I CAME TO DANCE!

Part of the on going Cityshoots series at Le Petit Déjeuner, I CAME TO DANCE! is a collection of photos taken at various House parties in Toronto over the last year from venues like 99 Sudbury, Sunnyside Pavilion, The Rivoli, and West.

I'm inviting you all to come and check out my work over the next six weeks. Sign the guest book (if I have it ready in time), and spend a little cash while you're there. LPD has a good brunch, and great artwork up for sale (wink, nudge).

Le Petit Dejeuner
191 King Street East

for more information visit:
www.down.ca
www.petitdejeuner.ca

Dear Friends,

The second annual "Picture the Cure" is underway and we'd like to invite you to be a part of this special event to raise funds for the Canadian Cancer Society.

First and foremost, you are cordially invited:

Picture the Cure 2006
August 21 (Monday)
6pm-midnight
The Gladstone Hotel
1214 Queen Street West

Advance tickets: $10
At the door: $15

Our goal for this year is to raise at least $5,000 for the Canadian Cancer Society who, along with the Terry Fox Foundation, is the primary source of funding for the National Cancer Institute of Canada. The Canadian Cancer Society:

* funds research on all types of cancer
* offers comprehensive and credible information on cancer, risk reduction and treatment
* provides support for people living with cancer, family members and friends

We have the support of the Ontario branch, and have their endorsement to include their logo and name to promote the event.

Our plan for August 21:

300 attendees
100+ matted and framed prints on display for silent auction with artist information
live entertainment
door prizes/raffles
light fare

How you can help:

1. Photography/digital imagery/painting

You can enter up to three pictures to the auction gallery, but once your submission is accepted, there will be an entry fee of 35$ CAD per photograph to cover the printing/framing costs (lower price for smaller pictures, minimum $20 CAD). You will be provided with a ftp account to upload your full resolution picture to a secure server. This picture will also be featured on the "Picture the Cure" website (in the works), along with your biography and link to your personal website.

There will be no other hidden fees required from you. The reason I am asking for a participation fee is because all prints will be handled at once and printing/framing costs are much more affordable this way. The goal is to donate as much money as possible to the foundation and we can only achieve this by minimizing expenses.

The costs for printing, matting, and framing for photography/digital imagery are as follows:

12x18, 12x12 - $35
8x12, 8x10 - $30
5x7 - $20

Please note the above prices are at cost. If you wish to provide the print, contact us for adjusted prices. We'll need ALL SUBMISSIONS by the end of June so they are ready in time.

2. Sponsorship

We are also still searching for sponsors for the following:

- catering
- live entertainment
- items for raffle (autographed merchandise, books, certificates, spa vouchers, or the like -- Botox injections? subscriptions to "Martha Stewart Living"?)

If you've got friends who do catering, are in the entertainment biz, or have any goods or services we can promote the hell out of on August 21 in the name of charity, send them our way!

3. Volunteers

If you would like to lend your assistance at the Gladstone, we will be only too glad to delegate. Please let us know.

Last but not least, thank you in advance for all your help -- we greatly appreciate it.

Your devoted organizers,
Irina and Gail

TIME IN SPACE

Featuring the first official
photographic exhibit of

Pramesh Attwala

Opening Reception
Wednesday, May 10, 2006
7:00 - 9:00 pm

M-ONE-11
561 Queen Street West

for more information visit:
www.contactphoto.com
www.mone11.ca
www.down.ca

The new version of photoblogs.org has recently gone live.

The new system works on a bookmarking and tagging framework as opposed to the previous Favorites framework. Using your photoblogs.org account, you will able to bookmark all the photoblog sites you like to visit as well as add descriptive commentary and keyword tags for each bookmark. Very web 2.0.

Make sure you Tag any Toronto sites with a "Toronto" tag, it already seems to be one of the more popular tags on the new system.

Hi all,

Just wanted to share some news about exciting blog related initiatives happening at the AGO.

I've been working with the gallery to start embracing the blogging community in the city as media. As a first initiative, a group of bloggers - photo, video, podcast & others - will be reporting from the opening launch of the Frank Gehry exhibit next Tuesday. The group will have almost total access and I'm hoping some wonderfully creative work will be produced.

There's some more info here: http://singer.to/2006/02/09/blogging-at-the-ago/

As well, you may want check out the AGO blog: http://www.artmatters.ca/

Cheers!

Eli Singer
http://www.singer.to

Have some time to spare?

Check out the chat.photoblogs.org


The chatroom has been up for just over a month now and is always filled with plenty of photobloggers from around the globe. Also, there is usually a local lurking around, actually several.

For those of you who are familiar with IRC, you can also access this via Freenode channel #photoblogs.org.

