Photo Contest @ MindSay

I had followed a link in another mindsayers post many months ago and entered an on-line photo contest at

www.photo.com  .  Then I promptly forgot about it - it was a monthly contest and obviously I didn't get a notification so didn't get selected for my photo of a windmill in Texas :

>

 

So today, imagine my surprise when I thought I had received an early Christmas gift! 

A notification letter in the U.S. mail from the  International Library of Photography ( aka photo dot com )saying my pic had been chosen for publication!!

It included a form to give them permission to publish, a promise of a copywrite notice to accompiany the picture, a sample of my photo, right there in the letter, wow!  And the proposed name of the book of photos that was to be published in early 2008. 

And that's not all!  They listed the library of congress serial number for the book!  AND told me I was still eligible to be selected from those in the book, for a prize ranging from a modest $25 medallion, to the $1,000 first place!

But wait!  There's more!  For a low, low, price, I could pen my own 'photographer's bio' to be published with my winning entry!  And if all that isn't enough, I have first shot at buying the book at a low, low, pre-publication rate of ONLY $70 !!!

 

MY GOD!!  (how expensive is that book gonna be if that's the discount price?)

 

But don't worry, they said, "BRUCE, you don't have to buy the book, your photo has already been selected for publication".

 

So, looking outdoors to my pickup truck, I clearly see it is NOT full of turnips, thus I couldn't have just fallen off it, and I googled. 

 *did you ever notice that without the ogle, googled spells GOD?* 

I digress.

 

This outfit has been running this scam legally since 1999! 

http://www.betterphoto.com/forms/QnAdetail.asp?threadID=12825 

http://www.acecam.com/photography/11077.html

They apparently manage to repay disgruntled ripped off customers so the multitude of Better Business Bureau complaints against the Owings Mills, Maryland company must get recorded as settled.  But think of the millions they must get every year from people falling for this overt expensive form of vanity publishing.  Oh yes, they do occasionally publish a book, and some people in various forums say they have received it, and it does contain their photo.  But people, SEVENTY DOLLARS?????   To get ONE picture published??????

You know, if this company was legit, they could actually make a decent living by being honest, soliciting photos, and publishing them in book form with the pre-order payment of the contributors.  They could sell it to them at cost and then maybe even sell it on-line as a product with NO complaints against it that would encourage more photog wannabes to get in on the next publications.

In my letter, they call it Endless Journeys - the title they used according to some people who complained way back in 2003 !  They also use the same ISBN # 0-7591-5247-7 that they have used for years and years (it is different from the books that they really have published).

 

One response to the HUNDREDS of on-line complaints suggest going to Kodak.com and arranging to publish your OWN book of photos.  I haven't researched that yet, but really, wouldn't THAT be worth a hundred bucks?  To have a coffee table book filled with nothing but your OWN great photos?  Look into it, and please, please, please, don't fall for this photo.com scam.

 

OK, I looked into it for you (your welcome).  Kodak photobooks two styles, one $30 one $70 - the Legacy is the more expensive, 12" x 14" hardbound with a leather cover, 10 single print pages, or 20 double sided pages (40 pictures!) , that can be increased up to 40 single side, or 80 double side (uncertain of the costs of the larger page counts).  And right now?  Offering 20% off AND free shipping!

http://www.kodakgallery.com/PhotoBookOverview.jsp 

 

But I guess as long as photo.com can trick people into throwing money away on a product that may never even be published, they will continue to do so.

 

 

From where I live the hiway into town has some of the few remaining giant billboards. One in particular remains neglected for extended periods between being changed. That, basically, is the billboard you see above. The ocean is a stock photo. Between Photoshop and Paintshop X an hour and a half of manipulation and detail work I ended up with this.

 

What does is mean? It means: Mindsay, blog, blog, blog! You would have to view the high-res version to see the details of the neighborhood of homes behind the "blog, blog, blog" on the billboard... implying a neighborhood of bloggers. Anyway, I guess the sky is the limit, every blog is large, out there, and soon to change... hence the peeling and fading words on the upper part.

 

I start my day of with a healthy dose of Mindsay, and if that isn't corny then I don't know what is.

 

The picture is so small for some reason. Hold on... okay photobucket is being weird, so that one might be slightly distorted.

 

 

http://img.photobucket.com/albums/v299/emptygrrl/bonappetit001.jpg  <--- same thing, not distorted.

 

By the way, here's the recipe:

 

Sandwich:

2 slices of generic white bread.

1 tbsp of peanut butter

1 tbsp of jelly (I prefer grape, but this is strawberry)

A handful of raisins

A handful of walnuts

 

Dipping sauce:

1 cup of marshmallow topping

1 chocolate bar (styled as the Mindsay pacman-guy)

1 tsp of red sparkley sprinkles.

 

Garnish:

The last strawberry in the container

8 pieces of wilting lettuce

Spoon, fork, and knife

(I don't even use utensils, they're just cliche"

 

Beverage:

Now, that would appear to be orange juice,

but it's actually generic Crystal Lite, called

"Orange Early Rise."

 

Cas knows best when it comes to saving.

 

Enjoy!

MindSay's creators are hosting a photo contest which deadlines this weekend. I wasn't going to participate until I had an idea. Once I had one, I hunkered down and got it snapped.

The eye is Byzantium's eye. I took the logo which can be found as a header on multiple internal pages from the MindSay site, opened it in Photoshop, used the magic wand tool to capture the individual letters, copied and pasted them onto a white background and increased the size until the whole screen was taken up by the MindSay logo. I flipped it horizontally so that the reflection of the logo in the eye would be read correctly.

I set up the laptop on the coffee table in our darkened living room. Just above the screen I set up my camera to take a shot, using a remote shutter release and a tripod. My model, my sister, leaned in as close as she could to both the laptop screen and the camera's lens. The toughest part for me was to focus on the reflection in the eye and not on the eye itself. The toughest part for my model was to hold still and to hold her eye open wider than she was accustomed.

Once I snapped about 15 pictures (Byzantium was kind enough to take a few of me in the same pose), I downloaded the images onto my laptop, took them into Photoshop to see which ones I would/could use. Narrowed it down and began to process them. Auto level, some gaussian blurring, increasing the contrast and brightness, cloning out some redness and voila: it was finished.

I'm sure there are a ton of very cool entries to come out of this contest, one of which my sister Foreverknight created. I can't wait to see what others do. For me, I'm really please with how my shot turned out. For more detail, you can see in the smaller picture a close-up of the gorgeous iris and logo.