1.  I am moving hosting companies!  The timeouts here on the website have gotten pretty bad, and I hear you all loud and clear.  To those ends, the confidence in my current provider has waned pretty substantially to the point where I am laying the groundwork to leave for a VPS solution that can accommodate my budget.  So, the blogging may be spotty for the next couple days while I prep the behind-the-scenes stuff.

2.  I’m updating the photography website.  Yup, aside from the blog (which generates the greater of the traffic), I am also giving my photography website a serious makeover.  Truth be told, I’ve never really given it the attention it deserves, since most of my work has been through word-of-mouth, and not through my online presence (do as I say, not as I do!   )

3.  And last but not least, I am updating my portfolio.  We all have our favorite designed and layouts, so will be tinkering with a few to present on both the blog and the other domain.  But, since you all like pictures the best (at least Google Anayltics tells me that’s the case), here’s some selects from the latest upgrade to the portfolio:

And since any portfolio also needs a gallery to really give it the full semblence of appeal, here’s the entire collection assembled.  Ideas, thoughts, comments, suggestions and critiques, are always welcome!

Before I go, just two quick reminders for you today too:

1.  The Live Learning Lab Webinar is coming up this Wednesday – where Kerry Garrison and I will be tackling the topic of “Mastering Exposure”.  All about the essentials of getting your exposure spot on each and every time.  Tag a reminder to join us now, and we’ll see you Wednesday!  http://tinyurl.com/6aexmnm

2.  Nations Photo Lab is also in the final two weeks of their scorching hot Sizzling Summer Super Size Sal (say that 10x fast)!  Get 50% off all enlargements up to 16×20.  And if you don’t have an account, open one and use promo code “Jason” to get $50 free in prints when you sign up!  Can’t beat that pricing, eh?

3.  We’re also in the final two weeks of the monthly Flickr Contest – submit your own photo to win a free StreetWalker Pro bag courtesy of yours truly and Think Tank Photo!  Click the link in the upper right corner of the blog to submit your best “Street” themed photo before it’s too late!

This week is shaping up to be an exciting one here at CB/LDP.  Here’s what’s in store for the upcoming week, both on the blog, and for the podcast:

1. Hardware Review
2. Software Review
3. Podcast Publication
4. Comment Giveaway for Scott Kelby Digital Photography Book, Vol. 3

So, with four days of the week already accounted for, what the heck am I doing on here talking about it rather than doing it?  Well, if you are reading this via feed, then get yerself on over to the blog, because something should look drastically different to you!  That’s right, the blog has gone through a major update in layout and design change.  As you can see, the upper right has a rotating gallery of images, so each time you come back, you will see a new image featured in your browser.  You will also notice the headline looks a lot cleaner with tabbed links to major sources of content, including an About Page, a Flickr Page (for contest news and such), and soon to come is the Digital Photography page.  A slight shift in layout is taking place there in development mode and will roll out soon with dedicated galleries, client contact forms, and bunches of other stuff.  I will also be incorporating a podcast link across the header so you can get your latest fix of podcast news from there as well.

I know, it’s a lot to take in, but I seriously would like some feedback.  Is there anything substantial missing that you used to like or enjoy?  What about stuff you would like to see (excluding the teaser info above about what’s forthcoming)?  Is it too empty?  Need more color?  I am trying to take advantage of the appeal of “negative space”, but at the same time, don’t want it to be too boring.  What would you (the readership) like to see?  Sound off in the comments, and who knows what may come of it!

Here’s a sample view for the feed readers to entice you to seriously stop in for a critique-style visit to the blog:

With the blog updates nearly complete, and the schedule kind of “leaked” a little early for the week, I’ll leave you in the dark as to when each item will come out, so just keep on stopping in for your daily fix.  In the meantime, keep on shooting and we’ll see you back here tomorrow for…well, you’ll have to stop in to see, won’t ya?

Don’t forget the Flickr contest now underway…it’s linked in the header (remember that?) navigation, but here’s a quick link for the less adventerous:  November Contest

1st – The How-to’s of Website design: I did take a leave of absence on this primarily because there is an area that I am not as fluent on that I was hoping to find some help in the form of a second contributing author, and that has not come to fruition yet. So, if anyone is interested in co-authoring a book on the subject, feel free to let me know!

2nd – The Online Photography Test: The Basic test is complete, and the Advanced test is about 90% complete. I’d like to get some ideas and more feedback before taking that phase to completion, so again, if anyone has some suggestions on good questions for an advanced online photography test, I am all virtual ears! As for the Expert Test – I am nowhere near getting ready to even put that one out there. I am of the old school variety in that I don’t think it’s right for someone to pose a question for others to answer if they cannot provide some basis of an answer themselves. (The idea is that how can one teach or offer knowledge if one does not have that knowledge themselves.) Although higher education and high schools are rife with examples of this – I, in good conscience, cannot pretend to be an expert when I have so much more to learn on the subject of photography.

3rd – The Weekly “What’s This?” series saw an abrupt halt a few weeks ago, and I never came forth with the answer. The last shot was this:

What’s This?

And the answer is: the grill from the front of our microwave. Unfortunately, we are no longer in the house, so I can’t capture a full version of the appliance to show you a zoomed out perspective. But anyway, thanks for those that waited patiently to discover the answer. I should have a new “What’s This?” back up and running tomorrow.

Finally, as I endeavor to get back into a steady routine of tutorials and regular writings, I have a video tutorial put together for this week. Since I did get a few questions from people who asked if I could show the method for achieving a panorama rather than just writing the methodology out, here is the “outtro” for how to post process a series into panoramas. Since the podpress plugin is still misbehaving, I’ tried an alternative means for feeding things for the time being, but that doesn’t seem to work either.  So, I am going to have to go another week with a link to both the Flash and the Quicktime!  Sorry again for the continued inconvenience.

I’m not adjusting the iTunes feed just yet as I have confidence that the podpress developer will have an update coming sooner rather than later, but if people wish to add the secondary feed to their readers, that will be in play until the original feed comes back online. I am posting it to the podpress feed link too though as a test to see if it comes back online, so if you subscribe to the original feed and it shows up, let me know. Otherwise, continue to visit the blog (which is preferable anyway) to catch the flash version. Hope you all enjoy it!

I’ll be back tomorrow with a Wednesday Walk around the Web, and a new installment of “What’s This?”! Until then, happy shooting, and watch those apertures!