Mr-F.org

Well today for the very first time I’ve experienced what a lot of other photographers seem to moan about on photography/modeling websites, the “no show”. I’ve been so luck up till now with never having experienced this particular issue that seems to plague others. What is even worse is that is was the model that contacted me just over a month ago because she like my work and wanted to work with me! We made all the basic arrangements back then and then at the beginning of last week I emailed to confirm that she was still going to come. After she confirmed I sent her full details of location, times, and other things that she might find useful including my phone number. So yesterday my wife and I went in and setup the studio (which always takes longer than you expect) so that I wouldn’t be rushing around this morning. I arrived this morning to do the last little bits such as position lights for the first idea, run power cables and so on, and then sat and waited for the model to arrive. The agreed start time came and no model. I waited ten minutes and nothing, no phone call, no text message, no email. So I sent her a text message just asking if she was still able to make today, not wanting to seem to over bearing or anything. Half an hour later, no reply so I decided to call it a day and started to pack everything up.

As you might guess I’m annoyed. Not only have I wasted time setting everything up for nothing, I also could have used the time to help a friend shoot a local musician that wants some images done.

It seems that now my time in the department is coming to an end I’m starting to notice more and more ways in which things could be improved. One thing that has shocked me over this weekend is the speed in which you can effectively collect data online. Now I know online studies in the student population are more effective. I’m guessing that it due to the fact that you can collect RPS credits whilst still laying in bed. However, I put a study online for a final year project student on Friday evening, and it’s already collected eighty eight participants. Now you may be thinking that eighty eight people really isn’t that many in approximately two days. Well you have to take into consideration the following:

• Many students are no longer need to collect credits, and in general they don’t participate in extra studies
• Most of the students are focusing on exam revisions (well at least that is what they tell us)
• For those students not revising, and not partying hard, they are focusing on writing up their project proposals/dissertations/essays
• Oh and it is a weekend of sun shine, need I say anymore

So to get this number of people, this quickly is pretty impressive. Considering the student in question only came to me a couple of weeks ago, and the deadline for the whole project is less than a month away, its rather lucky. However, I just wondering the number of other studies that we could possibly convert to run via the web, which would make it easier to collect larger amounts of information, or just run studies more quickly. Obviously there are some limitations such as experiments that require timing constraints, but, well there is plenty of scope for some of the studies that are conducted to be transferred.

Just a quick note to say congratulations to my dear friend Dr Mike, who has just secured a new job as a GP. Even better it’s back in Kent, closer to all of us that have missed him so much….YAY!

When I think of Mike as a doctor (even though it’s a fake ‘Dr’ *nudge, nudge, wink, wink*), is the 1998 film “Patch Adams” where Patch (Robin Williams) believes that the best cure is laughter. Knowing Mike and his wicked sense of humor, I’m sure all his patients are going to be in stitches of laughter. I just wish I could be one of the lucky ones that would have him as their doctor, but alas that will never happen.

Congratulations again, from both Mrs F and myself.

I think the title says it all, and I apologise for the rant but I need it.

Today Nick and I had arranged a shoot with a local musician who wanted some new shots done. On Wednesday I checked with the University staff that I could use the space, so that everything was above board, and with the yes from the person in charge of booking these spaces I thought we were all good to go for today. Since the term finished last Thursday, and it is also a bank holiday Monday, I thought it would a great day to have the shoot as there would be less people running around and starring.

Well, in theory this was all good, however upon arriving at the University today I found that the college where all my equipment is stored was shut, well more like locked down. There was no way in, even with my special “staff” swipe card. There was no warning or messages posted around the building as is the normal procedure when a building is going to be locked down like this, so I was a little annoyed. So I took a walk over to campus watch as before they have sorted problems like this out, and all I wanted was to get my equipment out. They however were taking a hard line and refused to open up anything for anyone. I even explained why I needed access and that it wouldn’t take me long to get the equipment out, but they still wouldn’t let me in. I know it’s not their fault but they clear realised that no-one had informed members of staff of this lock down as he indicated that they have already had to turn away loads of people. So completely out of luck and gloomy weather, which meant we couldn’t switch to shooting outside, Nick and I decided that it would be best to cancel the shoot for the time being.

I’m so annoyed right now, I mean how long would it have taken somebody to make a notice up and print them out, or heavens forbid using the email list for all staff across campus to inform them that they were locking down the colleges. GRRRRRRRRR.

Just a quick note to Nick over at The Godsell. Happy birthday from both Mrs-F and me.

Well I’ve been waiting to tell the world about this for a while, but needed to wait for one reason or another. However, I can now officially say that in approximately two months time I will leave the University of Kent to start a new job. I guess that most important part of this is that my new position is nothing to do with the University of Kent (or any other University)! I know shock horror, I won’t be at the University any more. Now I know that a couple of you thought that I’d be there until the day I retired, but I’m out baby! I’m finally leaving and heading on out to the real world.

I have to say that I’ve had some really great times during my stay at the University of Kent. I’ve had the pleasure of meeting some really wonderful and inspiring people, both students and staff. I have even had the luck to work with some of these people on some rather interesting and cool (in a geeky sense) projects, which have spanned multiple departments. However, it has come to that time when I just need to challenge myself in different ways. I need to stretch myself in new and different directions, so that I can develop and further realize my potential. All of which requires me to work with people that have different working methods, and people that will allow me to grow in these different ways which I wouldn’t have been able to do in my current role.

As you might have guessed, I’m a tad excited about the future and what this change in job holds, but will miss some of the people that I’m leaving behind.

This morning I tried to sign up for a yahoo and flickr account. I hate signing up for new things these days. All the common login names that I use are often taken and so it takes me forever to find something that a) I will remember, and b) I consider appropriate. So after spending what seemed like ages search through possible logins, I found one that would work. I enter in the rest of my details including another email address to validate it against. I thought I was on the home run and was following the instructions of validating my alternative email address. I clicked the link, and stared in confusion and disblief as this error message appeared.

Just to clarify, the values in the both black boxes, are the same. So yahoo is telling me that I’m logged into the wrong account to validate the address against (despite the fact that I have only one account with them). Then they tell me to that I need to log out of account X and sign into account X. Well this surely has to be a “confussed.com” moment if ever there was one.