Configurations

I use a two monitor configuration when I am on my laptop at home. When I stay at my MIL's in Florida, I haven't got the second monitor. I'm debating the merit of taking it with me when I head south on Friday. My laptop and monitor will fit on the table that I have set up in the Florida room down there. But the house will be full of family, I won't have that much time to scrap and I'll haul it back up north before New Year's.

As much as I love my dual monitor set up, December is not the right time to haul it down to Florida.

Buy it or Style it?

Included in the bundled kits I've gotten recently are styles. I can put glitter on something, I can make it into a plastic item, I can make it felt textured or whatever. Since all I need to do is apply the style, I don't need to buy an element that is glittered, or plastic, or felt textured.

This is a concept to mull over. I'm sliding down that slippery slope to creating my own stuff. If I am not creating my own stuff, then at least, I'm not limiting myself to using the elements in kits as they arrive at my laptop. And that's good.

Is it Disaster Worthy?

I got the latest kit from Lori Davison and when I looked at the shadowed elements, I had to laugh. If the light is coming from the front, the shadow should not fall forward. And it isn't just one element with a shadow problem, there are several. Thank goodness Lori also provided non-shadowed versions, so I can add shadows that fall correctly. Unfortunately, I don't think Lori used a consistent light source for the entire kit. Mixing and matching elements is going to be a PITA. There are lamps and candles included in the kit. I'll have to put them in to provide light from a different source.

Fact. If the light is coming from the north, the shadow must fall to the south. It cannot fall to the west, nor can it fall to the south-east. It must fall in a straight line that is created from the light source to the object. Physics does not make exceptions.

I've noticed problems with Lori's kits before. In one, she had issues with perspective and the vanishing points didn't converge. What I saw was a room that had walls that didn't angle correctly. If I looked at it for too long, my eyes crossed.

Fact. There is only one vanishing point in any scene. If there is more than one vanishing point, the scene is a kluge of several mushed together. And in my lexicon, 'kluge' is not a good word.

I caught Lori's once a year sale. Once a year and it ran for two whole days. The kit with the shadow issues was not included in the sale. I paid full price for it.

Lori does not include any 'folder' images with her kits. Since I have set up Photoshop so I can search the folder images, I have to go to the Scrapbook Graphics website and download them separately. This is a significant annoyance. Lori does not name her files so they match the kit name and that is also an annoyance. I tag files with the kit name and can find them in Bridge. But I cannot find them by the file name.

Spelling Always Counts

Sneak. As in sneaking around, it is a subterfuge, a ploy, something hidden, not to be seen or noticed by everyone. Peek. As in take a peek, peek though the lens, peek a boo. Peek, as in looking at something briefly. Peak is the highest point of a mountain, the apex, the tallest part. Take a peek at Everest. Can you see the peak?

It is "sneak peek" and not "sneak peak."

Thank you, I don't care to tippy-toe my way to the top. I'd much rather get a glimpse that isn't for everyone.

I Yield

I'm packing up my studio to haul it South. It will stay either in storage, or in my MIL's house until we move. I'm hanging out at her place most of the time, anyway. Will I really have a studio? No. I'm hoping that I can prevail upon her to let me put up a table in her work space on the glassed in porch. With the cat litter boxes. Because it certainly won't fit in the bedroom we are using. I'm not talking about a full 8' folding table, I'm talking about my wooden camping table that's half that size.

It will be like going out for a crop that never ends. I'm thinking that a lot of my stuff will end up in Rubbermaid tubs that will stay in the back of my truck. There isn't storage space inside her house. I've been spoiled with my custom closets.

I've finally realized that I must mark boxes clearly with the contents. Especially since it may be many months before I see those boxes again. I will not remember what is in them. I'm not used to that, I'm used to packing things up and then unpacking them within a few days. I might not unpack these boxes until March.

The Nature of the Beast

A lady was complaining that PS7 was eating up her RAM. She said it was using up 'like 1.5 GB' and wanted to know what to do. She was considering downgrading to some other application. I answered her as politely as I could, saying that you can configure Photoshop to use less RAM, or a smaller percentage of your RAM, but then it would run more slowly. Mine is the only response she has gotten.

What she's done is the same as buying a car with a huge, powerful engine and then complaining because it isn't very fuel efficient, or getting a puppy and complaining that it needs to be fed and walked. There are some things that are the nature of the beast. Complaining about the negatives won't get me much sympathy. If I want to dance, I have to pay the band.

Trying to Hide

Can I just stay off the Internet until all this New Moon nonsense is over?

And will it ever really be over?