Expressions 3.0 has launched. If you are looking for a quick and easy way to start a photoblog, Expressions would definitely be one of my suggestions to you. Tags and scheduled entries are among the many new features in this release. And as always, you can try Expressions out for free for 30 days.

Awesome work Lorissa.

The weekly photo meme has recently revamped and taken on a new i-dentity. The new site is now called Pxite (pronounced 'pics site'). This weeks contest is Summer

Check out the new and improved Photojunkie if you haven't already done so. It is now "a blog, photoblog and online zine" and well worth a look. Rannie is the founder of the Toronto Area Photoblogs site, as well as the GTAbloggers, and a great photographer.

More than just photos, Rannie also has a 'Spotlight' section (currently an interview with Antony Hare), and interesting blog entries about photography, Toronto, and photography in Toronto.

Its great to have Photojunkie back, Rannie!

A few days ago I discovered a new app for Flickr users that creates online flickralbums using your flickr tags and photo streams. It's an awesome app that give your photos an air of professionality. [ie My lubitel album]

Well today I discovered that soon, Flickr will be rolling out a print on demand service which will include individual prints, as well as photobooks. There is no set date for this new feature, but it is definitely coming in the near future. If everyone else can be published, why not you! And soon you will be able to.

Apparently in the US, many photo labs are turning away customers because their shots look "professional". The article talks about how the wave of digital photography has raised the bar in the quality of photography coming into local photos labs causing concern in the lab that the images are possibly infringing on copyright. I suppose it is both annoying and flattering to be told that your images look too professional, so we can't print them. The labs are covering their own interests, which is understandable. What I want to know is, if your pictures are THIS GOOD, why bother having them printed at a Walmart or Walgreens? If it's worth printing, why not take your images to a pro or semi pro lab to get prints done?

From the creative folks, members of Flickr and the "Squared Circle" group, a beautiful giant peach made of ... squared circles, that's right. Clicking on each square will bring up the full size version. Now that's what I call interactive programming!

There's a great interview with our own Rannie over at the Torontoist. Check it out!

Spacing and the Toronto Free Gallery are excited to present PUBLICity, a five-week photo exhibit examining Toronto's urban landscape and public spaces as captured by the city's top photobloggers. By gathering together these highly-regarded multimedia artists, PUBLICity will showcase the variety of life that arises from our unique city.

Please join us Thursday March 17 (7-10pm) as we launch this exicting show featuring the work of Sam Javanrouh, Matt O'Sullivan, Rannie Turingan, Davin Risk, Gayla Trail, Jonathan Day-Reiner, and Adam Krawesky. Their images have graced the pages of Spacing, or your computer screen, but now you have the chance to examine their beautiful photographs up close.

PUBLICity
March 16th to April 23rd, 2005
660 Queen Street East.
(Just West of Broadview)

Opening Reception
Thursday, March 17th, 2005
7-10 pm.

Nominations are open for the photobloggies. Let us know who your favorite photobloggers are in 25 different categories. Nominations are open till March 16th. Spread the word.

Most of you might know already, but photoblogs.org is in trouble. See how you can help Brandon to continue his fantastic portal and source of inspiration.

It's been brought to my attention that Robert McClelland of My Blahg is running the 2004 Canadian Blog Awards this year. Nominations are now open until December 31st in 8 categories.

1)Best Blog
2) Best Liberal Blog
3) Best Conservative Blog
4) Best Group Blog
5) Most Humourous Blog
6) Best Non-Political Blog
7) Best New Blog (started in 2004)
8) Best Blog Design

Voting will begin January 1, 2005 and will close January 15, 2004.

Thanks to James Bow for putting in a nominating for my site and for the gtabloggers.com site. I'm really flattered with what James wrote. And I have to agree with James, I think there could have been a couple more categories especially on the artsy side of blogging.

There are definitely enough contenders that Best Photoblog, Best Music Blog and maybe even best Topical blog could have easily been added to the list. This is definitely more focused within the political blogging circles, but the awards is open to all Canadians.

So I'm urging everyone, put in a nomination for your favorites. Hopefully that will include either gtabloggers or Toronto Area Photobloggers in the Best Group category.

Currently there's a general blogs award site running, which includes a category for photoblogs. I was nominated but haven't mentioned it on my site because I'm not into awards like this and there are other photoblogs that deserve to be on the list, plus the whole 'vote once a day' thing just seemed to be a way to drive traffic.

Now it's come to my attention that the site is actually run by a right wing group, home site www.wizbangblog.com, and the awards site is awash with ads for bush merchandise. While I think it's ok for a right wing group to have an awards site I just don't want to be associated with it, but they are not accepting anymore requests for removals in any category. I assume because a lot of people have seen the site's provenance and want to be removed.

Just a heads up, I know Jon from groundglass is also on the list.

The newest issue of Spacing Magazine is coming out at the end of the week. Thursday night is the release party, which will feature visuals by Toronto's Top Photobloggers. Here are the details.

