Borderlands Books makes the AP Newswire

From the article:

SAN FRANCISCO - Former bodyguard Alan Beatts took a big gamble by opening a bookstore at a time when chains like Borders and Barnes & Noble and Internet merchants like Amazon.com were claiming an ever-bigger share of the market. So Beatts decided to carve out a niche by specializing in the science fiction and horror books he'd always loved. It was a smart move. A decade later, his Borderlands Books is thriving in San Francisco's funky Mission District. He sets up tables at horror and science conventions, and the genres' authors stop by for readings and book signings. Most importantly, nine out of 10 customers don't just stop in for a quick paperback. They keep coming back. "They are very appreciative" Beatts said of his passionate customer base. He estimates he's seen double-digit growth in each year since Borderlands opened. "There's an assumption that we have something in common which doesn't exist in the general interest stores."

Now, I'm actually a fan of Borders Books, but they also seriously depress me. When they came into town where I used to live, the best you could get was a Crown Books or B.Dalton Bookseller, both of which absolutely stink. But instead of killing off all the supid "I buy the important, topical ephemera-du-jour that make me look smart and sophisticated" and "yay for chick-lit! Melrose-Place means never having to think for myself!" bookstores, Borders and it's toxic cousin Barnes & Noble have been killing off all the really cool little independent bookstores instead. So now we've got a world with big soulless megastores where at least you can find Teilhard de-Chardin, and smaller franchise-shops not worth stepping into, but almost none of the high-touch places run by real booksellers (the kinds of people who can not only look at you and tell what kinds of books you like, but can also tell you seventeen other books you've never heard of by your favorite author's second cousin's wife's nephew's little brother and how those books fit into where the genre or sub-genre is heading, not to mention why they complement your favorite author's work so nicely). There's a reason that bookselling has always been the living example of oxymoronity: the prestigious minimum-wage job -- because it's important and can't be replaced by big chains (who seem to be strictly hiring bubblegum snapping teenagers who think they're "so above this" and can't wait until the get out of college so they can have "real jobs"). Perhaps genre-stores will be the last bastion that can remain sufficiently successful that booksellers won't go the way of the soda-jerk. I for one certainly hope so.

What the heck is this?

I was looking for some entrances to tantalizing backroads that I can see from I-280 near some really photo-worthy scenery, but couldn't figure out how access worked. I dialed up Google Maps, and found the above picture. Any brainiacs have any theory as to what kind of building keeps three white spheres on top? Any chances of getting shot if I drive by too slowly?

UPDATE: There is no LOS to this facility from any public road. The actual road up to it is "private, no tresspassing". It's in the middle of an "open space preserve" (CA has tons of them) -- it's definitely not a school. The picture now links to the google maps page; if you scroll around, you'll see a whole lotta roads that don't seem to go anywhere. If you go north, eventually you'll find this:

game pointers

On Photography

I've been thinking a lot about what the heck I'm doing with my photography lately. Someone I know thinks I should sell my stuff on his or her website, but I'm nowhere near ready yet. In the five years I've been shooting I've amassed maybe 12-18 "keepers", but have yet to take a picture I'd call a "show-er". Sometimes I rather despair that I'll ever take a picture of real merit. The other day though, my latest issue of LensWork came, and in it there was an editorial by some guy named Brooks Jensen:

We photograph nostalgia so that we can remember; abstracts so we can play with the patterns in our visual mind; flowers so we can marvel at the wonders of creation. These are worthy, soaring pursuits, even if our results remain grounded and somewhat pedestrian.

If I've ever given an "amen" in my life, that surely earned it!

The article came into my lap the same day I bought an adapter so I could mount my 4x5 camera onto my my tripod. Sadly, the little Bogen ball-head on my wooden tripod isn't up to holding a Cambo Legend, so I had to put it on my little aluminum Manfrotto tripod, which has a panning head that's just fine, but the tripod isn't up to the job. But I decided to risk it anyway, and went shooting on Sunday. As I shot, I was thinking the whole time about what makes a picture worth taking. Most of my friends think I'm a cracker-jack photographer, but I've done enough of my homework to know I'm only approaching basic competancy (not there yet). Like I said, no "show-ers" yet.

The first stage of competancy with a photograph is whether or not it is correct. Sadly, I am seeing more and more product photography in magazines where my first impression isn't the composition or the lighting, but "it's out of focus!" (I wonder if the trend towards digital has put more photogs onto auto-everything cameras that aren't so friendly to manual focussing as the older ones. Autofocus lenses have much shorter "throw" than traditional manual lenses, so getting critically sharp focus is often much harder with them.) To be considered correct, the photograph must be free from error. This means:

• Everything that's supposed to be in focus is in focus,
• The exposure must include everything in the frame (special effects like sunset silhouettes exempted),
• No branches sticking out of people's heads or other errors of composition.

This is a paltry list, though. Not so much something to aspire to as something to be ashamed of when it happens. If, as a snapshooter catching memories, one of these flaws surfaces, no biggie. But for an aspiring artist to commit one of these errors is to show that one simply wasn't paying attention to what one was doing. That'd be like a professional boxer not keeping his elbows down -- a neophyte like myself must suffer the inevitable uppercut, but the pro-boxer would deserve it.

But what then does a would-be artist aspire to when making photographs? So far as I can see, photographs worth taking accomplish one of the following:

1. Information -- The photograph informs us of something we should know, or reminds us of something that should not be forgotten. The classic photo of U.S. Marines raising the Stars and Bars over Mount Suribachi and that napalmed girl in Vietnam are two good examples. This is different than "archiving an experience" as I do snapshotting with my belt-camera.
   
2. Esthetics -- The photograph should produce a pleasing image, regardless of whether the photo has any figurative content. Still-lifes of flowers and most of Ansel Adams's landscapes fall into this category (sunset beaches generally do not -- a beautiful subject and a beautiful image are two different things).
3. Emotion -- The photograph brings about an emotional reaction in the viewer, be it awe, mystery, lust, chagrin or empathy, here the point is to be moved, to have some part of your being touched and shared through the silver halide.
   

My working hypothesis is that a nice photograph will succeed in one of these, a good photograph must succeed in at least two conditions, and that no great photograph fails to succeed in all criteria. Maybe I'll see things differently in another five years, but for now that's my $0.02 and I'm sticking with it.

Noam Chomsky & Howard Zinn's Tolkien Commentary

A charming diversion for Thursday morning:

McSweeney's Internet Tendency: Unused Audio Commentary By Howard Zinn & Noam Chomsky, Recorded Summer 2002, for The Fellowship of the Ring Platinum Series Extended Edition DVD, Part One

But put down your coffee first!