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<title>Art and the Zen of Design</title>
<link>http://www.artzen2.com</link>
<description>Build complex toys and simple tools</description>
<language>en-us</language>
<pubDate>Sat, 12 May 2012 10:14:36 EST</pubDate>
<docs>http://blogs.law.harvard.edu/tech/rss</docs>
<managingEditor>Tony Karp tkarp@techno-impressionist.com</managingEditor>
<webMaster>Tony Karp tkarp@techno-impressionist.com</webMaster>
<category>Art, Photography</category>
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<title>May 07, 2012 - An evening with Gene Kelly</title>
<link>http://www.artzen2.com/artzen2-0210.htm</link>
<description><![CDATA[In the summer of 1959, I got an assignment from NBC to do all the still photography for the TV shows of the fall season. I flew to Los Angeles in July and stayed there for about four months, on my own. I'd photographed a few NBC shows in New York, so I knew my way around a TV studio. ]]></description>
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<title>Apr 28, 2012 - A portrait of Donna Mitchell - Variations on a theme</title>
<link>http://www.artzen2.com/artzen2-0209.htm</link>
<description><![CDATA[The year was 1962. I was a young photographer, sharing a studio on West 23rd Street in New York City. I had already done a lot of location shooting for NBC, but the whole studio thing was new to me. Fortunately, there were a lot of aspiring models, willing to post for free, in exchange for photographs.]]></description>
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<title>Apr 01, 2012 - The "Sky Dream Ultimate" plug-in from Wilkington-Smythe</title>
<link>http://www.artzen2.com/artzen2-0207.htm</link>
<description><![CDATA[Digital photography has brought many advances, both through the use of digital camera hardware, but especially through the ability of software to extend the vision of photographers into new realms. The advances seem to come faster and faster. Take, for instance, the new IPad 4's 360 degree 3D display, or the Flytro "wavefront' camera that lets you compose the picture after the picture has been taken.]]></description>
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<title>Mar 30, 2012 - There's a 3D object on this page and why you can't see it</title>
<link>http://www.artzen2.com/artzen2-0206.htm</link>
<description><![CDATA[It appears you don't have Adobe Reader for this browser.You can click here to download the PDF file.]]></description>
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<title>Mar 06, 2012 - Post-processing: Going from good to great</title>
<link>http://www.artzen2.com/artzen2-0205.htm</link>
<description><![CDATA[As I've said before, it's rare that a picture emerges perfect from the camera. Think of a picture straight from the camera as a cake, and post-processing  -- working on a digital image in a photo editing program -- as putting on the frosting.  Even the freeware photo editing programs have most of the basic tools you'll need to get started.]]></description>
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<title>Feb 21, 2012 - Winter pictures from my Panasonic DMC-FZ150</title>
<link>http://www.artzen2.com/artzen2-0204.htm</link>
<description><![CDATA[Never buy a new camera in the winter. Your shutter finger is itching, but there isn't much to photograph. It's dark most of the time. The sun is always at a bad angle. There's no color. The landscape is dull. No flowers. And, to make things worse, it's cold. I hate the cold.]]></description>
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<title>Feb 17, 2012 - Using the Panasonic DMC-FZ150's "Photo Style" Menu</title>
<link>http://www.artzen2.com/artzen2-0202.htm</link>
<description><![CDATA["why do it simply, when you can make it wondrous and complicated?"- A design philosophy that leads to things that do not end well.]]></description>
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<title>Feb 14, 2012 - A valentine for the Artist's Muse</title>
<link>http://www.artzen2.com/artzen2-0203.htm</link>
<description><![CDATA[ ]]></description>
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<title>Feb 10, 2012 - The Panasonic DMC-FZ150's controls</title>
<link>http://www.artzen2.com/artzen2-0200.htm</link>
<description><![CDATA[This will be about the controls and other external features of the Panasonic DMC-FZ150. I'll start with the bad news. The FZ18 was the first of this intermediate series. It had a nice big electronic viewfinder (EVF), With the next model, the FZ28, they shrunk the viewfinder from about 1/2 inch to less than 1/4 inch. All of the models since then have had the same crummy viewfinder. Tiny. To make it look the same, they had to increase the magnification of the EVF by at least twice. The result looks great on paper, but it makes the viewfinder hard to use, especially if you're wearing glasses. That said, you do eventually get used to it, but it's not something that Panasonic can brag about.]]></description>
