I was thinking of writing a post on backups only last week when on Saturday the inevitable happened. I was locked out of all my websites (all are on one server) and unable to correct it. The sites were still live, so people could see my websites (the front end) but I was unable to login as an administrator at the back end to add posts and new content, or to delete and change any settings or files that may have caused the problem in the first place.
During the day and a half that my sites were affected and while I waited for the hosting company to figure out a solution (by now we realised it was on the server side), I decided to do some cleaning up of the server and a undertake a completely clean install of WordPress on my main website. Not just the WordPress files but the database too – everything. In for a penny, in for a pound I figured, so I erased all the files. All. Of. Them. And the database.
The good news was that I knew I had solid backups going back twelve months for everything; the database, plugins and themes etc. No way would I ever have contemplated doing any of this without knowing that they were there and, more importantly, that they would work. The bad news was that it took the best part of Sunday for me to go through the backups and upload only the most relevant files. Out with the cruft and in with the new. Now I’m all “Ooh, look, shiny!”.
The Dynamic Range, University of Minnesota installation.
I’ve just finished designing and building a long overdue website for Beth Dow.
This latest website is built on WordPress and is completely responsive on mobile phones and tablets. Reality check: iPhones and iPads. Andro-what?
What this all means is that you get to see a nice website on whatever it is you’re viewing it on and we get to easily update it with new projects and news when necessary. A win-win situation, right?
Back in London in the early 1980s when I opened my own lab I used a friend, who was a graphic designer, to design my letterhead and business cards. She insisted that I use Bush Hollyhead for the logo even though I didn’t really know anything about him or his work at the time, but I trusted her and think I paid him about £200 to design it.
L – R George Hardie, Bush Hollyhead and Malcolm Harrison
Since then I’ve discovered more about Bush and his career, despite him being quite elusive. His early days in the 1970s were at Nicholas Thirkell Design, which, with colleagues George Hardie and Malcolm Harrison, quickly became NTA Studios and was located in Charterhouse Square, where my friend worked.
During this time they were all working as freelance artists on jobs for the design group Hipgnosis; George Hardie creating Pink Floyd’s Dark Side of the Moon album cover and Bush Hollyhead designing the logo for Led Zeppelin!
Recently while going through some old boxes I found the original artwork and thought it would be fun to resurrect it for my website.
As an endnote, not long after the stationary had been printed I was approached by the Victoria and Albert Museum who asked for copies of each piece – business card, letterhead and compliment slip – for their archives.
I have a newly redesigned website that I’ve been working on for a couple of weeks now. There are still a few tweaks to be made – adding titles to the images is one – but for the best part it’s up and working as it should be.
I wanted to bring together a few aspects of my site that were scattered around before, because they used a mix of static HTML and WordPress – the weblog and the iPhone Photostream especially. So now the whole thing runs on a WordPress database, looks seamless in design and is easier to customise. One app to rule them all.
One of the concerns I had before was that it took time to create slideshows and/or put up new work. Using Lightroom helped, but because the site was primarily made up of static HTML pages it meant I couldn’t take advantage of certain WP plugins like Raygun‘s Portfolio Slideshow Pro. I love this plugin and I’ve been wanting to integrate into my site for a long time now. Momnt have now taken over the distribution for this and other Raygun plugins. So for now, creating slideshows is simple and quick, rather than a daunting task.
The other part I love is the iPhone Photostream, for want of a better name. I can take photos with my iPhone, edit them if necessary and then quickly and easily upload them on the go to Flickr. From there a plugin pulls them into my website automatically.
This iOS app from F295certainly sounds as if it could be the one. The estimated date of availability in the App store is May 15th.
Cameleon doesn’t want to be your novelty, toy camera app of the week, but is looking for a serious long term relationship. It doesn’t rely on kitsch filters or novelty toy lenses, film packs, or in-app purchases, but instead gives you an almost infinite amount of control over the picture’s most important parameters. We realize that one app can’t nor should do it all, so we concentrated on the important things:
1. #getitincamera Get the shot you want, with your distinct look, the first time, and eliminate nearly all routine post processing.
2. #nopostprocessing As much as possible eliminate those time consuming same steps often repeated over and over to give an image series your signature look.
3. The Digital Safety Net The ability to make a picture and change it as often as you want without losing data. For example, let’s say you snap it with your own tweaked and highly customized black and white, high contrast look, but later you think golly! I wish I would have made this in super saturated color! No problem! Go into the Cameleon editor and dial it up! Done! No more sacrificing.
4. #Onward The power is in your hands! Moving beyond toy lenses, film packs, and predefined unchangeable parameters.
5. Fast Cameleon is lightening fast. No delay or lag at start-up that causes you to miss the shot.
6. No in-App advertising We hate it, and suspect you do too.
7. No tracking of your information We don’t care where you were, where your going, or who your with. We only care about giving you the tools to make awesome photographs. Cameleon doesn’t harvest any of your personal data.
I was thinking of writing a post on backups only last week when on Saturday the inevitable happened. I was locked out of all my websites (all are on one server) and unable to correct it. The sites were still live, so people could see my websites (the front end) but I was unable to login as an administrator at the back end to add posts and new content, or to delete and change any settings or files that may have caused the problem in the first place.
L – R George Hardie, Bush Hollyhead and Malcolm Harrison
