though, you never know when a prime photo opportunity might come up. 

Take this photograph above. My roommates and I were having a poker night, just a regular night that we usually have once a month. I never thought to take a photograph of it or let alone the table. But for some reason I had my camera and took this photograph. This photograph may mean nothing to you, but to me this explains the entire night. It tells the story of our poker night in a nut shell. I love this photograph and have it framed in my room. It is priceless cause I can have another poker night, but nothing will compare to that night.  

 Here is another example. I ended up going home one weekend and decided to take a photograph of my bedroom door for whatever reason. I didn't think to much of it and didn't for a while after. A couple of months later my mom decided to sell the house, it all happened so quick and I didn't have time to come home and pack my things. So my mom had to take care of packing up my bedroom. This was a project that I started when I was twelve, I would add little things all the time and it had many layers to it. It is something that I thought defined me and was a great way to enter my room. After the move though a lot of these things got lost, so now I at least have a photograph of it. I loved that door!

So tip is to always have your photograph. You never know what you will see that day. It is always a good idea to capture the moment as you see it and want to remember it. Feel free to post any tips or ideas you have!

Spotlight Photographer

Lynn Johnson

Lynn Johnson worked at the Pittsburgh Press for seven years and has moved on to an amazing photographer and has even had work published in National Geographic.  Below is her Bio from her website.

Photojournalist Lynn Johnson is known for her intense, sensitive work.
Dividing her time between assignments for National Geographic and various foundations, Johnson has traveled from Siberia to Zambia and photographed celebrities including Tiger Woods, Mikhail Baryshnikov, Mister Rogers and the entire Supreme Court. With her Leicas, she has climbed the radio antenna atop Chicago's Hancock Tower and dangled from helicopters in Antarctica. Yet her favorite assignments have been emotionally demanding stories about ordinary people; a family struggling with AIDS (Life), the death of an African-American coach in Amish country (Sports Illustrated), native Hawaiians who protect traditional ways (NG), the impact of zoonotic diseases around the world (NG).
Her vision is subtle. She invites the viewer to find the meaning in the frame. Her shooting style is equally low key allowing her subjects to reveal themselves to the camera. The photographs she strives for are compassionate. After 30 years of practicing photography, she sees her personal work moving from that of an observer to advocate.


She has done amazing work all over the world and I admire her for making her start here in pittsburgh. She has really proven herself and made a name for all her talents. 

Check out her website http://www.lynnjohnsonphoto.com
Especially her piece on Hawaii and Natural Medicine.  

Photography Bloggers

Here are my pick for the top Photography Bloggers out there.

I did a little research and have been following a couple of these for a while and came up with these contenders.

http://www.adidap.com/
All Day I Dream About Photography!
This site is pretty sweet, it may be a little overwhelming when you first get on but once explored it is full of amazing tips and photographs. This site also does a fun thing called "Flickr Round" its where it posts about 40 or more photographs and viewers can vote on there favorites.
This site also does some great tutorials on topics that are sometimes hard to understand.



http://www.photoinduced.com/
Photo Induced 
This website is awesome about promoting new photography gadgets. They also do a great weekly giveaway that is always something worth checking out.  I personally really enjoy the book reviews they do.

http://dslrblog.com/
Digital Photography 
This site is everything digital. It offers a broad range of how-to articles to photo reviews.This site hasn't been used lately but when looking back in the archives it is full of some really spectacular things. I highly recommend going in and exploring the back log of this site if for nothing else. 


http://www.boston.com/bigpicture/
 Boston. The Big Picture
I honestly spend half my day looking at all the images on this site. This site doesn't offer to much other then amazing photographs. It posts almost daily and usually has theme for the day. Each post has at least 30 or more photographs. I usually get lost in all the images. It is a great site for inspiration.





http://www.pdnphotooftheday.com/
PDN Photo of the Day. 

This site speaks for itself. It usually picks a photograph for the day and does a short post on it. This is just fun to see what image made the pick of the day.



These five sites are on the top of my list to check out. Let me know what you think or post some of your favorite sites.

History of Photography

This is an awesome quiz I made about the history of photograph. Let me know what you think!

http://www.quibblo.com/quiz/e0VGhIT/History-of-Photography