Moms on the web - get social.

An absolutely first-rate list of mom-centric sites from Social Media Mom! Thanks! If I could add: Off-Ramps and On-Ramps for women on real-life career paths.

Should a Woman Dress Like a Man (in business)?

I was setting appointments for some professional business headshots (that also needed to look good for online biz profiles). Why do men hardly ever ask "what do you think I should wear to look 'business-y' in my picture"? And a surprising number of women do? A nice article and interesting comments on this over at "Women for Hire."

A great Idea for hanging pictures

As much as I love taking pictures - I hate hanging them up. Drywall and I have never gotten along well. I was getting ready to hang some very large framed pictures in my studio and came across Danny Lipford's blog on hanging pictures right.

I have a new answer. Monkey Hooks. They are cheap, work amazing, and you can find them on Amazon if they don't have them at your local Home Depot.

Animation approach

I have received some nice comments about the animation and functions on my site - we use Protoculous, a compressed version of Prototype and Script.aculo.us. Thanks James Geurt and Ajaxian for pointing to it and all the folks behind all the technology!

Making Cold And Wet And Foggy Look Good

Well, my Sony A700 came back from the shop just in time for this long stretch of cold, lousy weather. I wasn't going to let that stop me - but for some reason folks aren't very enthusiastic about outdoor shots in 40 degree mist and rain.

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Lucky for me, Kim had an open afternoon and off we went to East Downtown Austin. I think the weather made for a better B&W shot. Its a rare thing in Austin to need to bundle up like this, but it made for some really cool shots. I took quite a few around the murals and buildings - definitely a location for future sessions!

If you haven't had a chance, you should make a point to get over and see the beautiful murals. But its okay if you wait for it to warm up and dry out first.

Best PC For Digital Photography

Well, the cold and rain this morning has ruined my planned outdoor session. Catching up on my reading I noticed an article in CNET's Underexposed blog on Digital Photography called Poll: What's the best bang for my photo PC buck? caught my attention - since I am breaking in my new Dell I bought just before New Years specifically because I needed more processing power.

So if you want to upgrade to a new PC and you do a lot of digital photography - I really recommend this article. My hubby is the techie - and my eyes glazed over two minutes into his explanation of what we needed to buy. This article is a bit easier to understand - and it actually confirms he made a good choice when balancing cost and performance. I ended up with a dual-core processor PC from Dell and it blazes! A few more things to consider if you are getting a new PC and you do digital photography.

• The color management on Vista is still tripping people and software up. I had checked out my hubby's dual-boot Vista/Ubuntu screens and I didn't like what Vista did. It has to do with Vista not supporting ICC profiles - which I calibrate using third-party stuff because I am not a programmer and just want things to work. So I wanted my new PC to run XP! Dell was the only out-of-the-box solution. All my Adobe stuff works great!
• I wanted built-in drives for all my memory sticks (I use 4GB sticks). The Dell came with that, and after a bit of tech support (had to open the thing up and reset the plug) it is great! No more hunting for my USB stick drives!

Now if it will only stop raining and I can get to work!!

Vote for America's Cutest (Last Minute) Tax Deduction

One of my clients - and her photo - is on TurboTax's Cutest Tax Deduction site! Jillian Sage - who was a very cooperative baby model - is the one to vote for. Its a thrill to see my picture of her up on the site.

She was a brand-new baby when we did the shoot. I went on location to photograph her at her home, using a soft box and natural light for the series. Shooting in home can be a challenge, since the last thing new parents really should worry about is having the space I need to set up everything. In this case, it worked out pretty well - we had just enough space. Of course, with a model this cute it really was hard to take a bad photo.

So what are you waiting for? Help Jillian Sage get that title and the $5000 Savings Bond!

URL: http://www.cutesttaxdeduction.com/

The world's first photograph . . . is in Austin!

And has been for years. Amazing what you discover about whats in your own town. And here I was proud of finally getting to the farmer's market with my camera. Here in Austin you can go see the world's first photograph, made in 1826. Read more at the Harry Ransom Center's web site. Or even better - go see it!

SSSHHH, baby sleeping ~

Thank you to K&C for letting me snap some pictures of their cute little bundle of joy, Wesley! He may be tiny but he’s already full of personality and made it known to me, along with Mom & Dad, that he was in charge. These were a couple of moments when he finally slept…



I look forward to watching you grow Wesley.