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<title>Jan 30, 2012 - Some thoughts on the Panasonic DMC-FZ150 - Part 2</title>
<link>http://www.artzen2.com/artzen2-0199.htm</link>
<description><![CDATA[I've been writing about how good the Panasonic DMC-FZ150's images are straight from the camera. They're also great if you're an artist and the out-of-the-camera images are just the starting point. Some cameras produce images that take well to this sort of fooling around and some produce images that just sort of crumble when you try to make something interesting of them. ]]></description>
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<title>Jan 21, 2012 - The Panasonic DMC-FZ150 - A cure for DSLR envy?</title>
<link>http://www.artzen2.com/artzen2-0198.htm</link>
<description><![CDATA[Let's face it -- real photographers use DSLRs. They're big and beautiful, fast operating, produce high quality images, have bright groundglass finders and oooh, interchangeable lenses. Just the thought of it makes me drool. I could have one of these sexy beasts if I really wanted one, but I've chosen small cameras like the DMC-FZ150 instead. What's up with that?]]></description>
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<title>Jan 18, 2012 - Some thoughts about my Panasonic DMC-FZ150 - Part 1</title>
<link>http://www.artzen2.com/artzen2-0197.htm</link>
<description><![CDATA[Just a note before we begin. I'm an artist, not a photographer. I will work on a picture, post processing it, until I'm happy with the image. It may not be 100% accurate from a photographic standpoint, but my goal is producing art, not photographs. That said, I still want a camera that will produce images that help me in achieving this goal. The Panasonic DMC-FZ150 is a terrific camera, and it comes the closest to my requirements of any camera I've ever owned.]]></description>
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<title>Jan 08, 2012 - The Panasonic DMC-FZ150 -- Best camera ever?</title>
<link>http://www.artzen2.com/artzen2-0196.htm</link>
<description><![CDATA[The new Panasonic DMC-FZ150 is my fifth camera from Panasonic's FZ series and, by any measure, the best one so far. I started with the petite FZ5, then the supersharp FZ18, followed by the so-so FZ28, and finally by the go-anywhere, shoot-anything FZ35. Up till now, the FZ18 still produced the best images, but it was fussy about getting the exposure, contrast, and white balance exactly right. The FZ35 was much more forgiving about the shooting conditions, but wasn't as sharp as the FZ18. What I needed was a camera that combined the best features of both.]]></description>
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<title>Jan 03, 2012 - Sunglasses - What can you add to a picture?</title>
<link>http://www.artzen2.com/artzen2-0195.htm</link>
<description><![CDATA[Sunglasses. Seems like a fairly ordinary subject. I was sitting on our porch, and I took off my sunglasses and put them down on the table. They threw an interesting shadow. Not a real shadow, since you could see through the glass, and they only gave sort of a half shadow. In addition, the sun was directly due west of our house, and the shadows lined up with the times on our table. The original shots were promising, but lacked magic. So I worked on them to add the feeling for the heat and light of the summer sun. ]]></description>
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<title>Dec 29, 2011 - Hey, camera makers. If my smartphone can do this…</title>
<link>http://www.artzen2.com/artzen2-0194.htm</link>
<description><![CDATA[I've always had trouble holding my camera level. No matter how hard I try, my pictures always end up with a slight tilt. This is especially apparent when I shoot panoramas - they always end up skewed one way or another, or with actual sawtooth edges.]]></description>
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<title>Dec 12, 2011 - The Artmuse Variations - a look inside my new book</title>
<link>http://www.artzen2.com/artzen2-0193.htm</link>
<description><![CDATA[This book is a voyage of discovery,]]></description>
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<title>Nov 11, 2011 - A tribute to George Washington on Veterans Day</title>
<link>http://www.artzen2.com/artzen2-0192.htm</link>
