2009 is International Year of Astronomy: Local Notes

2009 is the International Year of Astronomy, so here's two Seattle-related bits of cosmic news to start off the month of Galileo's birthday:

• Mt. Rainier made an appearance in NASA's Astronomy Picture of the Day yesterday


• On February 15th, the Museum of Flight will unveil two new large-sized prints of multi-wavelength images of the spiral galaxy Messier.

Astronomy Picture of the Day is an unadorned site of gorgeous photos accompanied by explanations in plain English. The photo above is of lenticular clouds near Mt. Rainier, taken in December 2008. Browse the APOD archive for more amazing pics. I particularly like this one: The Milky Way Over Mauna Kea. Wow.

The two new prints at the Museum of Flight combine images from NASA's Great Observatories: the Hubble Space Telescope, Spitzer Space Telescope, and Chandra X-Ray Observatory. The prints are provided by NASA as part of NASA's participation in International Year of Astronomy. One print displays the combined Hubble-Spitzer-Chandra images. A second print is a triptych that displays the three high-resolution images from Hubble, Spitzer, and Chandra side by side and with description captions below. The Museum of Flight is one of 100 organizations across the country to recieve two new prints from NASA. More info on the Museum of Flight's Happy Birthday Galileo! and print unveiling event to be held on February 16th.

Dear Santa: are you lactose and tolerant?

Dear Santa: are you lactose and tolerant?
Originally uploaded by smastrong

The note my niece left for Santa.
"The cookies are on the dining room table...
p.s. Are you lactose and tolerant?"
Adorable!
photo by my sis: Suzanne Strong Photography.

Check out her online portfolio and pencil in the Feb 5th First Thursday opening at 619 Western, where she'll be in a group show.

Seattle Celebrates and Obama Flickrs

What happened one night in my neighborhood.



I am thrilled to learn Barack Obama has a Flickr photostream.
I love that he is so tuned in to modern communication channels.
A president for our generation.

My current fav in the Election Night set -- so candid, so unguarded:

Band Smoosh likes this picture

I forgot to mention Asy of Smoosh contacted me a few weeks ago to arrange use of a few of my pictures from one of their live performances. The following is currently Smoosh's MySpace profile pic.



Smoosh is a sister-duo who started writing songs and performing in their 'tween years -- a mere 5 years ago. Asy and Chloe acheived enough noteriety in their first year to open for the likes of Cat Power, Sleater-Kinney, Jimmy Eat World, Death Cab for Cutie and even Pearl Jam by the end of 2004. [#] At first a novelty, the young ladies have matured their song-writing and performing skills to grow a solid fanbase which reaches well beyond their own demographic group.

This picture is from a Smoosh performance at the Head Like a Kite CD release party this summer. Speaking of HLAK, you really MUST check this group out. Asy co-wrote and sings the track "Daydream Vacation" on HLAK's 2008 release There is Loud Laughter Everywhere. Stream that tune on HLAK's MySpace page, and while you're there check out one of my favs from HLAK's release, "We Were So Entangled." Dave Einmo sings into an analog phone on this one. Rad.

hanging out

hanging
Originally uploaded by JeanineAnderson

I had originally intented to shoot some graff Sunday evening in Sodo. However, upon revisiting in daylight hours the site I saw in darkness, it wasn't as compelling as I thought it might be.

So Instead of shooting graff I played around with the tracks and the long shadows and the colors and lighting at pre-sunset. I love this time of day with the warm soft light and long shadows. It's hard to completely mess up a shot when the light so forgiving. Nature's candlelight, yes?

In this picture I was going for a peace sign shadow. Instead, it looks like I've been hung hanged from the neck until dead. Huh. (That's classic spaghetti western lingo, yo.)
Not what I intended, but interesting anyway!

I've been on a streak taking shadow pics when the opportunity arises. Maybe I'll have a series pulled together in a couple of years.
A few other shadow pics here.

photo wish

ride
Originally uploaded by JeanineAnderson

I like this picture a lot. It reflects her personality more than I think she intended.
I just wish my camera would do a decent depth of field. I have to put out some $$ to get it (which I'm trying to avoid atm).

Host girls in Japan: my most-viewed pic from trip

host girls: 21st century geishas
Originally uploaded by JeanineAnderson

This quick snap is of two "host girls" in the Shibuya neighborhood of Tokyo.
Host girls and host boys are frequently seen in the "entertainment" neighborhoods of Tokyo (and other major urban centers) in the late afternoon and early evenings. Girls are hurrying to their clubs jobs and boys are hanging out on street corners drumming up customers. Host boys and host girls earn their money by socializing, flattering, and developing emotional relationships with their regular customers. Modern day geisha.

A documentary on the sub-culture host industry, titled The Great Happiness Space: Tales of an Osaka Love Thief, was produced in 2007 and is available on Netflix. (Which I don't have, so someone get this movie and invite me over, please.)

Synchronicity project: city pic

synchronicity
Originally uploaded by JeanineAnderson

Here's what I was doing 1st January 2008 at midnight, Greenwich Mean Time. This pic was taken for the Synchronicity project.

It's a good bet that I'll peep this view a lot in 2008, so I'm happy I was in my neighborhood at the appointed time. I love, love, love living in the city. Yay!

click click click your camera

Is your dog/cat/partner/neighbor/child/parent/houseplant/roommate tired of getting their picture taken with your new camera? Two photography-related activies for January popped up this week.

Synchronicity: a project based on pictures taken at the same moment all around the world. Anyone can participate. Your photo must reflect what you were doing at the specified time. The next synchronicity moment is 1st January 00:00:00 Greenwich Mean Time (GMT). For Pacific time-zoners, that's 4:00 pm on 31st December. For other time-zoners, please check your local time compared to GMT. Have your camera ready!

Photogamer: a website-blog-flickr group-facebook group-twitter account which provides a weekly challenge to go out in the world and to fnd interesting photographs related to the challenge. As the name implies, the purpose is to have fun with your camera. After a couple of months' break, the photo games are back on. Bre, Hillary & Co have lined up a new challenge for every day in January. Sounds like the perfect winter muse to prevent a post-holiday coma.

Voyeuring colors

The images in Helga Steppan’s “Be long a part” photography show are not the result of camera filters or digital trickery. The photographer arranged her possessions into groupings by color, using classic still-life composition principles.

Results are quietly fascinating. I feel voyeuristic: it’s like peeking into closets and drawers and cupboards. She’s a smoker, she likes to wear blue, she owns a lot of masking tape. Then catholic-upbringing guilt made me stop snooping.

I like the concept employed here and am noodling how it might be extended. Perhaps items that start with the same letter? Colors work well for the visual medium, but letter groupings could be trickier. Would require more left-right brain coordination for the viewer, I think.

The show was held back in July 07 at the Man&Eve gallery in London, but you can check out the yellow, white, black, gray and other color compositions on Creative Review.