Notices by My camera shoots fascists (mikal@sfba.social), page 2

First art fair! Quite convenient because it cost five dollars and it was a whole two blocks from my house. It was a good low stakes trial run. I bought the beige Pro Panels (wish I could've found black) used on craigslist, bought a new pop-up canopy and brought the photos I'd already had printed – mostly lightning/storm photos. I even sold one. It's kind of fun to think of my work hanging up on someone else's walls and them enjoying it.

I've got a list of improvements to make, but I'm comfortable enough now that I'm going to start applying to more high-end shows. I'll need to do a few of those to see if the art fair route is going to be a viable avenue for selling photos.

On my #BorderWall photo trip in the San Rafael valley two days ago, I got a couple bonus lightning bolt shots. This is the best of them.

#Border #immigration #StormChasing #lightning #LandscapePhotography

Earlier in the day, 180° from the OP lightning bolt above, is this tree and a gap in the new border wall. I've been to this silly tree three times now trying to get the right shot of it. It's hard because most of the day the sun is straight behind it/overhead. By the time the light is better, the sun is setting behind the ridge.

Anyway, tree and stupid #BorderWall San Rafael Valley, Arizona.

#LandscapePhotography #border #immigration

My #SuperbOwl contribution. This burrow owl near Salton Sea is not amused.

I shot this years ago, one of dozens. It's still my favorite of the set.

#superbOwls

Another photographer and I went out today to survey the damage and document what we saw. I particularly like the composition provided by this ancient juniper tree and the gap in the fence. This is a phone snap, but I shot a lot of this tree with my big camera.

#Border #BorderWall #FuckTheWall #AllWallsFall

27 miles of new border fence being built across Arizona's San Rafael Valley, west of Coronado National Memorial. They are working at a frenetic pace. Strangely, this is being kept fairly quiet instead of the administration trumpeting it to the press like they did the first time.

#Border #BorderWall #immigration

@Oma_Trisha_F @steter @shansterable @grammargirl

Well, while we're at it: if you ever have to look at the writing on the side of your vehicle's tires, which numbers do you need to look at? The brand name? Nope. The radius diameter and other technical info? Nope. But all of that is inbig readable font.

The number you might have to look at regularly?? The PSI/load range. And how is that written? Tiny little embossed font, so zero contrast and requiring reading glasses to comprehend.

There is a very special hell for people who design or approve bad UI/UX. Very special.

I don't recall who recommended it, but "Listers" is hilarious. It's a documentary about extreme birdwatching, with lots of great bird photography to boot.

#Birds #Birdwatching

@Em0nM4stodon

When my business opens in the spring, we will have a separate sign next to our usual photo policy sign explicitly banning those glasses, whether they are on or off. And if they are someone's only prescription glasses, all the better. We don't need their business and it will send a message that they should've thought about this beforehand.

We need to make these things marks of shame and the people who wear them pariahs.

A while back I noted here that someone had deposited $0.01 in my PayPal account and I was wondering what sort of scam it might be part of. I reported it and PayPal said they found nothing untoward.

Now PayPal has locked my account due to suspicious activity. 🤦♂️
They wanted to know what I'd shipped or sold last month (nothing, which I explained) and then demanded I upload a scan of some form of government ID.

No.

Luckily, I've learned through others' experience to never leave money there, so I can happily just close my account with no loss (except the $0.01!).

#FuckPayPal

Also, here's a very cool saguaro. I might start photographing all the weirdest ones I see and create a little gallery on my website.

#SonoranDesert #Saguaro #SillySaguaros

Did another water drop today, this one over 10 miles round-trip. This one had shown no use since it was last stocked. We split into two groups and the other group checked a drop up a different canyon that seems like it had a little bit of use, but not much. Nearby is yet another drop that has in fact been getting regular use. There are hundreds of combinations of routes through the mountains and the ones people use change, often without rhyme or reason, so we try to check all of them regularly.

#HumanitarianAid #DesertAid #Migration

Everyone's talking about that turd-cam thing, but I haven't seen anyone mentioning Ondi Timoner's 2009 documentary "We Live In Public."

2009.

The live-in, underground performance space with cameras and microphones everywhere, broadcasting everything to everyone, also had a… you guessed it, turd cam.

The whole experiment and the thought behind it was quite amazing and it's an excellently made documentary. I saw it when it premiered at Sundance, but then it seems like it disappeared off the radar. Highly recommended if you can find a place to stream it. Here's the Wikipedia link:

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/We_Live_in_Public

#TurdCam #Documentary #WeLiveInPublic

@tomjennings

You didn't. Omg.

But if you did, why aren't you a zillionaire by now?

Another one bites the enshittification dust. Topaz Labs photo editing apps have no gone to a subscription model and done so in a not particularly transparent way, at least for those of us who already owned their older apps. I bought Video AI and Photo AI a year ago,, but didn't realize that apparently Photo AI is a subscription that seems to have now turned into Topaz Photos and is $400/year. Uh, no thanks.

I'm going back and forth with their customer support, asking for clarification, since what changed and when is anything but clear.

All I know is I got a 3-day renewal notice for $400 (but with some random large discount to soften the sticker shock). Had this happened last week, when I was AFK in Mexico, I would've been charged and had to fight it. 3 days notice after transitioning to a new subscription model seems not just sneaky, but manipulative.

#enshittifcation #Topaz_photo_ai #TopazLabs

@ewen

I suppose if someone just now finds their product and already assumes everything will be a subscription model, it might seem normal. But for those of us who appreciated the one-time payment and light-touch machine learning models of their previous apps, it really sucks.

if you are in central or southern Arizona, there is a rally tomorrow from noon to four in the San Rafael Valley opposing border wall construction there.

Scroll down on this page to "rally for the valley". There is a link to Instagram for location details.

This is the same area where the ridiculous shipping container wall was built and then torn down a couple years ago. It's an important resistance opportunity, if you're looking for some way to get active.

https://borderwallresistance.com/?page_id=1178

Please for the love of fuck, do not under any circumstances give a surveillance app access to your address book/contacts. You are snitching out all of our personal information that we trusted you with.

Why am I reminded of this once again? Because I went on FB for one of the few groups that's only there and noticed the People You May Know had a suggestion for someone I went on two dates with a couple years ago. There is no other way they could've made that connection unless she granted access to their app.

I think from now on, I'm only going to give date matches my Signal username. If they don't or won't use Signal, we're probably not a match anyway. Or maybe I'll just get an anonymous virtual SIM for things like that.

#security #privacy #infosec

I'm guessing the first frog-suit guy had no idea the image of him standing there in front of the cops would become so viral and emblematic of resistance.

Also, massive respect 🫡

On the fediverse, posts rarely go viral. But at times, they will go "fungal", like mycelium quietly working its way through the substrate, popping up again like mushrooms every few months to make another quick round before going dormant again.