Trying my "Hand" at another challenge

Yesterday I decided to start the Webmaking 101 challenge. I got the first part of the challenge down by doing the "Introduce Yourself" step. When I finished that challenge I got two cool badges; the Beta Hero badge, and part of the WEB101 BASIC badge.

Getting these badges just motivated me even more and made me want to go directly on to my next challenge... I started straight away! It was a bit harder than introducing yourself but I have some background in HTML so it didn't take me too long!

The challenge was to write some basic code by hand, which i've done. I also went one step further and explained some of the tags in case anyone out there wanted to know what they meant. :)

This is my handwritten code experience. Excuse handwriting!

Webmaking 101?!

Usually I'm here talking about photography but today I thought I'd do something a bit different.

I've dabbled in a bit of HTML and CSS and, well a few other bits and bytes and languages here and there but don't really have anything to show for it. 

I've decided to have a little fun and take part of the webmaking 101challenge.
It's pretty awesome and backed by mozilla. Best thing, it's not too difficult so it's a really great place to start if you want to learn the basics, or need a good place to start! Even better... You get a nifty badge!
 

PHOTO PRINT SALE NOW ON!

New year, new developments.

It's 2010, well, two months in, but i'm sure I can be forgiven for that. Good ol' February, the usual time where people start forgetting about their resolutions, but no, not me! I've been so buried under a rock of work for the last few months, I haven't even had time to think about resolutions, which means none really started, so none broken. Well, that's my official excuse anyway.

I've been very busy lately though, taking photos, making new design-y things, watching movies, applying for jobs and even saving time to still socialize. What would I be without the people in my life violently vomiting compliments at me (excuse the grotesque metaphor, I've been on-again-off-again sick for two weeks now, so it resonates very soundly with me at the moment).



All very well, but why the huge "LOOK AT ME" banner type thing at the beginning of the post and above this paragraph? Well it was just a quick job I did last night. I had fun making it, and it was a nice breather from a very extensive personal project I'm working on at the moment.

Getting back into design, who would have thunk it eh? I'm actually really enjoying it. Schools / Colleges / Uni's should encourage their learners to do more personal work and stop overloading them with dull rubbish. To get back onto point though, I'm working on a few projects at the moment, one of them is the ritual of the morning cuppa Joe. Which in part sparked the Hello Handsome and Hello Gorgeous wallpapers; you see, for valentines day I bought myself and my fiance coffee cups. Not just any sort of coffee cup but ones that say "Morning Gorgeous" and the other that says "Morning Handsome" They are a lot of fun. Specially when people see us with them and call us "Laaaaaamme" which, honestly, we are, in the best way possible. Lame for each other? Something like that.

Here is a little sneak of what the cups look like

You can't really see them in all their glory but you can see how lovingly biased my cup is, as it's just a einy weiny bit bigger than my fiances. Aaah, proof that size really does matter.

Other projects I'm working on at the moment: -

* Blood Splatter / Crime Scene (very Dexter inspired, even though I started before I even watched any Dexter)
* Decay
* Life / Everday Life
* RAMfest (even though this is not a project per se, I'm very much looking forward to covering RAMfest.It's going to be a lot of fun specially now that we are going as a larger crowd!)
* I'm also trying to take a step back from my abstract comfort zone and get into shooting people (with my camera!) so I have two possible models interested.

Okay, well I have to shoot off, sorry about the rushed feeling to this, I'm late already! Late, late for a very important date!

TAAL MONUMENT

TAAL MONUMENT, originally uploaded by teapotqueen.

So none of my plans for this weekend went as planned, but such is the way of life. I'm not sure if life was trying to tell me to take it easy, but if it was, I was definitely not going to hear any of it.  So Friday was a complete bust but Saturday, my camera was itching to have a go at taking some photos. I drove out to Synergy Live festival as was planned but I didn't get very far. On my way back from Synergy Live I did however get to take a look at the Taal Monument. The Taal Monument signifies a lot of things, including the influences of different languages and cultures on the Afrikaans language, as well as political developments in South Africa, the influences are as follows:

•    A - the European heritage (English, Dutch, German, etc)
•    B - The Asian heritage (Malay and Malay-Portuguese)
•    C - Africa (The Khoi Languages, Xhosa, Zulu, Sotho
•    D (the bridge) - The bridge between the Languages
•    E - The rapid growth of the language (ascending)
•    F - The birth place of Afrikaans, South Africa.

