Frodo

Nothing to see here, I just need a place to store them pics at Mods don't delete this one, pleeeeease

Oh, not at all - it's free.

I posted it in the "noisy bar" but figured I may have a better chance here. Please check out this question.

Video. Does anyone know what the soundtrack's name is, or at least name of the DJ? There are no words, so no way to google it...

There aren't too many even primes out there. Congrats everybody! Out of curiosity, how many videographers were in the air with y'all?

Well I guess I should consider it sometime... What would I expect to spend on the developing equipment (ballpark? is it closer to $100 or $500?) But what I'm most interested in learning about is this: how to choose a scene that *should* be photographed in b&w? How to take a picture so that a viewer wouldn't go "This must be a color image. There was no reason to shoot it in black&white"?

N/A

That's a cool site. I, too, had this idea of getting on the airplane with a group of jumpers, to take pictures on the way up and during exits. I wonder if they'll let me do that in a 182? What would it cost me - $15-20? (only the slot, without jumping)

If any of you photograph in black&white, can you give me some starter tips? I recently caught this "photo bug", and want to really get the technique down - especially the photography of land/cityscapes, night/low-light, and some other stuff as well. One of the aspects that attracts me is b&w. (If you've never seen photographs by Ansel Adams, check them out - I absolutely love them, they're just something out of this world. Very inspring.) I'm not interested in developing and printing the pictures myself, at least not yet. Too much variables to deal with, starting from zero. What I wanted to get y'all's advice on are questions like: what is most important in composing a black-and-white image - lighting, contrast, etc.? Is a certain time of day preferrable? Landscapes-wise, what are some of the subjects that will look particularly interesting in b&w? What filters should I use? (I think the yellow is for greater contrast, but besides that I don't know the purpose of different filters.) It'd also be really great if you could post some of your work. (My camera is a used Minolta Maxxum XTsi, in very good condition. Zoom lens, 28-200mm. Very wide range of shutter speeds and apertures. Currently there's an ISO 400 b&w film in it.)

Oh, come on... They're not about diversity, or race, or political correctness - they're about kids n dogs. One is not *supposed* to look for political/racial undertones there! I don't know really, it was something that a friend of mine sent me a while ago.

Happy new year y'all! And I really mean it, I do wish every one of you a great 2004...I just feel that this year may very well be the best in my life. Anyway, I needed to share some of the positive energy, so there it is... Which one of these pics is the bestest-nicest-cutest of all?

OK, here's a follow-up: I bought a really cheap and heavy steel-frame full-suspension bike, rode it on a trail once (it was in Guadalupe River state park), and I'm about to return it to the store, because I can now afford to buy a decent one. I shopped around, and found a store with good bikes for $250-400. They are very light, aluminium frame, 24 speeds, with "rapid-fire" shifters, easy-release wheels, suspension has good travel and adjustable stiffness. The bikes (about 3-4 models that seem worth buying) feel really good overall. Only problem: they're all with 19 inch frames, and several guys at the store said someone of my size needs a 22 inch. I don't see a problem here, but thought maybe some of you experienced fellas might explain how important this is, and whether it should hold me from buying one of these bikes. Oh and they also say that I can only find a really worthy full-suspension bike for my size for $1000-1500 or more, but I don't have that much.

I heard this too, but when I watch the videos it seems more like 3-4 seconds. Check out for example this video, at 1:45. The guy "starts flying" (or so it looks to me) after 3 seconds.

In A.D. 2101... (when I first heard of the AYB thing, I saw another animation - with american soldiers in Afghanistan... I just can't find that one. But all the sounds were the same as here.) Here are some more T-shirts.

Dear Santa, You must be surprised that I'm writing to you today, the 26th of December. Well, I would very much like to clear up certain things that have occurred since the beginning of the month, when, filled with illusion, I wrote you my letter. I asked for a bicycle, an electric train set, a pair of roller blades, and a football uniform. I destroyed my brain studying the whole year. Not only was I the first in my class, but I had the best grades in the whole school. I'm not going to lie to you, there was no one in my entire neighborhood that behaved better than me, with my parents, my brothers, my friends, and with my neighbors. I would go on errands, and even help the elderly cross the street. There was virtually nothing within reach that I would not do for humanity. What balls do you have leaving me a fucking yo-yo, a stupid whistle and a pair of socks. What the fuck were you thinking, you fat son of a bitch, that you've taken me for a sucker the whole fucking year to come out with some shit like this under the tree. As if you hadn't fucked me enough, you gave that little faggot across the street so many toys that he can't even walk into his house. Please don't let me see you trying to fit your big fat ass down my chimney next year. I'll fuck you up. I'll throw rocks at those stupid reindeer and scare them away so you'll have to walk back to the fucking North Pole, just like what I have to do now since you didn't get me that fucking bike. FUCK YOU SANTA. Next year you'll find out how bad I can be, you FAT-SON-OF-A-BITCH. Sincerely, Little Johnny

quade started the thread i believe.... his version had better timing IMO.. And here it is!! I believe we have a winner; Congratulations Lawrocket! LMFAO This is so fuckin funny. No, I didn't know that joke. But I see now that it has to be really old and really popular to have an annual betting tradition dedicated to it!

