Memory: Across Three Generations

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Here is a bit more Animoto animation, created the same night as the video of my two nieces. This one showcases three generations of my family, beginning with my mother's youth and continuing on chronologically to a picture of a toddler Chelsea. I was actually a little surprised when I watched it as one picture I thought I had included did not appear. Wow, is there a big chronological jump before that last picture! I had meant to include a family portrait taken when my brother and I were in our early 20's. Ah, well!

Reflection: Chelsea's and Callee's Video

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A video featuring my little nieces. Several of the shots were taken by me on Easter. There are a few from Christmases gone by.

Reflection: Farmers Market Scenes

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I tried out the Animoto 'air' template on this one, though I think I prefer using the traditional (or nontraditional as it were) Animoto template. A majority of the pictures here were taken in or near the U-District Farmers Market; a couple were taken in or near the Capitol Hill Farmers Market. There is, however, one major 'imposter', a themed picture far removed in space and time. It's not the cat -- that very sociable feline greeted me a couple blocks from the Capitol Hill Farmers Market and would have been happy to let me take a whole roll of pictures of it, had I been so inclined.

There is a "Summer Sunshine" contest on Squidoo -- create a page and set the royalties 100% to charity. Every weekday during the summer, they're picking a winner -- $99 bonus to the charity, $99 to the writer of the page. I haven't put a page up yet, but I'm planning to showcase the Seattle Farmers Markets, and set the royalties to a microenterprise or hunger charity.

The song for this little farmers market musical slideshow is "(Love is) Better Than Money". Ironic choice, or not so much? I dunno. I had actually selected the song for my farmers market slides a long time ago, but I had to get some "fairer month" photos before I put it up. I'm not sure which month the U-District Farmers market sign photos were taken, but the other farmer market photos represent December to May. So... now I'll probably get the page up by the weekend.

Memory: Mauicat Tribute 2

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Here's a second little Mauicat Tribute video, which includes a couple photos that were brought back to Seattle from my brother's house just recently. I'll add this video to Maui's Squidoo page later. The Animoto music library includes two songs by the artist, Angie Arnesault -- I used one for the first Maui video, and planned all along to use the other for the second. (I've used other artists from their library for my Seattle videos.) Sometimes the job Animoto does with what I upload and select is... just stunning. The Animoto shorts are free, but if one has enough themed photos for a full length song, it is surely worth the $3. (Of course there are also more expensive memberships for artists and others who want to use Animoto to promote their business.) One almost has to make some things free to compete on the internet -- but I would like to give Animoto a bit of support. They've done beautifully with my kitty pictures here.

Now I want to say something about that lovely kitty cat who died last June. You know, when he was six or seven, vets first started finding abnormalities in his X-rays and in his lab work; the results were conflicting, and they waffled what system was implicated, and whether anything was seriously wrong or it was more of an anomaly. He seemed very healthy then, and I know there were people who thought I was overanxious and/or that the vets were just after my money. Ah, but, I didn't think that kitty was going to die immediately -- I just feared he wasn't going to get as far as the average cat. He didn't. The life expectancy for an indoor-only cat is about 16; he made it to just 13. There surely are times I've felt guilty, but I know he reached double the age that he was when they first discovered things that were 'out of range' his heart size, his creatine and calcium levels.

Now I hope I didn't detract from this lovely little video by including those comments in the same post.

Reflection: February Blossoms

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The theme that I've been writing about lately... Ah, I'll be back to it soon. But first here's this Animoto short: February Blossoms. (Realize these photos were taken all across the month of February -- we're way past some of what you see pictured here.)

I think I'm ready now to put "Step Into Seattle: Spring" on Squidoo. As my first year in Seattle drew to a close (long ago) I wrote a poem which included the line "the order in which pink things blossom". I think "the order in which pink things blossom" is a pretty good thing to showcase on Squidoo... especially for a person who it behooves to get quite a lot written and posted. Barring trauma/bad news, it looks like I likely will make the spring (March 31) deadline to have my lenses reviewed for 'Giant Squid' status. The requirement is 50 high quality lenses; I'm at 37 now.

Reflection: Seattle Scenes

When I made my first little Animoto video of Seattle scenes (Trying to Set a City to Music), I was a little disconcerted by the particular lyric where my "Don't cross here" sign put in its appearance. Later, I decided it was funny. I've got another little Animoto short, with several "signs of Seattle". When I came across this particular song clip on the Animoto site, I thought it would be a nice accompaniment for Seattle signs. The twin "Use Crosswalk" signs appear a picture or two before they ideally should, so the joke isn't quite so apparent as it might be, but this Animoto short still very much appeals to odd little me. I added it to my "Step Into Seattle" page on Squidoo.

One (more)thing I like about putting things on that site: They do reward you for updating your pages regularly. As a person who has trouble resisting the impulse to go back and edit even their blog entries -- I try to keep that to a minimum --republishing pages is rather up my alley. I made a joke in an earlier post about how the Seattle lens had debuted a number 800-and-something thousand on Squidoo, but had ambitions. A couple days ago, it was closer to number 3,000 (#22 in 'local'). Those pages can flunctuate quite a bit according to various things.

Reflection: A Blue Light Off Ravenna Creek

My blog's wearing a new header, and for the first time, the header is made from a picture that I took myself. I was out last weekend taking pictures to illustrate various projects. I knew there was a brilliant light reflected off Ravenna Creek; I was surprised, though, when I scanned, how very blue the one picture looked -- and how well the tones matched the blog's color scheme. The cover picture on this 'Animoto short' is made from the same picture as the header. All the pictures in this bitty video are of Ravenna Creek -- two taken a few years back, the rest just the other day -- and they're paired with a song clip I very much like.

I've been doing a lot of off-site writing: Expect links links within a day or two... to some writing that means a lot to me, and that I really want to share.

Memory: Snow in Ravenna Creek Ravine

These snow scenes were taken in previous years -- though something gloppy did fall on me the other day. (Whatever it was, it became quite wet when it hit the sidewalk.) I have a couple versions, set to different snippets of music, and I'm not sure which I prefer. I did figure out how to add these little pieces to my Squisoo pages -- there are a couple extra steps to complete. I think I also know how to add musical slideshows to Blogger as widgets on the sidebar... though my teaching blog actually made a snide remark the other day about this blog's attire. "Just because you own it," it cautioned, "it doesn't mean you need to wear it all at once."

Reflection: Trying to Set a City to Music

This little clip was not included in my Seattle Squidoo Page(though eventually I will put one in). I selected a song clip that I thought was appropriate for a piece about a place, though the line "Time and time again, I've watched you sleep," did give me slight pause. It gave me more pause when... well, I'd included, amidst the nature photos, a picture of 45th Ave, with Seattle's Best Coffee in the background and a "Don't Cross Here: Use Crosswalk" sign in the foreground. On the line, "I've watched you sleep," what do you know, that picture appeared, and I won't go so far as to say that the sign got up in my face, but it did move forward a bit.

This is how the program works: I put the photos in order, and, after analyzing the pictures and audio, Animoto does the animations and transitions. Our combined artistry was lower on this piece, but I'm fond of listening to it, nonetheless. I may have enough photos of Ravenna Park in the snow to do that as its own 30 second video. Theoretically, I can put it onto Squidoo.