Spacing issue 3 release party
Thursday December 9 2004

El Mocambo 464 Spadina (@ College + Spadina)
doors open at 9pm
$10 cover - gets you copy of new issue
$5 if you are a subscriber

musical guests:
Reid Jamieson
Audible

Spacing's third issue, Work and Play in Public Space, hits the streets this Thursday. You can find it in independent book and magazine stores starting Friday Dec. 10. For a list of stores in Toronto visit: http://www.spacing.ca/stores.htm

You will also be able to pick up a subscription at the party. We offer a 6-issue subscription for $25, and a 3-issue sub for $15. The holidays are upon us and a subscription to Spacing is a perfect gift for all your friends who claim to be urban explorers and enthusiasts.

We are also offering up new Toronto subway station buttons! You will be able to buy a button of almost every subway station. We will also be offering a set of each subway line (Danforth, Bloor, Yonge, University-Spadina). These little beauties will make a perfect stocking stuffer. Check out some of the buttons here: http://www.spacing.ca/buttons.htm

UPDATE : The Spacing Magazine Photoblog is now up and running and well be featuring work from various Toronto Photobblogers through the month of December.

I'd like to start off by saying that I think Six Apart, the makers of Movable Type and Typepad should go ahead and create a photo only version of your popular Movable Type software. They can call it Movable Pixels. It would be a product very much like MT which would be specifically geared towards photo publishing and would work without any plugin additions "directly out of the box." I would definitely buy into that. Unfortunately, Anil suggested to me over the summer, that the best they could offer would be to create a download version of MT with various photoblog friendly plugins bundled in together thus cutting down on searching. Close, but no cigar.

-----------------

Last week, Monday, Anil created a post outlining a few tutorials and such that you can use to help you improve your MT experience with your photo heavy site.

Here is a quick list of links from the article.

Movable Type Flickr Photosets

MTPhotogallery

Tutorial by Nicholas Findley

Tutorial by Elise Bauer

MT wiki : Photoblog Tutorials

FotoNotes

A couple of years ago, I used Elise's method to create photo galleries, which basically suggests having a separte blog for your gallery. It's an interesting option, but is flawed if you are limited by the number of new blogs you can create with MT's new licencing with 3.0<.

My thumbnails tutorial was strangely left off the list, but I won't hold that against Anil. (NOTE: as I will probably be taking photojunkie.org offline in the near future, I may go ahead and republish some of the more useful posts here so they can still be googled and found in the future).

(original link via Dan)

This week on CBC Radio3 Davin Risk's photos are featured on CBC Radio 3's website. His group of photos are of "Indirect Objects"

Davin Risk is always on the hunt for traces of the past exposed in the present. His photos may look devoid of life, but it's there like a footprint left behind in the snow.

Click on the plus sign at the top right corner of their page to advance.
Congrats Davin.

I'm a little late on this news, but better late than never. 10 days ago, (so not the current issue, but the one previous) Matt O'Sullivan's photos were featured on CBC Radio 3's website. His group of photos are of "The Neutral God"

Matt O'Sullivan photographs people in his neighbourhood. A Favorite subject of his are men he sees taking a break from work or stopping to consider their next move.

Click on the plus sign at the top right corner of their page to advance.
Congrats Matt

The editorial team of Spacing is pleased to announce that our third issue, the Work and Play In Public Space issue, will hit newsstands on Friday Dec. 10th.

Issue 3 cover section features articles on: early morning bird rescuers; Chinatwon street vendors; the un-wired worker; street youth; street hockey; the city as a playground; outdoor theatre; subway parties; and what it's like to be a graffiti cop. Contributors for this issue include Ryan Bigge (CBC Radio), Ed Keenan (Eye weekly), Michelle Kasprzak (Montreal new media artist), Misha Glouberman (Trampoline Hall), Shawn Micallef (murmur), and Graeme Parry (Toronto laneway expert and tour guide). A variety of Toronto's top photobloggers also contributed: Sam Javanrouh (Daily Does of Imagery), Matt O'Sullivan (thenarrative.net), Rannie Turingan (photojunkie.ca), Jonathon Day-Reiner (groundglass.ca), and Davin Risk (lowresolution.com). Spacing also used the illustrative skills of Julia Breckenreid (Globe and Mail, National Post), Marc Ngui (Zak Meadow, and CBC's Zed TV host), Marlena Zuber (Boston Globe, Washington Post), and Jen Hsieh (recent Applied Arts illustration award winner). The issue was designed and art
directed by Matthew Blackett (m@b comic, Eye weekly).

- - - - - - - - - - - - -

Release Party!