<description><![CDATA[Well, it's Veterans Day, and I'm a veteran so I thought I'd do a tribute to George Washington. After all, he was our first veteran. "First in war, first in peace, etc." And besides, today's date is 11/11/11, so why not?]]></description>
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<title>Nov 08, 2011 - A visit to the White House</title>
<link>http://www.artzen2.com/artzen2-0190.htm</link>
<description><![CDATA[A few months ago, The Artist's Muse and I were invited to a reception at the White House. This is different from the regular White House tour where they hustle you through and you can't take pictures. This reception would last over two hours, you could bring a camera, and be free to wander around the first two floors of the White House. There would be food and drink, entertainment, and a speech by President Obama.]]></description>
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<title>Oct 24, 2011 - The little farmhouse, the tractor, and the interesting tree</title>
<link>http://www.artzen2.com/artzen2-0189.htm</link>
<description><![CDATA[There are many beautiful things to photograph here in the wilds of Northern Virginia. Most of the pictures I shoot now are of things within walking distance of our house. But there are some scenes that draw you back again and again as they change with the different light and the different seasons.]]></description>
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<title>Sep 27, 2011 - Buckminster, the baby buckeye butterfly</title>
<link>http://www.artzen2.com/artzen2-0188.htm</link>
<description><![CDATA[For the past three years, we've stocked our garden with plants that butterflies love. For instance, monarch butterflies prefer a specific type of milkweed in which to lay their eggs. The monarch caterpillars feed on the leaves of this plant on their way to becoming butterflies. The first two years, we got monarch butterfly babies, but this year nothing. Maybe it was the summer drought, but we only saw a handful of butterflies the whole summer.]]></description>
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<title>Sep 11, 2011 - Memories of September 11</title>
<link>http://www.artzen2.com/artzen2-0187.htm</link>
<description><![CDATA[We were still living in New York City on September 11, 2001. I was at home in Queens, working on a project, and the artist's muse was in Manhattan where she was consulting for a large conglomerate. At around 9 in the morning, she called me to say that there was a report that a plane had collided with the World Trade Center. Shortly thereafter, the second tower was hit. I left the house and walked a few blocks to where there was a clear view of the city. I could see the towers on fire.]]></description>
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<title>Sep 05, 2011 - Happy Corporation Day!</title>
<link>http://www.artzen2.com/artzen2-0186.htm</link>
<description><![CDATA[What's that, you say? It's really Labor Day? How 20th century of you. Now that the Supreme Court has declared that corporations have the same rights as people, and one of the 2012 presidential candidates has claimed that corporations are people, too, things have changed in America. Welcome to the 21st century, where corporations are more important than people.]]></description>
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<title>Aug 20, 2011 - A trip to Monterey and San Francisco</title>
<link>http://www.artzen2.com/artzen2-0185.htm</link>
<description><![CDATA[Way back in May 2001, when you could still just hop on an airplane without getting X-rayed or groped, the Hobbitt and I took a trip to Monterey and San Francisco. Monterey is beautiful and San Francisco is interesting. Together, they made for a very interesting trip. ]]></description>
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<title>Jul 21, 2011 - The first battle of the American Civil War -- 150 years ago</title>
<link>http://www.artzen2.com/artzen2-0183.htm</link>
<description><![CDATA[One hundred and fifty years ago, on July 21, 1861, the American Civil War began with the Battle of Bull Run, also know as the Battle of First Manassas. It should have been an easy victory for the Union troops, but it turned into a rout instead. Folks from Washington DC, who came to watch the battle while picnicking, as if it were an afternoon's entertainment, ended up running for their lives when the battle expanded. Casualties were relatively light, but were much higher in the second battle of Manassas which took place a year later.]]></description>
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