Did you really have to say this? It was supposed to be a secret, noone should've known the connection...

Here's a couple of links with further info. (obviously there was much more to the whole thing than I mentioned). http://carolmoore.net/waco/waco-photos.html http://carolmoore.net/waco/waco-articles.html http://www.outpost-of-freedom.com/wacoind.htm http://www.cnn.com/US/9909/10/waco.evidence/ CNN's article mentiones the pyrotechnic shells used to pour some of the gas into the building. They may well have started the fire. Of course the FBI was also denying that it had used these. http://www.fbi.gov/libref/historic/history/historicdates.htm (Notice the much more important date of April 19, 1993, and the "massve suicide" of 80+ people is not mentioned.)

The 2+ hours long documentary was just shown on the True Stories channel. You can read the summary of the 51-day long standoff in the last part of the attached article (taken from Encarta encyclopedia). Briefly: the Branch Davidians is a religious sect that believes in apocalypse, end of the world and all that crap. By 1993 ATF (bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco and Firearms) suspected they had illegal weapons and wanted to search their HQ. But they got screwed and 4 agents were killed. Apparently this enraged ATF and FBI (which soon took over) and made them forget a lot of the values that they are supposed to protect, because for what happened during the next 51 days I see no sane explanation. Shots were fired by both the sect members and FBI (the latter is clearly visible on the images from an airborne infrared camera). Yet FBI kept saying that they had demonstrated "outstanding restraint" and did not fire a single shot at all! They made holes in the buildings with tanks, and they poured CS gas into the building. Why the fuck do that, you might ask? They said, to force people's instincts to get out of the building and surrender. Instead, later autopsies showed that many of the bodies had broken bones, which happens when cyanide causes muscles to contract violently. (from what I understood, cyanide forms when CS gas is set on fire... hmmm, it's not too surprising fire did start, considering all the gunfire, is it?!) The others either burned or were shot. The fire destroyed the whole building pretty damn soon (thanks to CS presence in large quantities). Of the many people who died there (including a lot of children who had nothing to do with the sect's beliefs!) 20+ died from gunshots. Given all this, what do we see in the end of the investigation? A U.S. senator telling us that nothing indicates that the fire was started because of FBI's actions, and that the death of 80 (?) people was a massive suicide. I mean, yes, they had illegal weapons, and they killed ATF agents, but look at the response... Yes the FBI were returning fire etc. etc., but look how unable they were to deal with a situation, and what a mess they made, how far from "civilized" the solution was. Outrageous, what else can I say. Destroys most of my beliefs in the System. Duh.

Google is my homepage as well. Very convenient to have a search engine on window opening, plus the page is almost empty - if I use any other page, it's very annoying to wait for it to load every time I open a new IE. Frequent: autoreview.ru (a russian site about cars); mappoint.msn.com comes in handy all the time.

Ditto. Sorry man How small is the log that you can put it into the washer and not see it? Recalling a few episodes from my "early childhood", I'd lost a few postage stamps from my collection (ok, from my "collection" ) in that fashion, but that was about it.

You're right in what you're saying, and yet I will tell you this: when I was making my 3rd or 4th jump, along came a company of guys n gals - to do tandem jumps. Well, yes I did laugh at one of them when he asked "So, what happens if the parachute doesn't open?" (In a 100% whuffo way - not anything close to "malfunction" - just the plain old general public "doesn't open" thing). And he was very much surprised when told that we even have a reserve. I mean WTF?!! He's about to risk his life jumping out of a plane, he's 10 minutes from boarding it, and has no freaking idea how it all works? He wasn't curious enough to look it up or ask before, and he doesn't seem too concerned now either. Hmm... (btw, I didn't, like, laugh my ass off, no. That certainly would be very rude, and I'm in no position to humiliate anyone at the DZ.) I see this often. For example, when we (astronomy students) go to an observatory, there is always a group of school kids or non-astronomy students to whom experienced people explain stuff about telescopes, stars, etc. etc. Well, now and then we see people that just don't give a damn. They laugh all the time, don't pay attention, don't take in any information, and generally don't care if they're at an observatory, museum, theatre or whatever. Bottomline is, I don't like this tourist attitude. "I'm paying money, entertain me". They have no appreciation for what they see or experience. That seems to include some tandem passengers. Hopefully, only a few.

Here's mine, being "born" (that is, assembled, formatted, etc.) about a year ago. Yep, but I'm more bored by all the moaning about reposts. (not meaning you, i'm just saying...)

OK, can someone clarify why do that? What if you get self-induced line-twists or something and have to cutaway - don't you get a risk of falling out during the reserve deployment?