When: Thursday December 9th, 2004
Where: El Mocambo (462 Spadina Ave. and Spadina and College)
How much: $10 cover, which includes a copy of new issue
As usual, Spacing will throw a big bash to launch our new issue on Thursday Dec. 9th, at Toronto's legendary El Mocambo. Show up anytime after 9pm. Musical guests are Reid Jamieson and Friends, and Audible. Also performing will be Dylan Studebaker, a punk rock street magician. We will be projecting large images captured by Spacing photographers. You can also win a subscription to Spacing by entering our raffle that night.

Lastly, if you are a subscriber, you will be placed on a list that allows you to enter the club for only $5. See -- we said you were special and we backed it up.

Today Weblogs, Inc. , the largest publisher of professional blogs, announced the launch of their 58th and 59th Weblogs—“The CSS Weblog” with James Jackson and “The Unofficial Photoshop Weblog” with Glenn Hauman.

Weblogs, Inc. also publishes The Digital Photography weblog which started in September 2004.

I have passion, maybe someone can hire me to write a weblog for a living.

I dropped off some film at Pikto yesterday and found out that they are having their Free Hi-Res CD promotion again. Basically, with any roll process and printed at Pikto this month, you will receive your pictures scanned for free.

What is hot in the news right now, this hour? And how can a view that pictorally in 100 images or less?

Check out 10x10, it defines the times in pictures and words.

10x10™ ('ten by ten') is an interactive exploration of the words and pictures that define the time. The result is an often moving, sometimes shocking, occasionally frivolous, but always fitting snapshot of our world. Every hour, 10x10 collects the 100 words and pictures that matter most on a global scale, and presents them as a single image, taken to encapsulate that moment in time. Over the course of days, months, and years, 10x10 leaves a trail of these hourly statements which, stitched together side by side, form a continuous patchwork tapestry of human life.

10x10 is ever-changing, ever-growing, quietly observing the ways in which we live. It records our wars and crises, our triumphs and tragedies, our mistakes and milestones. When we make history, or at least the headlines, 10x10 takes note and remembers.

Each hour is presented as a picture postcard window, composed of 100 different frames, each of which holds the image of a single moment in time. Clicking on a single frame allows us to peer a bit deeper into the story that lies behind the image. In this way, we can dart in and out of the news, understanding both the individual stories and the ways in which they relate to each other.

(link via Christie)

There are a lot of blogging packages out on the market now. It seems that everyone is jumping on the bandwagon and creating blogging tool software. The problem with most blogging packages is that they are more geared towards text bloggers and not necessarily photobloggers. The big boys, like Blogger, Wordpress and Six Apart (MT and typepad) are more interested in jamming their products full of features geared towards the largest audience possible.

I've always had a wishlist for the perfect photoblogging content management system, unfortunately I don't know how to code. And most of the people that I know who do code are more in the business of creating software that is more generalized. I can't say that I am unhappy with MT (the software that I am using) but a lot of work went into adding plugins and other tweaks to get the site to do my bidding.

There are three main things I want to see in software.
a) easy to use and install (we are photographers, not necessarily coders)
b) fully functional out of the box (see above, people don't want to do half a dozen installs)
c) a package that is geared specifically with photoblogging in mind.

Anyway, a month ago PixelPost launched their photoblogging software to the masses. Upon initial review it looks like a very promising program. Here is what PixelPost has to say about themselves.

A small photoblog application that's extremely easy to set up and use - this is truly for anyone wishing regularly to post their photos on the web like a blog.

It is very heavily geared towards photobloggers and comes with a set of features that caters to photobloggers needs.

There are a plethora of software for the literary minded out there, far fewer for the visual person who want to set up a photoblog. Pixelpost is wholly and fully geared towards photoblogging. If you want to write, this is not for you. If you want to shoot, then this is something to have a look at.

It's definitely a move in the right direction. Hopefully I'll have a chance to check this out in more depth in the near future.

(link via Ryan Waddell who recently relaunched his photoblog Antifoto using PixelPost.)

In the on-going saga of imagery vs. generic photos, "dr. judge" posted his reasoning behind starting his parody of Sam's site.

I have to admit, I agree on some of his points, but I don't know if I would have went through the trouble of creating a whole mock site just to prove a point.

Check it out and decide for yourself.

The CBC really love us photobloggers. The latest issue of the CBC Radio 3 web magazine (Vol. 3, Issue 8, Oct 29 2004) features photos from Kendall's Abandoned Building Galleries. When you've launched the magazine, use the upper-right corner to navigate (or the table of contents on the left).

Congrats Kendall

Back in March, CBC Radio 3 showcased several Canadian Photobloggers in a piece called Point, Shoot and Post : Photoblogs Chronicle the Everyday. This week CBC Radio 3 has featured a collection of Sam's long exposure and panning photos which in their words; "capture the rapid pace of urban life" in their current issue. Click on the plus sign at the top right corner of their page to advance.

Congrats Sam