I was astonished by the monument and how beautiful it was; with its feminine curves to its very masculine points and hard granite disposition. I had seen the monument once when I was younger, but I don’t think I was able to really appreciate it as I had on Saturday. It seems I am not the only one, who appreciated it though, in a photographic/cinematic sense that is. Many photographers have used the monument as a backdrop for many photos I even found a beautiful set of fashion/glamour shots that were taken there. The most surprising however was this shot that had taken from Starship Troopers 3.

If you happen to live in the Cape Town area the Taal Monument are holding a special Christmas picnic event where you get to see this beautiful piece of architectural mastery at night. I can assure you the view from up there is amazing, and can only imagine how much beautiful it must be at night with the cities lights glowing up at you. The event is being held on the 2 December, which means it is going to be a full moon and there will even be a chance for the kids to meet Santa. If you want to want to find out more you can visit the official Taal Monument website here (currently under upgrade at the moment) or join their Facebook Page here . I will have many photos up on my website shortly, so head over there in the next few days to take a look (should be up by tomorrow).

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Ghostly Fog

Ghostly Fog
Originally uploaded by ninresources

It's funny how you can go from not being to being very busy. Synergy Live Festival have gotten back to me about press, so I'll be shooting there this weekend, but not before I catch some cricket, take a few photos and get a tan tomorrow.

I am also working on a review site that my fiance and I have set up; it's basically a review site that reviews everything. It's mostly games at the moment because i've left him to it, but once i get more time i'll be making a lot more posts. The site can be found at (www.lifeinreview.co.za).

The image in this blog is from my Nine Inch Nails fan art page on flickr, I am a huge fan of Nine Inch Nails, not just their music, but their album art as well. It's very inspiration; all of it. Big props to Rob Sheridan.

anyway not much more I can think of at the moment, so why don't you leave a comment, i'm always looking for ideas, thoughts and even criticism.

It's been awfully hot here for the past few days which has been doing terrible things to my creativity/work methods. I did however take this photo of a bunch of grapes (at least that's what I think they are). Summer lighting is amazing, almost as much as winter frost and autumn colours.

Been watching a bit of Mad Men tonight and I must say, it can be a bit inspirational at times. The colours, the style and values.I'd love to do a similar sort of shoot.

Talking about shoot, not much else has changed development wise, so to fill my time I've been reading some  great blogs and subscribing to lots of inspirational feeds. When i have more free time I'll compile the list and post it on here.

In addition to what I posted yesterday I would love to try some black an white photography, or perhaps get a model in and take a few photos. I really have a huge lack of model photography in my portfolio, and I'd be lying if i said there wasn't any money in it; that's where all the money is, that and wedding photography.

I've been going through all my old photos and have so many to work on, editing and improvement wise. I am also working on a few travel photos which i didn't take, just retouching them. I think I almost enjoy retouching as much as i do taking the initial picture.

Take a look at my site, and let me know what you think. I am always open to suggestions and looking for ways to improve. Looking forward to that new PC, it's quite tough to wait for the text to stop so i can start typing again.

it's been awhile since I have written anything on this blog, infact, I don't think I have ever really written anything (myself) on this blog, beside the U2 lyrics awhile back. Well, never-mind that. Now's a good a time as any to start.

My website is finally up, in all it's completion, even the about section which was lovingly written by my sister (thanks Tams!). I am glad to have that out of my way. I still need to figure out how to create some sort of portfolio and link it to my site, and visa versa.

Otherwise, I don't really have any projects lined up at the moment. I may be covering Synergy live next weekend, and I should start working on my concept for an album of a friends.

Editing wise, I need to go through a few photos and put them on my site, I can't believe I don't have any Rocking the Daisies photos up on my website and I took photos of two bands (feedback and Coda) last month that I still need to edit and put up.

Other than that there have been no new developments, but follow me, as I am sure things are going to start getting far more interesting, as I am upgrading my PC which means I can do more work faster.

Also, if you are looking for my website it's up at www.charperphotography.com or if you are looking for up to date reviews of games and things in between check life in review at www.lifeinreview.co.za

And as always drop me a comment or criticism if you are that way inclined. P.S anybody know how if i can remove the Ads from below every post I make, it is really rather annoying.

distanced

distanced, originally uploaded by teapotqueen.

It used to be my job to take photos of buildings for a big
construction company. I think architectural photography,
specially, if you are having to focus on the good points of
the building, instead of the broken windows, and rust
is rather difficult.

I am still trying to find my niche though, hopefully this
journey won't be a long one.